I ventured onto Wikipedia for a more
exact phrase and use of the term "Bohemian", since that is
my moniker online.
I picture myself as a gypsy (and now a
vagabond), with hardly any family or social ties save that of work
and rent. I am a tragic Romantic at heart and therefore immediately
felt a bond with the term Bohemian.
However, as with the case of Wikipedia,
I only found references to male Bohemians and not a single woman
listed, except as a painting subject who stares dully and placidly
out to the public, showing her tits in Renior's The Bohemian (or
Lise the Bohemian).
Even her name has been forgotten.
Why is
it, that even in the art world, a place where women excel naturally,
they are erased by men?
Camille
Claudel, a famous sculptor (whose works barely survived), was
committed to an insane asylum by her idiot brother where her bodily
remains are left there today. She never got the recognition she
deserved and had even destroyed her own works, possibly in despair.
And oh yeah, she had an affair with Rodin... otherwise she probably
wouldn't be remembered at all.
On
Listverse.com, a blogger known only by the word FLO, made a list of
women artists who were institutionalized (most of whom died or
committed suicide in the hospitals). The Top 10 Female
Artists Who Were Institutionalized
- October 25, 2012
(http://listverse.com/2012/10/25/top-10-female-artists-who-were-institutionalized/).
Listed is, Sylvia Plath, Camille Claudel, Zelda Fitzgerald, Suzanna
Kaysen, Emma Santos, Valerie Valere, Janet Frame, Mary Barnes, Unica
Zurn, and Aloize Corbaz.
What's
interesting to note about these women is that most of them are
diagnosed with schizophrenia, yet only a few managed to overcome
their "mental illness" as diagnosed by doctors and gain the
recognition they deserved.
I
can't help but think mental illness and art go hand in hand, yet for
these women they definitely suffered and expressed their feelings
through art, even though the public shunned them for it. Some gained
recognition, which in a few cases granted them their freedom from the
institution or in the case of Janet Frame, allowed her to escape the
tragic fate of lobotomy.
Lobotomy
was a cure-all for any mental illness at the time, a horrible fate
that John F. Kennedy's own sister didn't escape from. Chopping pieces
of brain out to cure a so-called mental illness or defect in the
brain is crazy in itself. I'm surprised such medieval nonsense
survived in a time just prior to a man landing on the moon. It just
tells you how crazy and uneducated doctors are even by today's
standards.
Women
have always been condemned in this country for acting
out-of-the-ordinary. Look at the Salem Witch trials. Need I say more?
Burning women to death because of a stupid accusation.
Even
today, I can't guarantee these women would be safe with their art or
from being locked up. I take a terrible risk by writing everyday and
by leading an unconventional life that is very different from most
women on the planet. I am a female Bohemian, the likes of which very
few survive.
Marta
Becket, a woman ballet dancer, went to the desert to fulfill her
dream of opening her own theatre and left the rest of the glamorous
world in New York behind. In the film, Amargosa,
her life is portrayed and shown as it is in the movie, where she is
still dancing close to the age of ninety. She is a true bohemian.
(http://www.amazon.com/Amargosa-Marta-Becket/dp/B000JLTSBW)
In my
quest to find more Bohemian women, I resorted to entering "Women
Bohemians" into Google and low and behold another great blog
piece popped up. Black Women and Bohemianism by
Stacia L. Brown - Clutchmagonline.com
(http://www.clutchmagonline.com/2012/07/black-women-and-bohemianism/).
Granted, I don't know who any of these women are but it brings about
another subject of the Bohemian lifestyle that is often ignored,
race.
Plenty
of women, Maya Angelou, Ntozske Shange, Josephine Baker, Billie
Holiday (to name only a small few), extraordinary women of their time
and today leave a lasting impression fit for the title Artist and
Bohème. The fact that I can't name a whole bunch off the top of my
head though, shows a terrible lack of attention to the Black Women in
America, to the Latin and Hispanic Women of America (Frida Kahlo), to
the Asian Women in America, to the Native Women of America and so
forth. I want to give credit to everyone but history and the realm of
men place little value on these women.
I
struggle myself as: a white woman with some money in her pocket, who
at age 31-years-old, is finally paying rent by her own earnings for
the first time in her whole life.
My own
mother never paid her own rent in her entire life. My grandmother had
my mother at my age and was married to my grandfather (they
celebrated their 75th wedding anniversary!). My grandmother never
made enough of her own money to pay rent or buy a house and her
social security is way less than my grandfather's, whose income from
his county job supports her and the place they live in.
The
fact that I recognize myself as a Bohemian does not help matters. I
don't believe in marriage or in my case, having children. I strive to
be fully independent in all things and hate anyone who tries to take
away my freedom.
This
of course means I'll never have a house, the support of an additional
(and much higher) income than my own, no social status or security as
a House Wife, I will pay more taxes than anyone else (I pay 37% on
taxes a month out of my meager paycheck), I will be less likely to go
back to school and get a higher education (No Bachelor's or Master's
degree), I will have no household support from anyone else (I do my
own laundry, limited cooking, take the bus with no car, etc.), and
will have to rely on myself for everything.
That's
a lot to give up if you're a woman in this world. I don't like
relying on men for money, except for my boss of course, so that means
I'm on my own.
Is it
worth it?
I
don't have children. I'll never have to take them to the hospital or
suffer their crying and screaming as babies. I'm not responsible for
anyone but myself. I'm not married, so I'm not the property of a
husband. I can do what I please without having to ask for permission.
I manage my own money and no one save the government can take it away
from me. I make my own money with my job. I don't have to clean,
cook, sew, iron, do chores for anyone else but myself. I have no
pets. I can go out at night and dance for hours, walking back by
myself alone without having a man to babysit me. I can flirt or talk
to whoever I want without a problem.
Most
of all, my time is my own. I can create art, work on my musical,
write articles for my blog, go to a museum, write at a café or bar
at all hours of the night. I have my freedom as long as I have my own
money.
Virginia
Wolf described it as, A Room of One's Own,
where a woman needed her own money and a room of her own in order to
create art, to work in peace without distractions.
I have
many distractions... Living in Chinatown carries the noise and hustle
and bustle of city life and its many varied dwellers (most of whom
are not in their right minds). It provides much fodder for filling
pages as I observe the lives and actions of others.
I
barely have time for laundry, showering or eating and as I write
these words I neglect other work. My late night habits have disrupted
any routine I may have had but I realize life happens at its own pace
and I cannot do much more than I am already doing. Library books
accumulate with their fines, piles of paper stack themselves up with
piles of clothes all mixed together which creates a chaos that wastes
more time in the hours before I get ready for work.
I
barely have time to write. I proposed an experiment where I would use
Google to translate my spoken words to text but this hardly brings
them to life with so many errors that need correcting, I may as well
type the words myself on a computer.
Oh but
the time! Where has the time gone? I miss the bus and must walk to
work. I miss the bus again and must walk all the way home, though
this pleases me more. I must be at work by 3 p.m., do I have time for
laundry? No, it takes 25 minutes to wash and an hour to dry... I have
waited too long. Do I have time to shower at the gym? Maybe... if I
hurry. But do I feel like hurrying? Must I hurry all the time?
Living
in the city, you learn to lower your standards by a lot. For $800 in
Chico I had my own apartment with walk-in closet, a roomy living
room, another hallway closet, a dining room, a dining room closet, a
big kitchen and most of all: my own bathroom. Here, I get a 10x10
room with a walk-in closet, a sink and that's it. No kitchen but a
hot water pot, rice cooker and metal shelves that serve as my food
cabinet. All my food is dry and packaged. If I want fruit, dairy or
salad, I go to 7-Eleven. I share a bathroom with 50+ people and it's
not very clean. I have a gym membership which I take full advantage
of. Still... it's better than being homeless. I have a lot of bills
too.
I
looked up Dandy on the list of Bohemian traits. It's a terrible
likeness that I resemble but I know of no other trait that describes
me so well. On the site: mtholyoke.edu
(https://www.mtholyoke.edu/courses/rschwart/hist255-s01/boheme/dandyism.html),
there is a description of The Dandy:
Fashion:Appearance and the latest fashion was everything to a Dandy. They delighted in elegance and accessories such as white gloves, etc. A significant part of their day was spent grooming; Baudelaire claimed that he always spent at least two hours at his toilette. They also believed strongly in cleanliness; most probably bathed regularly.
Unfortunately,
I have yet to see a female dandy. Perhaps Virginia Wolf's Orlando
would more closely fit the bill. Orlando has the luxury of changing
from male to female and female to male. I can only do this with
clothes, though I definitely have the figure for both.
Where
is the female dandy Bohemian that I resemble? Where is my mirror
image in the world? I think I must create my own.
While
going through a Lesbian phase (yes, it was a phase after all), I had
to create the images that the mainstream media lacked: women
embracing each other in ads that were always male/female. I took
magazine ads, used Photoshop and made strong women, daring women,
sexy women with other women in poses that were never seen before. I
created another world because the real world lacked what I wanted. I
brought these images to life and published them on a webpage. Alas,
these images are no more... the internet is a temporary place and
nothing is permanent.
I must
create my own world and re-define the meaning of Bohème.
I'll
start with Specs' Twelve Adler Museum Cafe (bar). I was there just
last night and shall go again. It reminds me of the Chico bar staple,
Duffy's though with much less sports (I don't remember seeing a TV
there). I have found my place, I think.
