JESSICA SHOPS

On my recent trip to Paris, I fell into an outdoor flea-market. The collections, the objects, the people, the colors, the age, the design and the cobblestoned street all played a role in creating the perfect concoction...the remedy to my depleted soul, a soul deprived of trinket shopping. My first purchase was an antique horse and rider with the poise of David's, Napoleon Bonaparte.

I purchased this for my partner Sam as he too enjoys trinkets. A few blocks down, I spotted a brightly colored seahorse sculpture. With tunnel vision and jaguar stealth I reached the desired object, for which I still feel a great amount of affection but gave to my sister as a birthday present. Truthfully, she is more keen on sea themed decor, but since living in the desert, I am drawn to it myself. To be clear, there is something fabulously tacky about the sea horse creation but in the context of the French flea market and then later resting on my piano in Texas, I only found delight in its awkward form, material, color and content. 

This morning, Marfa Public Radio's Talk at Ten aired an interview with local artist turned gallerist, Sam Schonzeit, who is presenting a lecture by PHD student Josh T. Franco. Franco's dissertation investigates a particularly interesting juxtaposition that is the co-presence of minimalism and vernacular aesthetics in Marfa, an aesthetic Franco calls Rasquachismo in Spanish, loosely translated as tackiness. Franco explicates that Rasquache may be observed in the yards of locals--cluttered with decades of sentiment, accented with brightly colored flower beds and most likely completed with the iconography of Santa Maria.

Once a tourist, I remember celebrating the stark contrast of high and low here (picture above taken in 2010). In a less obvious way, Mirth flirts with the concept of high and low. Our aesthetic highlights the beauty of objects, but our objects are designed for utility, the ordinary and the everyday. On a mad shopping spree, I decided to purchase a few of my favorite things from Mirth.

Washi tapes, a turkish towel, a japanese body scrubber, a matching scissor and letter opening set, two wine glasses and the perfect pencil sharpner. I have used at least one of these objects everyday since. They are not tacky by any means but they do possess a sort of dual nature like Marfa.

-Jessica for Mirth

QUALE

I had the privilege of visiting with a lovely artist, poet and intellectual named Andi Shapiro yesterday afternoon. Andi has been a bright and pleasant follower of Mirth since our opening in March that coincided with her move to Marfa, TX. After a warm greeting, Andi served me a freshly-brewed, iced chai tea with milk in the thinnest crystal glass I have ever put to my lips--a delightful afternoon treat. She told me that the glass was a wedding present from Tiffany's years ago. Quickly, I knew that treasuring the experience of a perfectly crafted glass was one of many interests we shared.

After a tour of her and her husband Jim's beautiful home, Andi displayed her artwork for me. From her stories and associations with the works--ranging from the early 90's to the present--several themes surfaced and resonated with my own experiences of people, places, ideas and emotions. Andi informed me that the 'phenomenal character' of moments or relations to objects, meaning one's subjective sensory experience that floats between the physical world and a cognitive conscious, is called quale or qualia (pl.) in philosophy, an unfamiliar term to express a quality that is ineffable and strangely familiar to an individual. In her work, Andi daringly chases qualia, delicately plucking trinkets from the physical world to render new symbols and coax a visual language that evokes that which is verbally inexpressible.

Often I find my thoughts and desires difficult to articulate which can be dreadfully frustrating, but perhaps impulse needs no explanation. In celebration of this newfound purpose for many confusing moments in life, I vow to never question the ineffable in myself...for example, why I'm so attracted to Andi's partially painted over mouse brain or this perfectly organized washi tape display.

-Jessica for Mirth

NATIONAL ANTHEM

The Star Spangled Banner was adopted as America's National Anthem on March 3, 1931. We sing this wholesome refrain at sporting events mostly, and fun is had by all. The Fourth of July is a wonderful holiday for celebrating American staples and principles such as sports, hot dogs, fireworks, puppies, peace, sky, land, war, buildings, expansion, sex, beer, drugs, art, rock and roll, grills, love, freedom and each other. Today I am pondering upon a more appropriate national anthem for America--with a little help from my friends. (written by John & Paul, perhaps performed most famously by Joe Cocker)

My father has always claimed many songs as personal 'National Anthems'--too many to count he would say. There is Ohio Players, I Want to be Free, Jimmy Cliff's, Many Rivers to Cross, and Otis Redding's Call me Mr. Pitiful, on bad days. The ownership my father practices over these songs is a way of defining his own personality, experience, raising, emotions, principles, morals, and ambitions. Obviously, I am reading great value into many off-hand comments Daddy made with flared nostrils and tears brimming, but I like the idea of personal National Anthems as spiritual touchstones, complements or anecdotes to prescribed religion and practice. 

Lana del Rey released the single, National Anthem, from the album Born to Die on July 6, 2012 breathing yet another meaning into the idea of a National Anthem. In del Rey's twisted, patriotic world of acrylic nails, big hair and painted lips, she herself longs to be another's defining beat. The chorus goes like this: 

"Tell me I'm your National Anthem,

Tell me I'm your National Anthem, 

Red, white, blue's in the sky, 

Summer's in the air and baby, 

Heaven's in your eyes. 

I'm your National Anthem."

Del Rey's lyrics express a desire for someone to beat to her drum or perhaps, act as one beating to the same drum--an idea, seemingly, buried deep in a romantic past. Nevertheless, I urge you, readers, to feel passion for the pulse, riot for the rhythm, and breath to the beats that move you this fourth...ha! And tomorrow let the fourth be with you ha ha! And please, enjoy the suggestions below that I have received for America's new National Anthem...

The New National Anthem:  Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen, Everyday People by Sly & The Family Stone, American Pie by Don McLean, This Land is your Land by Woodie Guthrie, Wild World by Cat Stevens, Kiss by Prince, George Michael !, Dear Mr. Fantasy by Traffic, Wicked Game by Chris Issak, basically anything by Cher,  Free Your Mind by En Vogue, I'm Proud to be an American where at least I know I'm free...jk, Love's in Need of Love Today by Stevie Wonder, Rocky Top (for the volunteers) National Anthem by Radiohead, The Southern Anthem by Iron & Wine. more to come!

-Jessica for Mirth

BEAUTY

A thing of beauty is a joy for ever: 

It's loveliness increases; it will never

Pass into nothingness; but still will keep a bower quiet for us, and a sleep

Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing. 

-Keats

-Jessica for Mirth