gore.

I've been reflecting on my relationship with gore imagery. It's been changing a lot lately in things but I guess that's what it's like to experience having personality. The way I interpret the world has been becoming more objective or that's the goal at least. Sometimes I'm so bad at that! I spend too much time in my head and it's hindering my performance. I've been trying to think less, and to keep my past behind me but I've been unpacking what forms of violence overload my senses.

I tend to police my artistic expression a lot. I get overly considerate of what I'm putting out there and worry about upsetting my family or my job. I worry about going too far. I think it might be whiplash from social media's relationship with art. Gore is something we have exposure to at our finger tips. We know extreme violence is a very real part of the world. Life is a nightmare. We experience and express real evil constantly. Everyone has their own relationship with that part of life.

I am clean off real gore videos. I used to watch shock videos as a way to vent my own feelings of victimization. Now all those videos are tattoos on my brain. I don't regret seeing it, but I'm convinced I have some kind of brain damage now. Hopefully it's just a light dusting and not a deep dent in my dome. I didn't want to see anymore, I just started throwing up and getting sick. Looking back maybe I was morbidly curious. I knew the world was dangerous but I wanted to see it for myself. The videos aren't as traumatic as the exploitative nature of those videos for me. I can't see past it, I can't even watch porn with real people anymore. I can't think of one without thinking about the other.

I like gore in illustration a lot though. I love it actually! My first ero guro manga was when I was a kid (maybe eleven) called Pure Trance by Junko Mizuno. It's such a fun read! I love when art feels like a dark fever dream. It's a really unique feeling that I can't put into words. I also don't get to safely submerge myself into in day to day life. It marries sensitivity and violence which makes it a multi faceted experience for me. I like the conversations it brings up, I think art about death leads to a lot of discussion about life and what it's like to be alive. A lot of my darkness I think comes from a tight grip I have on optimism. I fear it comes off as very naieve. I need it to survive though. When I lose joy it's really scary. It feels deep. Endless. I fear my own depths and I like expressing that through my drawings. There is a very visceral, violent mode in your heart when I am harnessing the strength to continue. No other genre of art has made me face myself not just as an individual but as a human.

I don't like gore performances in real life. They're not for me. There is too many factors in that , and it's so stressful for me. I've met a few gore performers because of the intersection of gore and noise but I have a hard boundary of not going to a show where someone harms them self or someone else. It's not for me, and I have to make a hard line with myself not to dabble in that either. I like my life boring and nonviolent. My dream is for my home to be a healthy place. I wish to die comfortably. People can do whatever they want once they get on stage, that should ideally be the one place on earth you have complete right to your body. I don't have any intention to take that away from people. I know if I continued down that path I'd hurt my own trust with myself.

Making dark art helps the same way acupuncture helps. I feel calmer. It's really hard to get to know yourself these days I feel like media programming has too much access to me. I feel pressured to find myself, and that I can't be still. I think with experience it will get easier. Not life itself, but the way I handle it.