//
The Monday on the 1st of the
12th of the 8th.

My weekend - was an eventful one. Friday I worked my ass off - I went to see my friend Bernice - we went to Rof! - I met some great guys, promised my chick Hariwa ( the hip hop advisor ) to plug her blog ( here ya go! ) - went to the HKU, met Anne for the first time, ran into Rutger by chance, cause I said his shoes were nice, not knowing it was him ( I had emailed him previously for a collaboration hah! ), took a whole bunch of Polaroid shots, came home, went dead asleep and watched Samurai Champloo the entire weekend. And oh - last Thursday I bought me some new headphones, and the day before that I went to see Bas play at the SJU.

Basically - last week was dope.

But!

Once again - it’s Monday. Not only is it Monday, it’s the 1st of the 12th month of the year 2008. Needless to say this year has flown by, with all it’s ups and downs and whatnots. It’s crazy how Mondays, and especially Mondays like these make you reflect upon certain things, events, feelings, thoughts. Especially when that December month hits, with Christmas and New Year coming up, it makes you go all sentimental and thoughtful.

I’ve had a roller coaster year this year. I moved from one place to the other, said goodbye to people, said hello to new ones, went on adventures, had many sleepless nights, took hundreds of photographs, drew a lot, was alone most of the time, and always enjoyed myself. Many tears fell, many laughter came, many hugs were shared and magic moments came alive in the year of 2008. I could babble on for ages about all the things I experienced this year - but a picture says more than a thousand words - so I’m gonna make a full length photo post, posting the highlights of my year so far. ( and I am really bummed I did not get the chance to take any shots of the time Misha and I worked at the North Sea Jazz festival - because I had the greatest time there this year. )

Enjoy.

May 10th, 2008
I went to the beach with Allon & Ernst.

July 4th, 2008
I went to visit Allon.

July 6th, 2008
I went to Metropolis.

July 8th, 2008
Narek came to visit.

July 15th, 2008
My best friend Rachid stopped by.

August 6th, 2008
I went to the Booijmans van Beuningen museum with Misha.

August 13th, 2008
Misha and I walked all the way home.

August 13th, 2008
Misha and I worked at Blockbeatz at Watt.

September 14th, 2008
I went to visit Marc - and it was the last time I saw him.

September 19th, 2008
I worked at Mitros Playground and I connected with my girl Bernice.

September 26th - September 28th, 2008
I went to the Ardennen with people from my internship.

October 7th - September 28th, 2008
I worked as a photographer at Culture Beat.

October 31st, 2008
I went to Rof!.

November 1st, 2008
I went to Rock The Bells.

November 8th, 2008
There was a party at Habek.

November 22nd, 2008
I had a solo adventure.

//
And then …
it snowed.

And yesterday I had a solo adventure throughout Rotterdam.
Check out the pictures here.

I feel like hot chocolate & christmas movies.
But for now - I’m listening to Porgy & Bess - by George Gershwin.
That pretty much does the trick.

Y’all have a beautiful Sunday.

//
For one to be an inspiration -
one must be inspired.

Someone once told me to write about what inspires me - about what I experience, see, hear, feel. And that I should draw about things that inspired me - that I see, experience, hear around me - or feel inside.

The dictionary describes inspiration as one of the following - “a divine influence directly and immediately exerted upon the mind or soul” - and - “the divine quality of the writings or words of a person so influenced.”

A lot of things inspire me. Music - conversations - the things I see when I travel from one place to the other - but what mostly inspires me are people. I think a lot of people underestimate the power of other people. I have met many many people in my life - and I have learned many many new things from many people. I hope I too have had the ability to teach someone something.

As I continue my journey every day - and reflect on the past, present and future - I can say without a doubt that the drive I have for life - is caused by people. They are my inspiration, they inspire me, and some - even support me in being inspired and daring to dream, pursue my dreams and make something of myself and of my future.

To all you out there who I have met - am living with in the present - or who might become an inspiration to me - thank you all so very much. Even to the people out there who I will probably never met - but who have also inspired me - thank you.

Love to all of you.

//
The first coloured USA
president.

Tonight - I saw history be written.
This will be the day my children will read about in books.
We all know why.

Congratulations Barack Obama!

//
He had a
dream.

“I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.”

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”

I wonder what he would feel right now, what would be going through his mind, if today, he was still alive. I wonder how excited he would be, how emotional he would be, how scared and how satisfied at the same time.

I hope his dream - will come true.
Or at least - come closer to becoming true.
I hope that today will be a change for the better.
I hope that people will finally see that race doesn’t matter.
I hope that someday everyone will realise we are all equal.
That we should all be able to have equal chances.
And we can all become what we want to be.
No matter what colour or gender we have.

I hope.

//
This is what it comes
down to.

I could write a whole story about my weekend, but the whole vibe of this weekend basically comes down to the following video I recorded last night. The boys Pax, Reazun, Atactic, Meester T, Big Ap and some other dudes killing it after Rock The Bells at Amsterdam Bijlmer/Arena trainstation. We were waiting on the train and some magic came alive.

This weekend had the true meaning of Freeflow. Freestyle. Freedom.

Goodnight everyone.

//
Look at
us.

Me and my homegirl Tifén chilling out at work.
Really dig this chick - and I love this shot of us.

//
Hide your
face.

And once again - I am back! I just relaunched my website after a long long long dreadful time. Yes - I admit - it was built with Indexhibit, and no - I am not ashamed about it! I believe that the whole hype of overly graphic fancy looking motion stuff has gone and died somewhere between then and now. I came to realise that I do not care much for it - I just want to show my work. If this is done in a very efficient clean simple way - why not? Some other great people using Indexhibit are; Stefan Lucut, Boompje and Punchdouble.

Anyway. While I was working on my website - I put a picture of myself up there on the front page. I previewed my site to a friend of mine - and he asked me why I felt the need to put a picture of myself up there. I never really stopped to realise that with almost every version of my website I did this. And while discussing it with him I discovered that I usually find it interesting to see the person behind the work and there for - perhaps people would have the same as me - wanting to see who is making all the stuff.

He simply replied that not having a picture - brought a whole mystery to it for him.
And besides - it’s all about the work.

Right?

//
I love
life.

Pfoe. Okay so i doubt that anyone out there still reads a blog, but I decided it was time for a restyle and an update.
So let me update!

I have applied for an internship at Boompje, and I will keep you posted on the updates. I would love to run my internship there, it would be such a great learning experience. Perhaps get a bit more into 3D visuals and motion graphics? Hm. We shall see!

Other then that, I moved from Utrecht to Rotterdam, into my own studio. It’s not a huge house, but perfect for one person. Own kitchen, shower and toilet, and no roommates. Great stuff. The whole house was renovated before I moved in, so freshly painted, new floors, and the best thing about it is that I have hot water whenever! No more boilers! Woohoo. It took me some time to settle in, but I am getting around to it.

I have been running behin in school, the motivation for it has gone and died somewhere along the process. It’s a very hard time right now, I feel like I am not being stimulated to any real development in my work, and we are solely trained to do whatever a client wants, instead of ALSO being trained to develop our personal qualities. I find this highly dissapointing. Never the less, I promised my parents I would graduate, so I must continue on this path. In October I am going to apply for the Willem De Kooning Academy, I hope I get accepted.

And other than that, I have been updating frequently on Behance.net. I should be having my website up and running by now, but I am out of inspiration. I have been running around like a chicken with no head trying to get everything done, and not getting to do what I WANT to do, so there for my site is currently still not there. But I have been actively updating on Behance.net and you can check out my profile here.

Well that is all for now I suppose.
Have a great day!
Tarona