Her Light will forever shine bright

Maya Angelou passed away yesterday but she is not gone. She left many reminders of herself here on earth. Reminders filled with wisdom, love, and enlightenment. If you dig a little you will find all three of these things and much more in her many autobiographical works and poetry.

She was born and spent a majority of her childhood in my home city, St. Louis, Mo. We have a kinship in my eyes. I feel like I understand (in part) the way she grew up; the neighborhoods; the people. STL is a hard, downtrodden city where a lot of souls are crushed.....hers was too but still she rose. I read, "I Know why the Caged Bird Sings" when I was fifteen years old. The book saddened me and gave me hope. It opened my eyes to some things I couldn't swallow at the stage in my life but to this day I will never forget some of that prose. Maybe the most important thing one human can do for another human is to give them a sense of hope; a sense of strength; a glimpse at what they can be. Maya Angelou dedicated her life to passing these things on to other people. She found a way to rise from poverty, abandonment, and abuse and turn them into Love. That's something....to self teach Love.

With her passing, Twitter and FB blew up. I'm definitely cool with that because even if people didn't know her work or her story then maybe now they may take the time to find out for themselves. It can only help your life to have her teachings in it. Even if some idiots use her legacy and name in a negative light it's cool 'cause I was reminded many times yesterday of something she said long ago, "Nothing can dim the light which shines from within."


-tshurn

"Art is anything you can get away with"

The title of this blog post is a pretty famous quote from Andy Warhol. I have heard it before but I never really thought about it in any kind of distinct way before yesterday. I saw it framed at a trunk show that I attended in the bishop arts section of OC. The atmosphere of the whole event musta had my brain open because I started to think about that quote and a lot of other things while I was there. The trunk show was put on by Daniel Perez of Caviar Club menswear. I believe that he was debuting his line of mens accessories, such as bow ties, lapel pins, handkerchiefs and such. I have to admit that I have never worn any of these items but they looked great on the people that where wearing them at the event. He had classic bow ties, some a lil funky and some just plain elegant. Same goes for the handkerchiefs....but his items where not the only thing there. There was a photographer/graphic artist there showing and selling some of his pieces as well. His name is Daniel Driensky and his drawings were really dope. His pictures were of various things that he is interested in. The sriracha sauce bottle, miller lite can, robo cop vhs tape, and walkman where my favorite selections, the later of which I purchased to hang in my crib. It was so90's Dallas son! You can find Daniel on Instagram....Ya'll know that I consider myself pretty knowledgeable on the Dallas music scene so I have to speak on the sounds. Vinyl Fantasy was manning the 1's and 2's and he had me when I heard him spinning that Shaft, memories of my dad and his friends in our basement while I was stuck upstairs trying to sleep. Any DJ that incorporates 70's soul in his set has a fan in me.....So far it's looking good right??? Classic cool menswear, chill sounds, graphic art.....man, but there was so much more in this small studio. They were offering shaves for men, "menicures" by Vanessa Quilantan who I think is @pronailprincesa but I don't know for sure because of my social problems :), free chocolate mustaches, free TATS!....yall don't hear me tho!, FREE TATTOS! After my two Jamesons on the rocks, I was itching to get a tat on my forearm, but my friend who attended with me @verniciav talked me outta it. I'm not a virgin to ink but none of it is visible with my clothes on, last night I was willing to change that. Maybe it was the art in the air, I'm not sure.....@debdoingdallas hipped me to the party and that was really cool. It kinda represented the vibe that I got from the trunk show last night. People willin to reach out to one another for art's sake. I'm not into posturing and fake shit so it was refreshing to smell realness in the air. Like Andy Warhol said, "Art is anything you can get away with", well the artists last night got away with some really fresh items that will resonate with me for quite some time.


-tshurn