skip to main |
skip to sidebar
DATE: ~1990
DESCRIPTION: These assignments were fun. Write a poem and combine it with 'skillful' drawing. This one apparently about contemplating whether to kill a porcupine. Must have been from one of those short stories in a giant literature book we would browse through on a daily basis. I couldn't find anything about "Gordon and the Porcupine" in Google.
DATE: May 1982
DESCRIPTION: This is definitely an example of post-WW2 abstract expressionism. It's early Kandinsky-esque, with its devotion to inner beauty and color symbolism. Bright colors on a muddy background. Painting much like creating music.
Kandinsky said, "Color is the keyboard, the eyes are the hammer, the soul is the piano with the strings."
Four year-old Bryan said, "I like Dino vitermins!"
DATE: April 1988
DESCRIPTION: School poetry and art project. I liked military aircraft at the time. I must have paid a lot of attention to detail as well because I drew the tail codes (ED) - representing Edwards Air Force Base, which was just over the mountains from where we lived.
It was around this time that I decided a career in the arts was unattainable.
DATE: Fall, 1984
DESCRIPTION: Here I am with my team, the "Raiders" in the Littleton Soccer Association. Yes, I know we weren't black and silver, but for some reason we chose the name "Raiders". Oh, and we liked to pull our shorts up high.
My dad was an assistant coach, pictured to the right of me in the team picture. Since it's the Fall season in Colorado, there is snow on the ground!
One other thing to note, my hair is weird. I think I might actually have had a different hair style at one point in my life and it was here in 1984.
DATE: April 1985
DESCRIPTION: My parents used to keep the spirit of the Easter Bunny alive by leaving my sister and myself clues of his arrival and departure. Sometimes we would find footprints, and sometimes we would receive letters.
Here is one such letter. I think that The Easter Bunny left us a hamster cage. One interesting thing is that the handwriting is not really identifiable. I can't tell if either of my parents wrote this or if they contracted it out to one of their friends. I'm suspicious it was my dad writing carefully in a style not normal to him.
DATE: ~1988
DESCRIPTION: This is a creative writing assignment in the 5th grade. It is quite possibly one of the most ridiculous creations that can be attributed to me.
Wow, I must have liked saying "rad" a lot. Not really sure why cancer and Fresno are linked together. Cancer and Fresno are both un-rad things. Skateboarding on the freeway sounded pretty rad at the time. Unfortunately, the consequences to doing so are not rad.
Lastly, it ain't cool having such a long last name. I still apparently did not have the hang-of writing my last name into the top-right corner. Teachers should have been teaching us to put our names in the top-left!
DATE: March 21, 1986
DESCRIPTION: Class photo from Lewis Ames Elementary in Littleton, CO. I am the student in the top-left corner (In other words, top row, furthest to the left, next to the US flag). My best friend at the time is standing next to me and for some reason looks scared. His name was Christos.
Please take note of the fashion styles of the day. Christos and myself are rocking the striped long-sleeve cotton polo shirts. Some of the girls look like they stepped out of Little House on the Prairie.
DATE: ~1995
DESCRIPTION: A letter to me from "Your Admirers" - which turned out to be two friends of mine who must have been extremely bored in one of their classes. Was probably PE or something. Anyway, it looks like they spent about $2 in cheap lipstick on this letter as well.
I'm not going to bother explaining anything here. It's been too long for me to remember what certain nicknames (Nor-boy?) mean or what the intent of this letter was. Interpret as you like.
DATE: ~1988
DESCRIPTION: I think this essay originated in Cub Scouts, not school. I apologize for the poor quality, but the paper looks like the Dead Sea Scrolls by now.
It's a nice short blurb about "Freedom" and "America". Very obviously written from an immature, sheltered young boy's perspective. I also must have been spelling below-par at what I'm estimating is a Kindergarten level.
I do enjoy the last line most of all. It's got nice rhythm with the climactic misspelling. Say it out loud. Nice 'pop' to it.
Re-written 20 years later...(today):
DATE: ~1999
DESCRIPTION: Biochem really must have been boring. This is another drawing from what I can only assume is the same class as the prior post. For all I know now, this could be a copy of a drawing from lecture - some of you reading this might have a version of your own.
SIMS = Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry as stated in exclamatory rage. Evil Pac-Man-like ions bombard a thin surface, ejecting 'victim' ions into the detector 'box'. Also, for some reason I drew a hollow cylindrical shell (left).
