Art166 - The Fine Art of Insomnia

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~ Circular REM

Coming soon to my Art166.com galleries.


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This fractal-based piece is a variation of Rem Sleep, which was posted here last year. I love the original piece, and, exercising the true spirit of digital art, return to it often when inspiration strikes.

Have I mentioned that I love working with fractals?

Have I mentioned that I love circles and rounded shapes?

Have I mentioned that I regularly experience many of the symptoms of REM Sleep Behavior Disorder? No? Well, that's a story for another day.


Emotions in Motion

I'm a very emotional creature. More often than is good for me, I'll go out of my way to wring every last drop of highs and lows out of any given situation. Questioning everything. Wanting to know everything and feel everything. Which is why, instead of sleeping last night, I decided to watch the most emotional movie ever filmed.

That would be "Testament", the realistic, heart- (and gut-) wrenching tale of one family's struggle to survive the first few months after a nuclear disaster. Without the use of special effects or political hyperbole, this quiet film dogs the footsteps of a suburban mother (Jane Alexander, in an Oscar-nominated role) as she witnesses the inevitable decimation of her family and the surrounding community.

To say too much would spoil the film for those who haven't seen it, but it's beautiful, impossibly sad stuff, and I cried myself right into a headache. Testament is one of my all-time favorite films. Rent or buy it to view -- don't watch it on network TV, massacred by commercials and PSAs.

So, at 3 a.m., with my face all red and splotchy, my nose running, and my head pounding, I realized that my spirits needed lifting -- immediately.

Pop quiz:

What does a girl watch when she needs to snicker and chuckle and laugh out loud?

When she's desperate for improbably attractive male eye candy that will immediately turn her thoughts away from creeping nuclear fallout?

When she's got an urge to rid the world of the criminal element, but is too lazy to grab her gun and hit the urban streets?

Well, if the girl is this girl, she makes a cup of Red Zinger tea and curls up with her treasured episodes of "Keen Eddie".

Of course she does!

Keen Eddie stars the delectable Mark Valley (currently seen on Boston Legal). It's the very tall tale of an NYPD detective who, after a drug bust gone ridiculously wrong, follows his leads across the pond. There, he settles in (yeah, like a fish out of water settles in) with a stuffy squad at Scotland Yard.

Keen Eddie is one of the smartest cop shows ever filmed. It's full of rollicking fun mixed with moments of intensity, second only to the incomparable Due South. (Admittedly, that "second" is sometimes only because Due South has Paul Gross. And, Paul Gross is . . . well, PAUL GROSS.)

Keen Eddie looks like a feature film and feels like a fast paced rock video; it's brimming with quick camera cuts, amazing visuals, and a wicked, contemporary soundtrack. The dialogue is rapid, slyly witty, and sharp enough to give you paper cuts. The gallery of characters, and their performers, are what TV would always be about -- if this world were a perfect world. There's even a touch of romance, a cuddly cat, and an evil little dog with way too much attitude to ever be called a pet.

Y'see? Something for everybody! What on earth were The Powers That Be over at FOX thinking when they let this one go? What's the plural of "dufus"? Dufuses? Dufusii?

Well, at least I'll have enjoyed every one of the 13 Keen Eddie episodes, more than once, before I'm engulfed in nuclear winter.

So, that's what I did last night.

When did I sleep? Ooops, I knew I was forgetting something . . .