September girls

 I emerged from the underground garage into the pissing rain in Utrecht. Great. I am tired of the rain but hell, off to my meeting it is. On my bicycle. In the rain. It’s not that bad actually, as I like riding my bike. I make my way through a wet, dirty and extremely grey Utrecht along with dozens of others. They freak me out coming from all corners and ever so close to you. I arrive all wet and cold at the meeting place. Hot coffee’s waiting though. Awesome.

 

The meeting is cool and it’s the first meeting since I have been home that makes me feel excited about things. It’s cool to hear that someone on this side thinks the project has relevance. I almost feel like in CT, like “yeah, let’s just try, let’s network, let’s go for it”. I get excited about possible collaborations and think, hey maybe Overtone or the Network should get involved too. They could do X,Y and Z while we do this and that on our side. It’s a nice feeling. I don’t care that nothing’s definite or planned. I just like the feeling of possibility.

 

The market is changing in the NL (as everywhere) and one can’t afford to sit around and wait for clients to come to you with jobs. Clients don’t want to spend money on design right now. You either have to just do as they say without being too stubborn or arty or face a difficult time while they go to your competitor. If you want to do something cool and creative you *have* to get yourself out there. File sharing and free downloads, trading or giving work away while making money some other way is the way forward. Collaborate. Get yourself known. Do. And damn, if it doesn’t sound familiar to me:-) Cool. And it’s a good feeling too.

 

Some people immediately ask “What has been agreed upon? What are your plans? What are doing with your time?” Like everything is a failure until there is a buck in your wallet. I disagree. I usually bite my tongue. I realize that playing schtumm isn’t really helping anything but for now I’d rather shut up. I simply don’t have a lot of answers yet. Maybe it would be a very good idea to spend some time somewhere on my own with a laptop, camera, some music and wine. And then just think. I need time to think. Actually, not “time” but “space”. Space to find out what I’ll do next. To properly *think*. I used to laugh at my flatmate when I asked what are you doing and he answered “thinking”. I don’t any more.

 

A friend’s parents came with to the exhibition in November and his mom approached me. We chatted for a bit and she told me she admires and worries as her son, myself and so many people present choose such difficult area’s to work in. How hard it is making a living and a space for yourself but that she likes it too and would like to support me somehow. I thought that was sweet. 

 

Back to feeling excited about the meeting yesterday afternoon. I decided to start looking at my time in the NL as a project as well. Who can I meet, what can I do, how can I get funding and most of all, how can I get to be where I want to be? I’m still in mid-air so to speak but while I am trying to land on my feet, doing all this boring admin stuff, backing up all of last year’s shoots and cleaning out my computer, I better make the most of the view and start trying. I can’t keep writing boring, whiney blog post for that much longer anyway:-)

 

 

Silly randoms #1: Dutch woman are *tall*, more men wear very nice shoes and coats, stroopwafels are awesome.

 

The top photo is a Dutch singer called Lella Fathia, the other girl in Julia Merrett from Miss Texas 19977. Both photographed by me. Oh and the title comes from a Big Star song “September Girls”…

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