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Friday, October 18, 2013

My Walls pt. 1

The only reason this is a multi-part post is because I'm not done yet and the only reason I'm writing about this in the first place is because I want something to write about. I realize I'm stretching it a bit here and I apologize for that. Again, I wanted something to write about and this is what I've been doing in my free time the last couple of days. This may or may not end up having a follow up post.  

So, here's the thing. I have a ridiculous amount of wall space in my living/dining/office area. Probably not a ridiculous amount for an actual house, but for a one bedroom apartment, it's a lot. The room itself is about 22 feet long and minus an opening into the bedroom/bathroom area on one side and a sliding glass door on the other side. Everything else is wall.

The down side is I have one window (aforementioned sliding glass door) for a 30 foot room (the extra 8 feet come from the kitchen). Up side is I have SO many posters and pictures and artwork and I've never had enough space to hang everything up. Now I do. 

So I'm currently working on the wall to the right. Or the one that's right in front of me as I write this. It's on the west side of the apartment. I have three distinct groups of pictures/art that I wanted to hang and I initially thought it might look weird with three separate groups on one wall. I think it'll be okay. If not, oh well. I'll use tunnel vision for the duration of my stay here. 

Here's group number 1: 


I'm calling this my Women Who Kick Ass Wall. Or rather, section of wall. I've got both classic and modern Wonder Woman, Buffy, and a Marvel thing. I don't know what to call it so I'm sticking with 'thing' for now. The Marvel thing features 6 X-Men characters, and only 2 are women, but I'm letting it slide since you have to get up close to really be able to tell what it is. Maybe someday I'll replace it with my X-Men No. 1 variant by Brian Wood featuring an X-Men cast made up entirely of women. It's awesome, by the way. If you like X-Men, you should read this comic. 

Anyway, back to the wall. All four of the pieces are from Comic-Con. The Marvel thing I got cause it was $5, but the other three I was legitimately super excited about. There was one booth with a ton of those tin art works, one of which was classic WW. The guy only sells wholesale bulk so I think the only time you can buy one at a time is when he goes to SDCC. 

The modern take on WW I found in a booth in Artist Alley. A giant version of this picture was hanging up behind the artist and there was no choice - I had to have it. This is probably the single coolest artwork of Wonder Woman I've ever seen. The artist's name is Joshua Middleton and I've fallen in love with a lot of his work since then, but none more so than this. 

That leaves Buffy. Ah, Buffy. Now, the comics aren't my favorite, but I still read and buy them all because they're Buffy. How can I not? However, I really like the artwork. At least when Georges Jeanty does it. They've featured a couple other artists, but I haven't been a fan. But I love Jeanty's artwork, and this cover is my absolute favorite from season 8. I still get chills when I look at it sometimes. I was delighted when I saw Jeanty's name in Artist Alley, and this was the very last copy of this particular cover he had. Totally lucked out here. 

Here's group number 2: 


I have less to say about this group. It's all me, though. I haven't used my SLR in ages, but I used to be big into photography. I'll get back into it soon. But these are all photos I took in high school. No, I lied. Three are from high school. The be one on the top and the two flower shots. The other three are from college. The big one in the middle is from Arlington National Cemetery and it's my favorite. There was a light mist that day and the background fades into a fog. I love it. I took it 5 years ago and I still love it. Some I took... I think 9 years ago. I think I hang these up more out of habit than anything else. And to remind myself to get off my butt and go take nature photos. 

Last, but not least, group number 3:


My legit art. Starting at the top is a Van Gough-esque painting of DC. I bought it at the Eastern Market while I was interning out there over four years ago. If I had money back then I would have bought one that was three times bigger than this. The guy had bigger ones available. Not prints, all oil on canvas. But I didn't, so I got the small one. It's alright though cause the big one wouldn't have worked with any of my other stuff anyway. 

The smoking lady and the street lamps were both done by one of my two oldest friends, Virginia Johnson. Her sister is my other oldest friend. http://virginiainmay.tumblr.com/ There's her Tumblr. Virginia, you should post more of your paintings. Anyway, She sold originals and prints of her work for school a few months ago and I bought two, but I wanted to buy a lot more. Again, it was a money thing. The streetlamps piece is the original and I couldn't be more happy I bought it. The blue lady is a print, but trust me. I would have bought the original had I not been strapped for cash at the time. I feel like that's been a theme in my life...

The one at the bottom is a painting I bought in Paris. This guy had a bunch for sale, I think they were all done by art students. Oil on canvas again. I don't know much about art and mediums, but I'm pretty sure oil on canvas is my favorite. I bought a bunch of these paintings for souvenirs for my family and they left me the Moulin Rouge one. I wanted to keep all of them, but whatever. Next time I go to Europe I'll be more selfish.  

And the final product: 


That light is not doing this picture any favors. I know, I need to move the grouping on the right up a couple inches, but overall I think it kind of works. Right? The middle group doesn't look centered from this angle, but it totally is. I still can't decide if I like it, but in all likelihood I'll just keep everything up there because I'm lazy. 

Now for the other wall. It'll be my movie poster wall, so it'll definitely work better than this one. I have 5 framed so far and 9 more that I want frames for. I'm anal and don't want to poke holes in my posters even though four of them were free at the IMAX premiers. Wait, five. And four were free at SDCC. 

Framed:
Two Avengers (free with BluRay purchase), 



one Vertigo (purchased at local independent movie theater, not pictured),

and two for The World's End (free at SDCC).


Unframed: 
Star Trek (free from IMAX premier, but I didn't go to the IMAX premier, so I bought it), 


Godzilla (free at SDCC), 


Guardians of the Galaxy concept art made into a poster (free at SDCC), 


Pacific Rim (free from IMAX premier)


John Carter (free from IMAX premier)


James Bond (free from IMAX premier)


Iron Man 3 (free from IMAX premier


Ghost Protocol (free from IMAX premier)


and Rubin and Ed (also purchased from local independent theater and also not pictured). 

All told, I bought 3 posters and I still don't want to poke holes. I may have a problem. 

The bigger problem now is finding the right sizes. I've been to Ikea, Ross, TJ Maxx, Target, Wal-Mart, Hobby Lobby, and Michael's. I found a grand total of 6 frames, not counting the two I already had. I really don't want to spend money getting these custom framed, but I'm still not willing to poke holes in them. But I really want my movie wall...