With the Sun Setting on Year of the Wrong

With less than a month left in '08, my head is spinning. This has been the most incredible year. It's slipped by me like a dream: first galloping out in a wash of brain-melting fantasy and then finishing in a dense and deceptively quiet remission. I've been up every morning before sunrise (no surprise), sometimes climbing on the roof to watch. I'm starting to feel the new year approaching and wonder how to prepare myself for the other side of the dawn.

I still have so much to sort out from '08. The treasures of this year have taken me longer to process than they took to receive and as a result I've been holed up in my basement, furiously trying to pillage this well of feeling with a paintbrush. I did take a quick break for Thanksgiving, though. My family would be lost without pie and I'm the official pie-lady around here. I'm not really into pie myself, but I do love baking, inventing recipes and feeding people.

U like penis? Every piece of art I've received (with the exception of a print of Saddam Hussein) has been a penis (or multiple peni.). My favorite is actually a self-portrait made for me by one of my favorite sculptors. Bueno as fuck. Someday maybe I'll post my collection of cock-art. This apron, although not a part of the collection, compliments it nicely. My daddy got it for me.

Lars ate this whole pie in one sitting.

And then wanted more.

We must've been feeling festive this year, cause we even cleaned up for Thanksgiving dinner. Sure it celebrates the mass genocide of my mom's people, but fuck it. I'm feeling extra-American right now. I think Lars and I are both feeling particularly grateful for our exciting lives.

Dinner was nice. My family is nuts. People always say that about their families but trust me, mine really is. Here's Sweet Granny. She raised me and we hang out a lot. Precious, no?

When dad set the fire alarm off (his favorite holiday tradition) someone yelled, "Who brought the drugs?" Suddenly many of us were suddenly inspired to take a walk. The need was so urgent and overwhelming that I didn't even have time to grab shoes. It was wet, so Pookie (my little sister) carried me, all the while PASSIONATELY attempting to sing "The Phantom of the Opera" in it's entirety.

Mom and me, bustin' a move.

This is a special pie I invented. I'm not sure about sharing my secret recipe... My family always tells me this pie could win me a new kitchen. I'll have to trust them because by the time I'm done serving it, the whole thing is always gone.

The Rat Shit thing was inspired by both the secret-ingredient AND my dad's traditional desert- Dead Rat Pie. His pie, however, had no pie involved.

Here's Poo- once again bestowing her theatrical gifts.

My dad whipped some cream. And then decided to beam me in the face.

This is just par for the course. If you were to come to a family gathering you'd inevitably end up seeing my dad pelt me with food. The most impressive was a sugar snap pea he shot from about 20 feet away. Amazingly I did manage to catch it, but the velocity was so great that the sharp stem-end badly cut the back of my throat. The good news is that everyone was cheering while I spat out blood. I coudn't swallow well for days. It's sad when you have to bleed for approval- but alas, I've come to welcome this unrelenting truth.

After dinner we decided to drive out to Montana and tag team R8's ex, Mei Mow.

We so sexy.

Our trip to Montana was an awesome mini-vacation from life, which I resumed the following day. I'm working on a lot of things as this year is drawing to a close- revamping the website, laying blueprints for my dreams of an art tour, compiling images for my book (Year of the Wrong), and pushing out the final body of work from '08. Lars, Jake Jake and I are also spending a good deal of time honing our DDR skillz so we'll be cool if we ever have enough money to visit Japan. We've actually started a dance troop called "Three as Hell."

You should see us go. Your five year old would be proud. Sorta.

it makes us proud. In fact, just the other nite our dancing opened the doors for the bumblebee to fly in and we were whisked away on a magic carpet of velvety color, sound and texture. Once we had danced ourselves useless I decided to show Jake Jake my new body of Ft. Collins paintings (all still in progress).

What do YOU do with your Tuesday nights? I know this looks a little bizarre, but parts of my paintings are designed to move depending on the light an we do what we gotta do to get the eye-fuck.

Here are a couple other in progress shots, just for kicks..

Man, I want to show ya'll- but this looks SO fucking shitty and different online. Red is particularly difficult for computers...

These photos are really dark and the paintings are incomplete... still, you can see where I'm going. This whole body of work is born from seeing Ween play in Ft. Collins. That night kicked my ass (and soul) so fucking hard I can still barely function when listening to the bootleg. The energy was so rich it was literally dripping from the atmosphere. I've often wished i could show others what I see when I stand before Ween. Sadly, I'm not that skilled yet. This series is sort of a step toward that eventual goal...

It's just not the same to show work through a screen- they are an entirely different experience in life. My new biggest priority is taking my art on the road (if you want me to come to you, please email me or check the "shows" section shortly for details.) These paintings have elements that cannot be experienced through a computer. Even the drawings lose a little something (although they translate much, much better than the paint). My work is made for REAL life: to dance, party, and melt with you.

I've spent most of this year using pens and marker- doing graphic drawings. Now, as the year is drawing to a close I am (once again) working with paint. Paint is more emotional and visceral to me and seemed like the only option for this newest series.

As far as 2009, I am planning to expand. Like I said before- I am very seriously interested in hearing from you if you want me to visit your city for an off-road art adventure. My website traffic suggests the best places for me to hit first would be: the NYC area, Philly, Portland, the greater San Francisco area, and the greater L.A. area. Although I said I was planning on hitting NYC first- I've decided I'm gonna try to do practice run out west. If you're interested in helping me out- please check the "shows" section of my site. It would be a great way to contribute to the arts without putting yourself out, financially.

That's it for now, but please do stay tuned. I know I've been a little lame at updating, lately. It's cause I got a lot of sheeeiit in the works right now- soon to be unveiled. Also, thank you SO FUCKING MUCH (again) to everyone who's been supporting/buying/writing about TWCB. I appreciate it more than you can begin to imagine. I got word from Chocodog about a week ago that they're selling pretty well. As far as I know this is a limited edition thing, so if you want one you might wanna move- they were halfway gone at the 25 day mark... Bueno.

Love you guys, helluv. Please dance. And for the love of God- make sure to punch fear in the fucking teeth if it rears it's ugly head.

Severiously,
Thea "charmer of the wild trouser snakes" Wolfe

P.S. I share a birthday with Rap artist Jazzy Jeff. Just thought you should know.

Posted on 5 Dec 2008, 24:58
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I HEART GWAR, Danzig, The Almighty Mustache and My New Life-Dream

The past weeks have been a montage of memorable events, kicking off with the Presidential election on November 4th. Watching the results come in was something most Americans will never forget. Personal feelings aside, I thought both candidates gave exceptionally beautiful, patriotic and sincere speeches and am heartened by the widespread ripples of hope and unity I have clearly seen flood out into the world. (photos taken from www.time.com)

November 8th was also a special day because it was Lars and my five year anniversary. We celebrated by checking out my spirit-animal Glenn Danzig on his Blackest of the Black tour. Oh man, I love that dude so bad. SO FUCKING BAD. His deathy-ness is so goddamn adorable it makes me want to punch my OWN face. Lars and I met in the mosh-pit of The Accused, so this seemed an appropriate celebration of our unconventional and awesome matrimony. Glenn was perfect: all pony, scowls and power-moves. Unfortunately his bouncers threatened bodily harm to anyone who took a picture of the dark lord. The crowd also left much to be desired.

I am very disappointed (both for my blog AND my carousel) to not have any sweet Danzig photos. I guess all I can do is post a picture of the feeling.

Take a moment to meditate on this image. Now picture a crowd of angry, shirtless drunk guys (who clearly listen to rap-rock) shoving, screaming and flexing in the foreground. It was awesome. Personally, I fall into the old camp of Danzig fans. You know.. long hair, rocking chairs, leather pants and aggressive mustaches. These guys did make an appearance but they are fewer and fewer as the years go on, being sadly replaced by short, barrel-shaped dudes with tribal armbands and frantic, miniature Marilyn-Manson's.

We had only a moment to recover from Danzig before the AWESOMEST non-Ween show one could possibly see: GWAR. I wish I was as cool as GWAR. In fact, I'm making a painting called "I Wish I Was As Cool As GWAR." If I were cool enough to be in GWAR I would have an excellent outlet for my welding skillz AND- at long last- a use for my deadly slam-dancing. GWAR is a non-douche band, so they didn't have any problem with cameras, however the crowd was quite douche-intensive so we made a point to stand on the outskirts. Regardless of our vantage point, it was GWAR, so it was beautiful. Goddammit- I would grow my tits out for that gig. Seriously.

We were literally so far to the left that we were almost in the hallway next to the stage. Again, not the greatest perspective, but the tradeoff was that we had decent dancing room so Missa and I busted our move to the nth degree.

We even managed to pull off a few sweet lifts before the bouncer stepped in to regulate. (We weren't blocking anyone- just endangering ourselves.) I guess he didn't realize that Missa's thrown me around like a hackey sac since the day we met and never broken me. We're less dangerous than we look, if you ask me.

The rest of the crowd, however....

Balsac the Jaws of Death is my favorite. Who can resist a man with a bear trap for a face?

As sweet as the last several shows have been, I think I'm done seeing bands for awhile. I don't want to get into some rant about the noble (and terrifyingly endangered) mustache, but I do want to say that I am incredibly saddened by the culture of disrespect that has come to define the music scene I grew up in. The brotherhood is being lost on the younger generations- particularly in the Northwest.

I think I'm going "away" for awhile- into myself to figure out how to utilize what I've gotten from this year. It's been rich to say the least. I'm working on several new projects: a new body of paintings, some t-shirts (since all ya'll seem to wanna join me in saying "FUCK YOU JAKE JAKE!!"), and some blueprints for my next wave of schemes. It's no longer practical for me to throw art parties at home, so I'll be dedicating myself to finding a way to hit the road in the next year. I don't know what that means, but I do know that if you have a space that you'd be willing to offer me, I would LOVE to hear from you. The first city I'm planning to hit is NY.

So thats it. Ya'll can still reach me by email, but I won't be out and about much. I'm fine- just holed up in my house- or more accurately, my bedroom (the only room we can afford to heat) Please don't hesitate to write- it's been wonderful hearing from all of you. I love your responses and if I haven't had the chance to respond to you personally, please know that I've truly appreciated you taking time to write. It's meant a lot. Here are some shots of what's up in my bedroom/office/studio/1 warm room:

Uhm... yeah, still working out my Ween-love in the only ways I know how...

Sweet, sweet dairy prozac- the ULTIMATE void-filler.

I'll be updating my website from my cave- hopefully more frequently as the outside noise settles down some. Hope everyone is having a beautiful autumn. Here's to the sun setting on an unforgettable year!

Thea "it's all toast with me" Wolfe

Posted on 18 Nov 2008, 13:22
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