-----------VISUAL

2012-01-28T23:53:00.001-05:00

“Love is that condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own.” Robert Heinlein

Photography

2012-01-06T18:54:00.001-05:00

Will Smith photographed by Annie Leibovitz for Vanity Fair, July 1999

I had the privilege of working with Will Smith on the set of Men in Black 3 for two weeks last year; I believe this image captures his spirit very well.

Ryan McGinley

2012-01-06T18:41:00.003-05:00

The Eternal and Youthful world of Ryan McGinley

Effectiveness over happiness ?

2011-12-26T17:44:00.002-05:00

In The Moral Animal, Robert Wright writes: "We are built to be effective animals, not happy ones. (of course, we're designed to pursue happiness; and the attainment of Darwinian goals -- sex, status, and so on - often brings happiness, at least for a while.) Still, the frequent absence of happiness is what keeps us pursuing it, and thus makes us productive."

In the new year

2011-12-22T22:09:00.003-05:00

Be curious

Do not give up easily

Do not lie to yourself

Be discrete

Take care of your body

Cry if it makes you feel better

Be sincere

Do not underestimate others

Do not underestimate yourself

Have high expectations

Be loyal

Help people

Do not ask for much

Love a lot

Be rational

Do not disrespect your partner

Do not imitate others

Do your very best

Be sympathetic

2011-12-12T21:10:00.000-05:00

Whether you want a romance or a tragedy, it depends on where you cut the film.

White

2011-12-08T15:57:00.001-05:00

Fiber Futures – tradition and modernity

2011-12-06T15:57:00.004-05:00

The extraordinary exhibition “Fiber Futures: Japan’s Textile Pioneers,” currently on display at the Gallery of the Japan Society features thirty contemporary Japanese artists who use various materials raging from cotton, antique paper scraps, flax, jute, ethereal silk and hemp to paper pulp and synthetic fiber to created innovative works of art.Though methods that are sometime deeply traditional Japanese, or though the latest weaving and dyeing technologies, these celebrated artists transform simple fabrics into three dimensional objects or abstract wall pictures. The works exhibited can be described as a combination of cutting age fashion, fine art, avant-garde design with the latest technology. My favorite was Machiko Agano's A wood III. One can walk freely through the entire room and see their reflection in the printed mirror sheets from which the object is made.This particular experience reminded me of Yoko Ono’s "Ceiling Painting" exhibited in 1966. In the “Ceiling Painting” the viewers had to climb up a ladder in the center of the exhibition, from where a magnifying glass hanging from the ceiling allowed them to view the word "YES". Therefore, in order to fully understand the work, the viewer’s needs to take a challenge. Similarly, I found myself in the Fiber Futures exhibit standing in front of the second room, ambivalent about stepping in. I was questioning myself: Am I allowed to get this close to a precious art object? Eventually I stepped into the room, and I’ve seen my reflection and the object up-close. And it was a liberating experience indeed, similar to the experience described by some of the viewers of “Ceiling painting” –including John Lennon.

Walk in Manhattan

2011-12-06T11:12:00.002-05:00

Nichita Stanescu

2011-11-30T17:20:00.001-05:00

Then we met more often.
I stood at one side of the hour,
you at the other,
like two handles of an amphora.
Only the words flew between us,
back and forth.
You could almost see their swirling,
and suddenly,
I would lower a knee,
and touch my elbow to the ground
to look at the grass, bent
by the falling of some word,
as though by the paw of a lion in flight.
The words spun between us,
back and forth,
and the more I loved you, the more
they continued, this whirl almost seen,
the structure of matter, the beginnings of things.

Search

2011-11-27T20:36:00.004-05:00

We search our entire lives and we never seem to be complete. We digest love stories, people, adventure, jobs, and then we leave everything behind; and we keep on searching for more...for better. We get tired and frustrated, but we never stop. We can't stop, because we are afraid of being alone, unhappy or unaccomplished. We are all others' options, and part of mind games that we are not even aware of. We compete with others that we don't even know of. I'm sometimes wonder how many of us settle for less, and they give up their life dreams, and aspirations simply because they are so tired.

2011-11-22T16:35:00.001-05:00

This photo screams "freedom"

2011-11-21T19:36:00.002-05:00

Tracey Emin - One of my favorite British contemporary artists...and ugh there are many phenomenal ones.

2011-11-19T22:35:00.003-05:00

We discovered each other thirsty for love, and hungry for flesh.

You bit me, I burnt you!

Love cut through my skin, and never left my body.

Love is a war of bodies and souls.

And we had to fight so many battles…

We could not achieve peace;

but we achieved days of happiness and moments of ecstasy.

We trembled, we yelled, we cried and we loved!

We have wounds and we have memories.

MM

2011-11-19T20:16:00.002-05:00

Marilyn Monroe, ca. 1960, by Weegee. The photographer used an elastic lens
to capture the distorted portraits of the star.
©WEEGEE/INTERNATIONAL CENTER OF PHOTOGRAPHY/GETTY

Maurizio Cattelan at Guggenheim

2011-11-19T16:03:00.002-05:00

The provocative, satirical artist Maurizio Cattelan has some of his controversial pieces on display at the Guggenheim museum. Cattelan's works are perhaps the most unforgettable images in contemporary art; firstly, for their frightening hyperrealistic quality, and secondly for being shocking critiques of today’s society. Cattelan is an artist who is not afraid to expose though humor the "Don't-s" of religion, politics or culture.

2011-11-19T15:58:00.003-05:00

War Is A Racket

By Major General Smedley Butler

WAR is a racket. It always has been.

It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives.

A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of the people. Only a small "inside" group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few, at the expense of the very many. Out of war a few people make huge fortunes.

In the World War [I] a mere handful garnered the profits of the conflict. At least 21,000 new millionaires and billionaires were made in the United States during the World War. That many admitted their huge blood gains in their income tax returns. How many other war millionaires falsified their tax returns no one knows.

How many of these war millionaires shouldered a rifle? How many of them dug a trench? How many of them knew what it meant to go hungry in a rat-infested dug-out? How many of them spent sleepless, frightened nights, ducking shells and shrapnel and machine gun bullets? How many of them parried a bayonet thrust of an enemy? How many of them were wounded or killed in battle?

2011-11-17T23:55:00.000-05:00

~Yehuda Amaichai~

A Pity, We Were Such a Good Invention

They amputated
Your thighs off my hips.
As far as I'm concerned
They are all surgeons. All of them.

They dismantled us
Each from the other.
As far as I'm concerned
They are all engineers. All of them.

A pity. We were such a good
And loving invention.
An aeroplane made from a man and wife.
Wings and everything.
We hovered a little above the earth.

We even flew a little.

Sexy Lights

2011-11-15T18:35:00.001-05:00

Love Is What You Want Neon by Tracey Emin

Lili Lakich’s Vacancy/No Vacancy, 1972, is in the show "Doin’ It in Public: Feminism and Art at the Woman’s Building," at Otis College of Art and Design, part of "Pacific Standard Time."

2011-11-14T23:44:00.001-05:00

“We were frightened of being left alone for the rest of our lives. Only people of a certain disposition are frightened of being alone for the rest of their lives at the age of 26…we were of that disposition.” — High Fidelity

There is something about NY

2011-11-14T23:15:00.004-05:00

2011-11-09T22:20:00.002-05:00

Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know, said once Hemingway

2011-11-09T22:19:00.002-05:00

Roy Lichtenstein, "I Can See the Whole Room!...and There's Nobody in it!," 1961
Estimate: $35,000,000 - 45,000,000
Auctioned at Christie's Post-War and Contemporary Art Evening Sale yesterday

2011-10-30T20:12:00.001-04:00

Don't attempt to penetrate into the intimacy of one's soul, when you carry with you the noise of your past.

Art

2011-08-01T11:26:00.001-04:00

Frederik Rattzen
Deep, dark, stunning...

2011-07-29T07:56:00.004-04:00

"What I feel for you is contempt. But it's nothing compare to the contempt I feel for myself. I don't love you. I've never loved anyone. I wanted you from the first moment i saw you. I wanted you as one wants a whore - for the same reason and purpose. I spent two years damming myself, because i thought you were above a desire of this kind. You're not. You're as vile an animal as I am. (...)Yesterday, I would have killed anyone who's tell me that you were capable of doing what I've had you do, Today, I would give my life not to let it be otherwise, not to have you be anything but the bitch you are. All the greatness that I saw in you - I would not take it in exchange for the obscenity of your talent at an animal's sensation of pleasure. We were two great beings, you and I, proud of our strength, weren't we? Well, this is all that's left of us - and I want no self-deception about it. (...)I held it as my honor that I would never need anyone. I need you. It had been my pride that I had always acted on my conviction. I've given in to desire which I despise. It is a desire that has reduced my mind, my will, my being, my power to exist into an abject dependence upon you - upon your body, your hands, your mouth, and the few seconds of convulsion of your muscles. (...) I want no pretense about love, value, loyalty or respect. I want no shred of honor left to us, to hide behind. I've never begged for mercy. I've chose to do this - and I'll take all the consequences, including the full recognition of my choice. It's depravity - and I accept it as such - and there is no height of virtue that I wouldn't give up for it. Now if you wish to slap my face, go ahead. I wish you would."
Ayn Rand

One of the most beautiful and sincere paragraphs ever written.

Thursday !!!

2011-07-20T00:27:00.001-04:00

2011-07-15T00:52:00.002-04:00

Metaphors are dangerous. Love begins with a metaphor. Which is to say, love begins at the point when a woman enters her first word into our poetic memory.
Milan Kundera

A photograph of me

2011-07-13T22:58:00.000-04:00

Face

2011-07-06T17:38:00.003-04:00

USA,July 2011 editorial

What modeling teaches us

2011-07-05T15:09:00.003-04:00

I've been working as a fashion model for seven years. In seven years, one can get finish college and get a Master Degree. What did I learn from seven years of modeling? Well, a bunch of useful things such as: delaying an airplane, a little Italian, what diet works best for me, getting around a big city without a Smart phones, surviving in a models apartment, my best face angles etc.
But what modeling teaches us very well is grace, seduction, and how to handling rejection.
I can spot an ex model not necessarily by her height or looks, but by the way she handles her body, the way she talks, the way she seduces. She knows how to hide her insecurities, and her flows, and how to emphasize her qualities. Remember that she spent years analyzing her own body, her moves, and she got feedback from a very harsh audience - thousands of casting directors, agents, designers and editors over the years. Her body and the way she moves were her only asset. She knows how to use that, and having a man in front of her, instead of a camera, is certainly more amusing.
A model also knows how to handle rejection, critics, and disappointment. She went though this almost every day, after confronting hundreds of people. Some don't even know her name, some were her 'friends' for years, others are simply faces, or titles with no names. They all believe that models are neutral to critics, either because they get criticized all the time, or because they get complimented often...or both. Even when you get knocked-up, sometimes you have to get back on track and feel confident within two subway stops, which take you to your next casting. Remember that your own insecurities are your worse enemies. And why should people see them, there is nothing attractive about them anyhow.
Models know how to dress. 'It is not about what you wear, it is all about the way it fits you' - one of my agents at Ford once told me. It is not all about buying expensive things, it is all about making things look more expensive, and that takes talent. The photo editors of Target or Macy's are going to agree with this.
Modeling takes a lot away from us, but it also offers a lot in exchange. You just need to figure out how to apply this to the exciting world outside of fashion.

Clic is Chic

2011-06-02T15:55:00.001-04:00

Here is another fun gallery I highly recommend. And here is the link to my CityBuzz post: http://citybuzz.com/new-york/new-york-explore/clic-is-chic

To see

2011-05-24T00:20:00.001-04:00

This weekend I'm spending the weekend with Picasso, at Gagosian in New York City.
Here is my CityBuzz post on Gagosian: http://citybuzz.com/new-york/gagosian-gallery

Black vs White, Woman vs Man

2011-04-20T17:30:00.006-04:00

On blogging

2011-04-15T15:13:00.002-04:00

Dear friends,
I know I was very slow with my posts recently, but I am back...and I plan to be a lot more active. ;) However, I didn't completely disappear from the on-line Universe. I am currently writing on www.Citybuzz.com for their New York section. Check me out: http://citybuzz.com/our-bloggers
And a have a couple of more fun project coming up, so stick around.
Otilia

Why do we need love?

2011-04-15T15:07:00.000-04:00

Love serves an evolutionary purpose, and it is the driving force of humanity. The feeling of love triggers desire, lust, and lust maintains reproduction. Loving someone keeps individuals focused only on one partner (at lest for a while), and this allows them to conserve and improve their resources. This also encourages them to compete with their peers, improve, evolve for the one they love - and evolution makes humanity move foreword. Love creates ties between individuals, security, attachment, dependence. This allows two humans to take care for their babies, setting an example for their young, and making them stronger in case of danger.
Today, increasingly more people tend to believe that they can easily live without loving someone, but doesn't this contradict nature, instinct, evolution? And are we really strong enough to combat these forces? But most importantly...why would you try to live without love? Simply...love someone!

New

2011-03-23T18:08:00.001-04:00

The Mind of the Market

2011-02-14T13:12:00.000-05:00

Don't let the scale of a transaction sway you. A $100 gain is the same whether it comes from a $1,000 stock sale or pawning your old bike.

Don't compare yourself to others. If the neighbors won $500 in a lottery and you won $5, you've still won, no matter how the profits match up.

Beware the endowment effect: People tend to overvalue what they already own. Try to be objective when evaluating a sale price.

Being an Economics major, it is hard for me not to share some of these brilliant writings on my blog. Therefore, for those interested, this is an extract from the book The Mind of the Market, which I highly recommend.

Never too late

2011-02-09T00:47:00.000-05:00

Once, my trainer told me something that stayed with me: 'You are never too old or too young, too rich or too poor, too fit or too fat...to start all over again.' I believe you can apply this to more than push-ups and crunches. So, if it's still worth it, be good to yourself, and give it another try to the things you gave up on.

Chess Mat

2011-02-08T11:35:00.003-05:00

Life is no different from a chess game. In order to reach chess mat you need to fight, and strategically eliminate all the opposing pieces around you. Some player will use you only to reach their goal, they will sacrifice you, and easily throw you out of the game. This will often break your heart, and leave you disappointed and insecure. However, you need to know your place in the game and conform to the rules. If you were created to be only a pawn on this chess table called society, you will remain that until the end. The kings will always be kings, but this doesn't mean they are undefeatable. In fact, they would be useless pieces without the others. In some cases, they can be defeated by only one knight. It not a matter of who you are, it is all about the way you play the game.

Fragment

2011-01-19T16:33:00.002-05:00

"I am finished with myself, with my sacrifice and my pity, with what chains me. I am going to make a new beginning. I want passion and pleasure and noise and drunkness and all evil. But my past reveals itself inexorably, like a tattoo mark. I must build a new shell, wear new costumes" Extract from "Henry and Jane", Anais Nin

January, 2011

2011-01-18T23:24:00.003-05:00

Someone, somewhere, sometime

2011-01-17T00:55:00.002-05:00

I am not ashamed of my deep adoration for everything that he is. And I am not ashamed of my suffering because he is no longer next to me.
With him I used to be brutality sincere. He could see me cry, and I didn't have to hide it. It is because he simply didn't judge nor care. I could be myself, and revel all my demons and weaknesses. I knew that he will still desire me physically. And I am not ashamed of that either. I am a woman and I love a man, it is as simple as that. He doesn't love me, and he assured me that he never will. But I forgave me, because I don't think he is capable of love. But I would take him back, only because he is the best lover I ever had. It was not romance, only reality.

Three types of lovers

2011-01-15T22:02:00.003-05:00

According to Socrates, each one of us falls in one of the following three categories of lovers. The first one is the 'Evil Lover' - someone who has no tenderness, nor solicitousness, and who only wants to satisfy his own appetite. This type of lover will love you just like wolves love lambs. The second category is the 'Non-lover'. A 'Non-lover' is emotionally handicapped. He or she evokes no emotional response from other. He is neither jealous, possessive, nor romantic. He simply can't feel anything. And finally, the last category is the 'Noble lover'. I think we all hope to either be one, or be next to one. The 'Noble lover' is only focused on his beloved. He never hurts intentionally, and he loves deeply and faithfully. Which one are you?

News on art books

2011-01-09T23:14:00.002-05:00

I want to list here my top five favorite books on contemporary art. All these works are an easy, fun read, but they deal with controversal issues on the contemporary art market. If you are interested on what exactly drives the prices of art, what makes a good work, or which living artists changed the direction of art, I highly recommend these books.

1. Steve Martin - An Object of Beauty
2. Sarah Thornton - Seven days in the Art World
3. Don Thompson - The 12 Million Stuffed Shark
4. Elizabeth Currid - The Warhol Economy
5. Calvin Tomkins - Lives of the Artists

Enjoy!

The power of words

2010-12-31T14:21:00.002-05:00

There is nothing more powerful than words. Guns can make wars, and tigger fear, but words can bring back compassion and peace. Words are information, and information is power. Words are knowledge, and knowledge is one of the most powerful possessions one can have. Words made the bible, and the constitution. Therefore, words can make the difference between right and wrong. Words can make people famous, writers immortal, and bring politicians to power. Words bring people together and create boundaries. We are connected right now because of words. People will love or hate you for the words you say and not for your body and skin. What make us supperior and different is the ability to use words. Words can change lives. Words are power.

New on art

2010-12-29T00:42:00.004-05:00

I recently discovered a contemporary artist I very much like - Adrian Gottlieb. His portraits and nudes resemble those of rembrandt through the use of light, visible artifacts and the somewhat cold, detached subject. But what I really like are his highly realistic still life paintings.

Cold, white, and windy...

2010-12-27T22:02:00.004-05:00

Tonight, I painted the ski with silver stars, and the ground in immaculate white for you. It was a little empty without you here, so i surrounded myself with blocks of snow. I made it so cold, hoping it will freeze your soul and the memory of me. The wind is so strong that it hurts all of us. It even hurts to breathe. I though you deserve to feel something as well.

Image: Turner's Snow Storm

Sent from my iPad

Being born a woman

2010-12-26T23:12:00.002-05:00

I, being born a woman and distressed
By all the needs and notions of my kind,
Am urged by your propinquity to find
Your person fair, and feel a certain zest
To bear your body's weight upon my breast:
So subtly is the fume of life designed,
To clarify the pulse and cloud the mind,
And leave me once again undone, possessed.
Think not for this, however, the poor treason
Of my stout blood against my staggering brain,
I shall remember you with love, or season
My scorn wtih pity, -- let me make it plain:
I find this frenzy insufficient reason
For conversation when we meet again.

Poem: Edna St. Vincent Millay
Art: Dorothea Tanning, Birthday 1942

Two women i admire...

New Year's Resolutions

2010-12-26T21:05:00.003-05:00

It is the end of 2010 and I imagined my life being a lot different at this point that it is. I don' t know exactly what different means or what I could change. On one hand, I am more confident in my own skin than ever before, on the other hand, I feel a little weak, a little lonely and a little tired. I don't know why we all strive freedom and then we cry of loneliness. All I wanted a little while ago was to run free, but today I need direction. I thought I can figure out my life by myself, but I have learned that I am terribly subjective and often wrong. I also made horrible mistakes this year, I took bad decisions, and deliberately hurt others, because I was wounded and afraid myself. Next year I would love to be able to listen more, and to follow others' advices. The ability to say 'i am sorry' could be helpful also. Next year, I would like to take more risks and to analyse my own actions less. I am good at being In control, but I can rarely let go. And when i do lose myself it often results in some sinful actions. I' m not going to work less, or be less disciplined in 2011, but I am going to indulge myself more. I am going to be easier on me, and easier on other people also. I haven't realized before this december how many wonderful people I have around. I will show them more often how much I appreciate their presence and support. I am also going to call my family more often. And I am not going to miss none of my friends' birthday parties this year. Little things mean so much to people. At the end it all comes down to people and people. Also, it would be nice if I could fall in love again. I thought I was at some point, but I believed I mistaken it with infatuation. I guess that's about it. That's all I have to say only because i don't know for sure what are my new year's resolutions. But once I will figure out exactly what I want i am quite confident that I will get it...it's always just a matter of wanting it bad enough and having enough patience.Good luck to you too!

Sent from my iPad

People vanish...

2010-12-23T00:53:00.001-05:00

Isn't it strange how people vanish? They come into our lives like sandstorm, and they take over all your senses. You can no longer see or breathe. You are no longer the master of your own body. They can control your heart beats and the flow of your blood. But instead of feeling frightened you feel happy and full. You are alive, you are in love. The thought of losing them one day scares you. You don't even remember the days when you used to get up without him by your side. It feels like it was this way since the beginning of time.
But people vanish, they vanish as fast as they happen to you. They run like the sand through your fingers and even if you try to close you hands you still can't stop it.
And then you wake up one morning and you are all alone again. Only painful memories, few of her things in your closet, and the smell of her hair on your pillow. Time passes, and you think about it less and less. One day you realize that you no longer think about it at all. It is because people vanish and there is very little you can do about it. Firstly, they vanish from your daily life, and then from your heart, and all your thoughts. People vanish...and it hurts for a little while, but then another sandstorm will take over you.

Loss

2010-11-22T16:35:00.004-05:00

Loss of love, loss of confidence, loss of safety, loss of freedom, loss of certainty, loss of hope, loss of dreams, loss of warmth, loss of control, loss...

The Girl With The Pearl Erring takes Miami

2010-11-21T22:21:00.004-05:00

Given that Vermeer's Girl With The Pearl Earring is one of my favorites paintings in art history, Dorothee Golz's digital painting captured my eyes on Art Basel Miami website. I love to see modern artists incorporating elements of classical works in their art. I still believe it is a shame that artists after the 1950s buried any reminder of tradition in art.

2010-11-14T02:52:00.000-05:00

Flemish drawings

2010-11-12T20:13:00.004-05:00

I am obsessed with drawings. Today, while passing by the Strand - great bookstore in Manhattan, I found an old book with illustrations of Flemish drawings - loved it, got it. Here is a study by Rubens. Isn't it amazing how powerful a pencil can be?

Fly for Ms team around the world

2010-11-12T13:13:00.007-05:00

I am very proud to be part of the Fly for Ms project. Over the last two months we reached and helped over 200 people with Ms in 30 countries, and brought Ms in the attention of millions of viewers around the world by being featured on over 25 different TV channels and newspapers around the globe. It was a wonderful journey, thank you team, thank you all for believing and supporting us.
Learn more about us at http://flyms.org/

A common affair

2010-11-11T18:27:00.005-05:00

They've met randomly one fall night. "I would like to see you again", was one of the first things he said. They were nor friends nor lovers for a very long time. They are so different, no one would understand. They became lovers only because they were both a little lonely. He found her very attractive. She was flattered. He was empty. It's strange, but if they cut him open they will only find emptiness inside. There is no blood, there is no love, no fear, no hater.
They were never in love, but their bodies could not live apart. She sometimes wonders how it is possible to feel so in love with someone within the boundaries of his bed, and feel nothing at all once you step out, naked and cold. At one point they became close friends. They would laugh and talk for hours about everything, and then make love again. There was not jealousy between them. How could it be, when they lived in a world of two all those countless nights. He could bring her to the boundary where two bodies turn into one soul.
After many months, one morning it simply ended. She walked out, knowing that she will never come back there. There were no slammed doors, nor tears, no regrets. She missed him for a little while. She even thought that she loves him and might not be able to breath without him. But everything vanishes, everything dies. And that was it.
He probably has another her next to him, and she loves someone else. One day they will get married with different people, they will be part of others' stories, they will fall in love, suffer, laugh or cry. They will move miles away, or live on the same street. They will never see each other ever again, or perhaps they will bump into each other tomorrow morning at the coffee shop.
Their story is simply like thousands of other stories that are taking place between close doors every night, stories that can not be understood nor accepted by people and circumstances. Stories that will be be forgotten and erased by time, but stories that are meant to be lived if...it feels right.

Keep it simple and move on

2010-11-06T21:54:00.006-04:00

This year I was diagnosed with GAD - those think that disorder actually exists can continue on reading this post, those who think it was made up by pharma companies in the US stop here. Anyhow. I am fundamentally a very happy, confident person, and if I look back I consider myself goddamn lucky also. In fact, some of my friends believe I am crazy only because I can't see how lucky and accomplished I really am - possible...I say.
However, about a year ago I thought my life is falling apart and I will never be able to put it back together. And so I tried therapy, Prozac, yoga, more sex, reading good fiction, more art classes, moving in my fav part of the city, spending more time with the girls, shopping, ending my relationship, traveling, seeing my family, getting a dog. But what really really works is a piece of dark chocolate, Vanity Fair and Cafe del Mar tracks. Try it every time you feel like the world is coming to an end - and remember that usually it gets better by Sunday.
Oh yes, and once in a while, do something really crazy - insane, totally out of control, and smile instead of worrying what others might think...

Take your masque off

2010-11-02T17:16:00.000-04:00

Save the Date

2010-10-02T10:15:00.001-04:00

The Fly For MS mission has visited sixteen countries and flown more than 10,000 miles, or halfway around the world--just one more half to go.
Fly For MS has been busy flying more than 100 people in the MS community, appearing on television, giving interviews to the press, and speaking to governments and leaders in 16 countries and counting to raise awareness for Multiple Sclerosis.
We're halfway there, and we'd like to celebrate with you.

Watched

2010-09-24T19:47:00.002-04:00

Tamara de Lempicka

2010-09-22T19:13:00.003-04:00

Puzzle

2010-09-19T01:01:00.002-04:00

When you start on losing control of your life, you feel as part of a jigsaw-puzzle impossible to solve. You see your existence divided into millions of pieces, all mixed together. You can't make sense of it; you no longer have a clear image. You are trying hard to reconstruct this picture, but you don't know what you are looking for. You feel lost, small and terrified. Fortunately, sometimes you only need to find that one piece, and place it into the right place, and then everything else will fall into place around it. I like to believe that I've found mine...

when i need you

2010-08-28T21:45:00.001-04:00

I would rip off my skin to get rid of all my sins for someone. Thoughts, vices, and sinful passions were running through my veins. My pores are hardly breathing under the weight of misery. Inject me with your purity and hope. Save me of my own self, of my own loneliness, and lock me in you.

Warmth

2010-08-25T18:37:00.001-04:00

Demarchelier

2010-08-24T22:20:00.004-04:00

She

The Unbearable Lightness of Being

2010-08-16T00:23:00.002-04:00

He kept recalling hey lying on his bed; she reminded him of no one in his former life. She was neither mistress nor wife. She was a child whom he had taken from a bulrush basket that had been daubed with a pitch and sent to the riverbank of his bed. She fell asleep. He knelt down next to her. (...) He had a sudden clear feeling that he would not survive her death. He would lie down beside her and want to die with her. He pressed his face into the pillow beside her head and kept it there for a long time.

Milan Kundera

Fashion for MS event

2010-08-15T16:37:00.005-04:00

Thank you to the over 300 who came in support of FLY for MS on August 10th in New York City! We sold out the tickets within 4 days, and the event was a real success.
Thank you, the entire Fly MS team.

Fashion for MS

2010-08-06T20:54:00.002-04:00

Fashion for Ms

2010-08-05T22:50:00.004-04:00

Friends,
I wanted to let you know about a very exciting project I have helped create. Fly For MS is an unprecedented effort where a team will fly halfway around the world and back in a small plane, stopping in almost thirty countries representing 70 percent of the world's population of people with Multiple Sclerosis. At each stop we will MS patients for treatment and for fun, and focus public attention on the needs of the MS community. Only a few hundred people have ever flown this type of place for such a distance. Few other models at the other top agencies have joined me to work on this amazing journey.
Our efforts have excited people around the world and was featured today in the Wall Street Journal and attracted the attention of the media world wide.
Next Tuesday, to help us finance as many patient flights as possible, we are hosting an invitation only party for a mix of the fashion and wall street elite.
This is a great opportunity to participate in a historic journey.
Check us at www.flyms.org

finds

2010-08-04T19:31:00.004-04:00

for Elena Perseil

on the rocks

2010-08-01T10:31:00.007-04:00

By Zev Tambor

Life as a play

2010-07-22T15:40:00.001-04:00

All the world's a stage
And all the men and women merely players
They have their exits and their entrances
And one man in his time plays many parts.
Shakespeare, extract from "As you like It"

What Women Want From Men

2010-07-18T14:20:00.003-04:00

We want them to know every inch of our body.
We want them to make us feel little in their strong arms before we fall asleep.
We want them to kiss us in the morning even if we are not awake.
We want them to hold our hand when we cry at the cinema, and to call us before exams.
We want them to spoil us, and to call us nicknames.
We want them to treat every head-aches we get as a tragedy.
We want their attention, time, and secrets.
We want them to be our best friends, confidants, and lovers.
We want them to trust us.
We want them to notice our new hair-color, and the new dress we bought thinking of them.
We want them to think that we are strong, but to treat and protect us as we are vulnerable.
We want them to be proud of us, and proud next to us.
We want to be their most precious possession.
We want them to say that we are more beautiful that famous actresses, models and that gorgeous woman at the party.
We want to feel comfortable around them, even when our hands are not neatly manicured, even when we don't wear make-up, and when we shower with the door open.
We want to dance, run, travel, read, cook, laugh, and cry with them.
We want them to simply listen sometimes, without saying anything.
We want them to be our safety-net, and be less scared of falling.
We want them to share with us all their insecurities, fears and sins.
We want them to miss us when we are miles away, and days apart.
We want them to love us in their own way.

puppies

2010-07-17T09:54:00.003-04:00

Currently taking over the garden

The puppies I rescued yesterday while riding my bike. They now have a big house and a loving family (mine). So in love with them already!

B and W

2010-07-15T16:49:00.002-04:00

We are all shades of gray

Silence

2010-07-08T08:28:00.003-04:00

Pamuk's Istanbul

2010-07-06T16:16:00.003-04:00

My shape, my way

2010-07-04T19:32:00.008-04:00

Istanbul apartment,self-portraits, yoga, very late, nothing more

Imagine an unstructured world. Imagine an Universe with no shapes, no determined forms. A place where the human self is not bounded by skin. A place where we have no wight, and no contour. Imagine our entire body with its bones, skin, muscles, and blood reduced to a cloud of colorful dust. A cloud that can not be touched, because a touch can make it vanish. Imagine a place where we can fly freely, dance, and intertwine with other clouds with different colors, creating harmonious nuances, never seen in the rainbow. Imagine a place where our body does not exist, a place where it can not produce carnal desire, nor critics.

Far

2010-07-04T15:34:00.002-04:00

I'm in Istanbul, I'll keep you posted.

Lingerie

2010-06-30T19:08:00.003-04:00

Something about NYC

2010-06-30T10:05:00.004-04:00

I'm not sad, happy nor lucky, but I still have the music

New comp-card...mean

2010-06-26T12:33:00.003-04:00

Well..that's how I introduce myself these days

Greed is not evil

2010-06-25T00:25:00.005-04:00

I'm fundamentally full of greed, and I believe it is a wonderful quality to posses. Greed is an acute desire for perfection; greed makes us strive for perfection, and it gets us closer to it. Greed makes us work harder, it makes us reach a potential that was always within us, but never explored. Communism is the biggest failure of the past century, because it was based on an ideology which suppressed greed -- greed gives individuals independence and confidence.
I'm greedy for information, people, energy, love, sex, nature, adrenaline, happiness, life. Greed is not a severe sickness, greed makes us different, and better.

RB to Elizabeth Taylor

2010-06-24T14:47:00.002-04:00

"I love you lovely woman. If anybody hurts you, send me a line saying something like "Need" or "Necessity" or just the one magic word "Elizabeth", and I will be there somewhat faster than the sound. You must know, of course, how badly I treat you. But the fundamental and most vicious, swinish, murderous, and unchangeable fact is that we totally misunderstand each other(...) You are distant as Venus - planet, I mean - and I am tone- def to the music of the spheres."
To love someone more than yourself

aNYthing

2010-06-24T10:31:00.004-04:00

out and about in the city

They will hurt you

2010-06-13T19:19:00.000-04:00

They will leave you drowning, without teaching you how to swim.

They will let you cry, without wiping your tears.

They will hear you shouting, and pretend not to listen.

They will take your breath away, and give you no air.

They will let you fall, after cutting your wings.

I love him with my entire self.

2010-06-11T23:35:00.003-04:00

I love him with every finger and toe, and with all my red nails. I love him with both my hands. I love him with my lips, and with my blue eyes. I love him with my long blond hair. I love him with the back of my neck, and with my right ear. I love him with my pale skin, with the scratch on my right leg, with my breasts and my hips. I love him with my long white dress. I love him with my mind, and I love him with every single corner of my soul. I love him with everything that I am.

Incandescent

2010-06-11T12:21:00.001-04:00

I'm still around

2010-06-11T12:03:00.004-04:00

Naomi Campbell meets Renaissance

2010-04-30T23:44:00.002-04:00

Or the destructive West meets Africa
David LaChapelle, "The Rape of Africa"

One night in Ny

2010-04-21T12:18:00.005-04:00

Contemporary Romania art

2010-04-20T15:40:00.005-04:00

Communism took a lot from us by suppressing the progress of art, so it is satisfying to see a Romanian artist -- Adrian Ghenie, using the "fading" image of our dictator before his execution as a subject.
The Ceausescu paintings will be shown in the U.S. this spring.

Lingerie

2010-04-16T21:37:00.004-04:00

New York City, March 2010

Degas with a film camera

2010-04-12T22:01:00.009-04:00

Clarence H. White seems to be a Degas in many ways, an artist using a camera and film, instead of pastel and paper. The warmth and tenderness emanated by his highly romanticized photographs was archived only by Impressionist artists before.
*At some extent, this also stands for Gertrude Kasebier.

Between black sheets

2010-04-12T18:20:00.001-04:00

She set quietly besides him, and watched him sleeping for minutes. He was so fragile...so vulnerable. It doesn't even seem to be the same man; the man whom dominates her in every possible way. He is not hers, but every part of her being is his. She wanted to hurt him for all those days of solitude, and for being so much stronger than she is. There were no walls, there were no black sheets, there were no empty glasses, clothes, no air, nor sound...only two naked bodies, and a strong odor. It was their smell. It smelled like love, and tears, sperm, cigarettes, and her perfume. This smell is all over her skin again. It is all over her soul. She tried to wash it away every time they have to say good by. It's always in vain. By the time the smell fades away, she starts on missing him again. And then they will fight another war, between his cold, black sheets.

Art as Love

2010-04-10T13:35:00.002-04:00

"The essence of all art is to have pleasure in giving pleasure" M. Baryshnikov
"Art has an enemy called ignorance." B. Johnson

Rembrandt's hand

2010-04-09T17:10:00.003-04:00

The reason why I love this drawing so much (and the reason why it stayed on my computer's desktop for so long) is that it makes me feel the artist's presence, more than any other art work. One can almost follow Rembrandt's hand while flawlessly depicting the timeless image of his subject.

Cry

2010-04-07T23:23:00.005-04:00

One day, I will start indulging myself with your body and the rest of your mornings. I want you, I want to make you cry of pleasure and regrets. Desire me. Let me be your strongest sin...your only unbeatable addiction. Suck everything out of me, and fill me up with you. Find me. Reconstruct me. Devour me into pieces, and put them together just how you wish. Put me on fire, inhale my ash, and let me give you ecstasy, and the power to fly away.

Great Photographs of the 20th Century

2010-04-07T11:07:00.003-04:00

Great ongoing exhibit in Hasted Hunt NY. Did I mention Irving Penn, Richard Avedon, and Steven Klein?
photo: RICHARD AVEDON