Uvi Poznansky's Blog, page 266
August 27, 2012
Katrina and Isaac
Today, faced with news that Isaac Sparks Hurricane Katrina Memories, I pray for the people of New Orleans. Thinking about the wild, ferocious forces of nature, I am reminded of two small details in two of my canvases: Katrina and Earthquake, both of which took months of work, during which I was in awe learning about the survivors.
I painted both of them on large canvases (36"x60") which force you to step back to view them, as befits the awe these subjects inspire in me. In both, I composed groupings of figures, captured at the moment of meeting their fate, meeting disaster. Most of them are completely oblivious to you, the observer, as they focus on trying to escape death, and helping others.
But in each one of these paintings, one figure--a child--turns a penetrating look directly at you, as if to cry out--Help! Can't you do something? Pull me out of here!
Detail from Katrina
Detail from Earthquake
It gives me pause today, knowing that the boy in second painting is inspired by my thoughts going back to the biblical story of the binding of Isaac. There he is, carrying a bundle of wood, which is meant to build the altar for his own sacrifice.
Let us pray for New Orleans, and for people everywhere, because we are all being tested by fate.
I painted both of them on large canvases (36"x60") which force you to step back to view them, as befits the awe these subjects inspire in me. In both, I composed groupings of figures, captured at the moment of meeting their fate, meeting disaster. Most of them are completely oblivious to you, the observer, as they focus on trying to escape death, and helping others.
But in each one of these paintings, one figure--a child--turns a penetrating look directly at you, as if to cry out--Help! Can't you do something? Pull me out of here!
Detail from Katrina
Detail from EarthquakeIt gives me pause today, knowing that the boy in second painting is inspired by my thoughts going back to the biblical story of the binding of Isaac. There he is, carrying a bundle of wood, which is meant to build the altar for his own sacrifice.
Let us pray for New Orleans, and for people everywhere, because we are all being tested by fate.
August 26, 2012
A Beautifully Crafted Triangle of Love
A new ★★★★★ book review has been posted today on Amazon for Apart From Love:
"The story is told from the viewpoints of Ben and Anita. Ben is the adult son of Lenny who has been estranged from his parents for the past ten years, with Ben blaming his father for the break up of the family when Lenny and Natasha divorced. Anita is Lenny's new wife who is pregnant, the same age as Ben and also has an uncanny resemblance to Natasha, so much so they could have been taken as sisters - but in appearance only. Natasha was a beautiful and talented concert pianist with elegance and grace to match. Whereas Anita is rough, ill educated, dresses brashly and her speech is no better than `street talk'. What Ben didn't know was that even when he was a child at home living with both his parents, his mother was in the early stages of Alzheimer's Disease and that this progressed to the stage where Lenny divorced her and had her cared for in a home. The marriage wasn't always happy with Lenny having many affairs and flings but Anita, one of his flings, had been around for ten years or so before he married her following an unplanned pregnancy.
Without giving more of the story away, there are many facets to each persons story and all have their hopes, fears and revelations. The love between Ben and Anita which both of them hide as much from themselves as each other, is a slow burn, almost dangerous dance that is more in their heads than physical. Lenny is a little bit like a spy listening to tape recordings of both Ben and Anita's thoughts, playing and rewinding the tapes over and over, torturing himself in preparing their words for the novel he is writing.
Uvi Poznasky is a very talented lady, not only is she a very accomplished writer, she is a poet, sculptor, artist, teacher and much more. The beautiful cover of the book is of one of her works of art and after visiting her website I see that she is indeed gifted and worth taking a look at uviart.com . This is a beautiful and sophisticated novel of love, loss and torture and well worth reading."
"The story is told from the viewpoints of Ben and Anita. Ben is the adult son of Lenny who has been estranged from his parents for the past ten years, with Ben blaming his father for the break up of the family when Lenny and Natasha divorced. Anita is Lenny's new wife who is pregnant, the same age as Ben and also has an uncanny resemblance to Natasha, so much so they could have been taken as sisters - but in appearance only. Natasha was a beautiful and talented concert pianist with elegance and grace to match. Whereas Anita is rough, ill educated, dresses brashly and her speech is no better than `street talk'. What Ben didn't know was that even when he was a child at home living with both his parents, his mother was in the early stages of Alzheimer's Disease and that this progressed to the stage where Lenny divorced her and had her cared for in a home. The marriage wasn't always happy with Lenny having many affairs and flings but Anita, one of his flings, had been around for ten years or so before he married her following an unplanned pregnancy.
Without giving more of the story away, there are many facets to each persons story and all have their hopes, fears and revelations. The love between Ben and Anita which both of them hide as much from themselves as each other, is a slow burn, almost dangerous dance that is more in their heads than physical. Lenny is a little bit like a spy listening to tape recordings of both Ben and Anita's thoughts, playing and rewinding the tapes over and over, torturing himself in preparing their words for the novel he is writing.
Uvi Poznasky is a very talented lady, not only is she a very accomplished writer, she is a poet, sculptor, artist, teacher and much more. The beautiful cover of the book is of one of her works of art and after visiting her website I see that she is indeed gifted and worth taking a look at uviart.com . This is a beautiful and sophisticated novel of love, loss and torture and well worth reading."
August 25, 2012
Seriously Sensual
Just listen to me, as I bare my soul Talking to Gabrielle and Nicki-Nicole No need to put me up on some high pedestal 'Cause here we are, girls: seriously sensual
To hear about some of the intimate details hidden in the pages of Apart From Love, Listen to my interview with at Seriously Sensual.
August 24, 2012
Seeing my Home Through a Fish-Eye
When my father passed away, I went back home for the traditional Shiva-a, the seven days period of mourning. Perhaps the grief did something to change the way I viewed things, or else it was sitting in that space--my childhood home--in a spot I rarely sat before, discovering it from a new angle, observing how light penetrated the far reaches of this place, how the furniture signified relationships in the family. I drew what I saw on a napkin; wiped my tears with it, and later discarded it.
Coming back to the states, I recreated that sketch from memory. In my new drawing I used a fish-eye perspective. What does that mean? Like regular perspective, the horizontal lines converge into a vantage point in the distance. But--here is the difference--the vertical lines are not straight, nor are the parallel. As you look up, vertical lines converge to a point up there, beyond the edge of the paper. You can call it Heaven. And as you look down, the vertical lines converge to a point below, call it Hell. Which makes the entire perspective embrace you, as if you are in the middle of a fish bowl, seeing the world curve around you.
And looking though such a perspective, what did I see? An earthquake, really, in the aftermath of my father's death. Books falling off the shelves; the lamp swinging like a pendulum; the little side table (in the front) overturned, so my father will never lay his pen upon it; and instead of the persian rugs that used to adorn this space once upon a time, I floated blank pages on the floor; pages he will never again use for writing.
In my next sketch I let the lamp swing even higher into the air. The place has completely tilted, and my father's armchair is ascending above the rest of the furniture. This is the sketch I used for an oil painting called My Father's Armchair, which will be the cover of my new book, coming out this fall: Home.
Coming back to the states, I recreated that sketch from memory. In my new drawing I used a fish-eye perspective. What does that mean? Like regular perspective, the horizontal lines converge into a vantage point in the distance. But--here is the difference--the vertical lines are not straight, nor are the parallel. As you look up, vertical lines converge to a point up there, beyond the edge of the paper. You can call it Heaven. And as you look down, the vertical lines converge to a point below, call it Hell. Which makes the entire perspective embrace you, as if you are in the middle of a fish bowl, seeing the world curve around you.
And looking though such a perspective, what did I see? An earthquake, really, in the aftermath of my father's death. Books falling off the shelves; the lamp swinging like a pendulum; the little side table (in the front) overturned, so my father will never lay his pen upon it; and instead of the persian rugs that used to adorn this space once upon a time, I floated blank pages on the floor; pages he will never again use for writing.
In my next sketch I let the lamp swing even higher into the air. The place has completely tilted, and my father's armchair is ascending above the rest of the furniture. This is the sketch I used for an oil painting called My Father's Armchair, which will be the cover of my new book, coming out this fall: Home.
August 22, 2012
One-Star Review... What to Do, What to Do?
So what do you do when the moment comes? There you are, all confused, faced with the dubious gift, which has been dropped at your doorstep (or rather, on your book page): a 1-star review. What should you do?Nothing!Nothing? But—No! No buts! The reader is your customer, and the customer is always right! Always. If she didn't understand the plot, or could not connect to your characters, it's not her fault—it's yours. So take your grief to a private place and cry and wail and shout there, until the pain subsides... Never, never, never argue with your reader! She's right, you're wrong.Never?Never! Except—Except what?Except... Do you have time? This is a long and convoluted story, which happened to me only yesterday—I'm listening.Yesterday, a 1-star rating, with no review, appeared on my book page on Goodreads (in case you don't know, this is a social network for readers, exchanging views about book.) As you can see, most of the existing reviews are 5-star rating, with a few 4-star rating. So, casting a 1-star rating is an extreme action, which should never appear without a review. Why? Because when a reader takes the opportunity to throw that fine record into utter imbalance, to degrade it really, why not include a review with some constructive criticism for the author? And why not tell other readers the reasons for your dissatisfaction?So then, what did you do?First, I looked at the other ratings this reader gave (nearly all were 5-stars) and at the kind of books she read (most of which were great literature.) Clearly, she was well read. Her name, Melodie, looked familiar, but at first I thought nothing of it. Then my eye caught the other actions she has made (listed in a log on the reader page on Goodreads) around the time she dropped this rating. And what do I see—Yes, what—She has voted for several books on a Goodreads list called Indie Book Better than 50 Shades of Gray. My book happened to shoot up to #1 on that list, exactly on the same day. Which immediately made me suspect that the bad rating was a ploy, way to draw my book down, out of some jealousy on behalf of another author. I asked myself if I should contact her—Really? I thought you said, never—Well, I reserve the right to break my own rules! And so I sent her a message on Facebook, and as I did so, I noticed that we've had an exchange of messages two months ago.Was it full of hate, of envy or something?Not at all! It was a delightful conversation, and now I remembered who she was: a great Amazon reviewer, who gave Apart From Love a glowing 5-star review, written in her articulate style! If you care to go two months back in time, you can read about her and about her review here.Now, that's strange—That's where the plot really thickens... Melodie wrote back to me, to say she was confused and concerned, because she doesn't belong to GoodReads that she knows of. The only place she has ever written reviews is on Amazon, or occasionally in Facebook comments.Then she connected to Goodreads via Facebook and was alarmed to see that she, or rather someone using her identity, has rated over 300 books!That's identity theft, isn't it?It is, and an extremely clever one at that. There were no reviews on these 300 books, only ratings. I suppose that the criminal entered most of these ratings to reflect Melodie's record on Amazon. But then, every once in a while, the criminal used Melodie's identity as a 'sock puppet' for herself. In such instances, she cast a rating that supported her own literary work, or else, to suppress her competitors—which is what happened here.Wow! If you stayed silent, if you didn't talk to Melodie, this would not have come out to the light...That is true. The rule is, walk away, never talk to a reader who gives you a 1-star rating. But the reward I got for breaking this rule is this: the rating has been stricken out from the books. Not only that, but the sock puppet is gone, too! Melodie's fake account on Goodreads has been deleted, along with its fake "history"—and now, let me finish by saying this: I hope that Goodreads identifies the criminal. It is not that hard, simply by analyzing the sock puppet's record!
August 21, 2012
Hanging Out with a Teddy Bear, Saving a Tilting Fish
From listening to previous author interviews at the Writers' Lounge, I knew that there was a teddy bear hanging in the studio... So in my mind, I could see it dangling there, listening while I was talking to the host of the show, Tom Riddell, whose review for Apart For Love was posted on his site about a week ago, and his co-host Robin Eduardo.
As the interview opened, Tom asked me to read a short excerpt. So here is a flashback to the time Ben was twelve years old child, facing the fish tilting sideways in his aquarium:
"The fish, it seems to be gulping for air. Maybe it forgot how to breathe. I know I can fix it. First I rub the mouth, delicately, with my finger. Then I try to massage the entire body. I am doing my best, my very best to be gentle—but in the end, some scales tear off the body, and a tiny fin flakes away.
At this point, I must do something, and fast. Just like dad: he did what he could for grandma, and blew his breath into her; and his breath was magical, because it lasted in her, somehow, for the next two weeks. I can do better than that for this little body, even with a few scales or a fin missing. So, I take a deep breath, put my lips to the fish—but then the smell, the touch... It makes me pause for a minute.
Still, I cannot give up: I must be brave, just like dad—or else, the spell may be broken. So again I gasp, and with frantic hope, I give a full-blown puff. The red eyes seem to be looking at me, and the tail is hanging over my finger, and it looks limp, and a bit crumpled.
I cannot allow myself to weep. No, not now. So I wipe the corner of my eye. Now if you watch closely, right here, you can see that the tail is still crinkling. I gasp, and blow again. I blow and blow, and with a last-gasp effort I go on blowing until all is lost, until I don’t care anymore, I mean it, I don’t care but the tears, the tears come, they are starting to flow, and there is nothing, nothing more I can do—
Then I feel mom, the smell of her skin. Here she is, wrapping her arms around mine. Softly, gently, she releases the fish, and takes me to their bed, and dad says nothing but makes room for me, and I curl myself in the dent between them, and it feels so warm here and so sweet that at last, I can lose myself, and I cry myself to sleep."
To listen to the entire interview, come hang out with us at The Writers' Lounge.
As the interview opened, Tom asked me to read a short excerpt. So here is a flashback to the time Ben was twelve years old child, facing the fish tilting sideways in his aquarium:
"The fish, it seems to be gulping for air. Maybe it forgot how to breathe. I know I can fix it. First I rub the mouth, delicately, with my finger. Then I try to massage the entire body. I am doing my best, my very best to be gentle—but in the end, some scales tear off the body, and a tiny fin flakes away.
At this point, I must do something, and fast. Just like dad: he did what he could for grandma, and blew his breath into her; and his breath was magical, because it lasted in her, somehow, for the next two weeks. I can do better than that for this little body, even with a few scales or a fin missing. So, I take a deep breath, put my lips to the fish—but then the smell, the touch... It makes me pause for a minute.
Still, I cannot give up: I must be brave, just like dad—or else, the spell may be broken. So again I gasp, and with frantic hope, I give a full-blown puff. The red eyes seem to be looking at me, and the tail is hanging over my finger, and it looks limp, and a bit crumpled.
I cannot allow myself to weep. No, not now. So I wipe the corner of my eye. Now if you watch closely, right here, you can see that the tail is still crinkling. I gasp, and blow again. I blow and blow, and with a last-gasp effort I go on blowing until all is lost, until I don’t care anymore, I mean it, I don’t care but the tears, the tears come, they are starting to flow, and there is nothing, nothing more I can do—
Then I feel mom, the smell of her skin. Here she is, wrapping her arms around mine. Softly, gently, she releases the fish, and takes me to their bed, and dad says nothing but makes room for me, and I curl myself in the dent between them, and it feels so warm here and so sweet that at last, I can lose myself, and I cry myself to sleep."
To listen to the entire interview, come hang out with us at The Writers' Lounge.
August 20, 2012
'Better that 50 Shades of Gray'
Apart From Love is currently voted #1 in Indie Book Better than 50 Shades of Gray! Are you a Goodreads member? If so, please show support and add your vote. 
August 16, 2012
Home, from the Back
Yesterday when I posted the front cover of my upcoming book, Home, a reader wrote to me saying she was so ready to read it! So I am working as hard as I can, designing the back cover. While the image on the front is based on my oil painting, the one on the back is conjured out of thin air... Here three snapshots I took of the design process:
Using gimp (a program with capabilities similar to Photoshop) I cut and pasted segments from the image for the front cover, creating a 'collage' on screen.
Using virtual 'brushes' of various sizes and bristle signatures, I painted the over the collage, so it became as textured and its lines as curvy as the front cover.
Then I took time off to compose the blurb. Once I was happy with it, I created the text shadows, which are not black but rather the darkest purple in the image. I blurred these shadows, to soften their hard edges. Then I created the text that appears over the shadows. (When text appears over an image that is highly textured, it is important to present any text over a layer of shadow, which helps separate the letters from the image.)
Using gimp (a program with capabilities similar to Photoshop) I cut and pasted segments from the image for the front cover, creating a 'collage' on screen.
Using virtual 'brushes' of various sizes and bristle signatures, I painted the over the collage, so it became as textured and its lines as curvy as the front cover.
Then I took time off to compose the blurb. Once I was happy with it, I created the text shadows, which are not black but rather the darkest purple in the image. I blurred these shadows, to soften their hard edges. Then I created the text that appears over the shadows. (When text appears over an image that is highly textured, it is important to present any text over a layer of shadow, which helps separate the letters from the image.)
August 15, 2012
Home
As you may already know, I'm hard at work on a new book, a vessel holding poems and prose. Today I have spent the entire day working on the design of the front cover:
The image may look familiar to you, I have showcased it in My Father's Armchair, and offered details in Muse and in This is the Place. However, I needed a higher resolution image for the front cover, which presented a real challenge. It is extremely difficult to photograph this piece, because the layer of gold, which is exposed in places, reflects light in unpredictable ways. So I snapped the picture in one room, then another, with diffused daylight coming from the side, the front, the top, with and without flash, then took it outside and snapped it in sunlight, in the shadow, here, there and everywhere... You get the picture.
At last I found one version that looked fine to me. First I had to fit the image to a prescribed size (according the book size I have in mind.) Then I created the shadows of the lettering. You may notice that the shadow's color is not black, but rather it is the darkest purple of the painting (which can be seen in the lower left corner.) Also, I blurred these shadows, so they do not have hard edges, but fuzzy ones. Then I selected a soft yellow, with which I typed the title, Home; and a less bright version of this yellow, with which I typed my name and my father's. Being brighter, the title 'comes forward' in relationship to the author names.
Normally I would make sure that all text fields are of the same width, or that they are arranged in a way that the one on top has the shortest width, and the one at the bottom has the longest width, which creates a sense of stability. Not so here, because I view my childhood home through the shaky lens of memory...
The image may look familiar to you, I have showcased it in My Father's Armchair, and offered details in Muse and in This is the Place. However, I needed a higher resolution image for the front cover, which presented a real challenge. It is extremely difficult to photograph this piece, because the layer of gold, which is exposed in places, reflects light in unpredictable ways. So I snapped the picture in one room, then another, with diffused daylight coming from the side, the front, the top, with and without flash, then took it outside and snapped it in sunlight, in the shadow, here, there and everywhere... You get the picture.
At last I found one version that looked fine to me. First I had to fit the image to a prescribed size (according the book size I have in mind.) Then I created the shadows of the lettering. You may notice that the shadow's color is not black, but rather it is the darkest purple of the painting (which can be seen in the lower left corner.) Also, I blurred these shadows, so they do not have hard edges, but fuzzy ones. Then I selected a soft yellow, with which I typed the title, Home; and a less bright version of this yellow, with which I typed my name and my father's. Being brighter, the title 'comes forward' in relationship to the author names.
Normally I would make sure that all text fields are of the same width, or that they are arranged in a way that the one on top has the shortest width, and the one at the bottom has the longest width, which creates a sense of stability. Not so here, because I view my childhood home through the shaky lens of memory...
August 14, 2012
Wonderful!
A4.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful! 14 Aug 2012By ShonUKFormat:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase"`Apart from Love' is quite unlike any story I've ever read, and I enjoyed every moment of it. The writing is full of lyricism and imagery, melancholy and hope, whilst the story seldom wanders very far from one cramped apartment in Santa Monica.
It is not a book that will take you on a journey through a place or an era, but rather through the minds of three people.
Anita, Ben and Lenny are undoubtedly connected through kin and marriage, yet are so sadly disconnected by their individual histories, secrets, guilt and remorse. They find an obscure way with which to communicate and reach out to each other, recording their voices and thoughts on an old tape recorder. The fact that they share this tiny living space, yet are so far from understanding each other is beautifully delivered through Poznansky's prose and style.
Anita is Lenny's second wife, articulate and eloquent with her desires and despairs despite her dreadful English, brash ways and lack of education. Ben, only a year older than Anita, is Lenny's son. He is recently returned after years estranged from his broken family. Natasha, Ben's mother and Lenny's first wife, is the white elephant in the room, her absence enormous and tangible.
`Apart from Love' is a clever, in-depth, unadulterated exploration of the thoughts of these individuals as they flow unheeded through their minds, allowing the reader to float, swim, wade, and splutter along with these oft times drowning characters.
The story wraps up in a wonderful way, pulling the threads together to make sense of the way the book has been structured.
I noticed that Poznansky is also the painter of the stunning cover design, her gift with word images spilling into visual art, proving herself a very talented artist."
(This review has just been posted on the book page of Apart From Love on Amazon UK.)
