My Kingdom Of ME And A Print Giveaway!

The Blue Ribbon © Sarah Allegra, Model: Katie Johnson. ME’s awareness ribbon color is blue.

May 12th – what is it?

We are rapidly approaching May 12th.

Why is that important?

May 12th is recognized across the globe as Invisible Illness Day.  Though most people are unaware of its significance… which is part of the problem.

It’s a day for bringing more awareness to diseases like fibromyalgia, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome,  rheumatoid arthritis, Lyme disease, lupus, multiple sclerosis and Crohn’s Disease, along with many others.  Diseases which can have horrific, devastating effects on the person’s life, yet may not outwardly show.  They can be completely disabling, and the patient still looks “normal” to the world.

And of course, this list includes myalgic encephalomyelitis, or ME, which I have.*

What ME is –

I’ve spoken quite a lot about ME on my blog, so a lot of you probably know the basics of it.  But for anyone new, here’s a quick summary.  ME is a neurological disease defined, in part, by:

• Profound fatigue which is unrefreshed by rest and sleep.
• Chronic pain, which can occur anywhere in the body, but is especially common in muscles and joints.
• Insomnia and other sleep disturbances, despite your constant exhaustion.
• Post-exertional malaise (meaning you feel worse after you exert yourself — and the exertion can be as simple as a trip to the grocery store or walking to your mailbox).
• Neurological problems, a.k.a. “brain fog.”  This can manifest in the form of sudden clumsiness, tripping and falling, being unable to recall a word you knew just a second ago, suddenly forgetting how to read or write, forgetting your name… you get the idea.
• Headaches of new or worsening kinds (I never had migraines until ME started sinking its talons into me).
• Dysfunctional immune systems (if there’s a cold going around, I will get it).
• Hyper-sensitivity to any and all stimuli — I describe it as the volume in my brain being turned up to “11.”  Noises are very loud to me, lights are bright, smells overwhelming… the scent sensitivity means that anything artificially fragranced makes me nauseated, but it has led to me find small, unnoticed gas leaks inside houses on several occasions.
• Post-Exertional Neuroimmune Exhaustion (your brain functions worse in every way after even minimal efforts — mental or emotional efforts as well, not strictly physical ones).
• Low threshold of physical and mental fatigue (lack of stamina) resulting in a substantial reduction in pre-illness activity level — things you did before you were sick are now out of the question.

And so on.  Because ME affects every system of the body, in a way somewhat similar to multiple sclerosis, the symptoms can vary from person to person, but these are the classic signposts of the disease.

I have what would be defined as a “moderate” case of ME.   A mild case would be someone who could still maintain a somewhat normal life, but would probably need extra recovery time after big events, help lifting heavy objects, etc.  Moderate, like what I have, is someone who can’t work a normal job, is partly or completely house-bound, may not be able to drive and has a great deal of their life impacted by the disease.  Their world becomes much, much smaller and quieter.  Severe cases… you wouldn’t wish them on your worst enemy.  These are people who are completely bed-bound, unable to care for themselves in the most basic ways, unable to tolerate any light, sound or touch.  They lay in dark rooms in silence, often on morphine drips for their severe pain… and this can last for decades.  It’s been described as “a living death,” and for good reason.  It’s truly horrifying.  This is often the time when patients try to take their own lives.

Vanity’s Murder © Sarah Allegra, a self portrait

My Kingdom Of ME video –

I would like to say that I spent a great deal of reflection on coming up with the idea of my bed being my kingdom, but it was more of a response to thinking, “Shit, I have this video… now I need a name for it…”  But I think it holds true despite it’s spur-of-the-moment conception.

When you spend the vast majority of your time inside your house, it becomes your entire world.  If, on a good day, I take Calantha for a walk around the block, I feel like a Viking setting off to explore new lands (but not planning on Blood Eagle-ing anyone).  If my house is my world, my bedroom is my home, and my bed becomes my kingdom.

Though it is a queen-sized kingdom, it is a kingdom nonetheless.  This is where I am most myself, most honest, most raw, most pure.  I spend most of my time here, in my PJs, hair a mess and no makeup (because who’s going to see it, I don’t feel like putting it on, and I especially don’t feel like washing it off).  This room is most set up for my comfort and is bent to my will.  Why is there such a huge pile of stuff always on my nightstand, or next to my side of the bed?  Because then I can reach it easily, no matter what state I’m in.  Geoff’s side is spick and span, while mine is a crazy jungle, but that’s how it has to be.  In this whole world of things which cause us pain and discomfort, we need there to be someplace that is designed for us.  That is, usually, our beds.  And in my bed, I rule.

In Between Awake And Asleep – © Sarah Allegra, a self portrait

My art and my Enchanted Sleep series –

Some people are surprised to learn I have a chronic illness, especially one which confines me to my house and bed so much, since I seem to produce a lot of art.  It’s all the result of very careful planning of everything.  I keep my shoots very short and I plan several concepts I can shoot one right after the other while I have my model.  My shoot is usually the only major thing I have planned for the week.  Actually, it’s usually the only major thing I have planned that month.  If we’re driving to a location, my model will usually drive us since I’m often feeling too tired.  I try to bang out as many concepts as I possibly can, then I crash.  Usually the next two or three days will be awful, and I will pay dearly for my shoot.  But after that starts to wear off, I can sort through my images and work on editing them… which is only possible because I can do that with my laptop while lying in bed.  If I had to sit at a desk, I could not be a photographer.

Using my laptop and my Wacom tablet, I can create art again.  There was a while as I was getting sick where I was truly terrified that art would be taken away from me.  In one sense, that did happen, since I had to put away the pencils and paintbrushes which became too painful to wield, but art abhors a vacuum as much as nature does, and photography quickly sprang up in its place, with help from my photographer husband.

Photography has given me a voice.  But it’s more than that.  It’s given a voice to all of us who suffer from these invisible illnesses.  When I started shooting the images which would become a part of my Enchanted Sleep series, portraying what life with ME is like, I never dreamed that other people with illnesses would flock to it like they have.  I unintentionally tapped into an underserved community, and those within it have made their approval loudly known.  I didn’t set out to capture anything but my own experiences, but in doing so, I captured all of ours.

Spoon Theory © Sarah Allegra  –  a self portrait

This is why you should care –

ME alone effects millions across the globe.  There are millions and millions more who bear other invisible illnesses, and you might have no idea that they carry these with them everywhere they go.  Most likely, you know someone with one of these illnesses, though it might be undiagnosed.  Most of the invisible illnesses tend to be diagnoses of exclusion; meaning there’s no one test for this disease, so you have to rule out EVERYTHING else that it could be before you decide what it is.  It’s a long, grueling process, and not everyone really wants to know what’s wrong with them anyway.  For me, I couldn’t stand not knowing.

Your aunt who often complains of pain?  Your friend who frequently has to cancel plans?  Your sibling who gets migraines which always come at the worst times?  They may have one of these diseases.

The online chronic illness community (spoonies, we call ourselves) is extremely supportive, but we need to have healthy people on our side too.  We need real changes to be made in the world, and frankly, we are too ill to do it all on our own.

These are not diseases which merely dampen our fun or mildly cramp our style, these are diseases which kill.  Sometimes that death is a suicide, as the patients cannot stand the suffering any longer.  Even if left to more “natural” courses, these illnesses are evil thieves and rob us of years.  They take away our livelihood, our joys, our passions and, eventually, our lives.

How many more of us have to die before the world pays attention?

Unjust © Sarah Allegra – model: Aly Darling

A DreamWorld/Enchanted Sleep crossover print giveaway!

I try to always do something around May 12 to help bring awareness to ME and its sister diseases.  This year, I’m going to be giving away a print of a brand-new image… one which won’t be revealed until May 12th itself.  It’s going to be a really, really great image though, I can promise you 🙂

This one will feature model Katie Johnson, and it’s so complicated, I’ve been working on it on and off for about two years.  I had to put it aside for a long time until I upgraded my laptop.  The file size was SO huge, I could only work on it for about ten minutes before it would crash my entire computer.  Obviously, that didn’t work for me.  It’s still a monster of a file, but on the new machine it only crashes Photoshop every few days, which is much better..

This image will be very unique in that it straddles both DreamWorld and Enchanted Sleep, a foot in each world like the Pillar of Hercules.  No other image of mine does this.  It will be a first on several fronts!

Another thing about this image that’s special is that it will be the first to be printed on my new, museum-quality paper of choice: Hahnemuhle pearl paper.  You really have to see it to believe it.  It is a thick, luscious paper with a bit of texture to it, similar to watercolor paper.  What pushed me over the edge into switching to this paper though, is the very subtle, pearlescent shimmer built into the paper.  It is magic.  And it compliments the ethereal nature of my work so well, it seemed we were made for each other.

Did I mention that this special new print is a $400 value?

Is your interest peaked?  Want to win the print for yourself?  Instructions are right below.  🙂

A Fading Girl © Sarah Allegra, model: Brooke Shaden

This is how you enter –

Here’s how this giveaway works.  It’s going to be very easy and there are quite a lot of ways for you to enter!

First thing: subscribe to my blog if you haven’t already.  There’s a button in the upper right-hand section of the screen for you to enter your email address (which you may do safely, without fear of spamming or other annoyances).  Do that, then move on to step two:

You have your choice here!  You can either:

• Retweet the facts I’ve tweeted about ME (these are embedded at the bottom of this post to make things super easy – you can like or retweet it without even leaving this page!)
• Like me on Facebook and share my Kingdom Of ME post on Facebook
• Follow me on Instagram and re-Gram my Kingdom of ME Instagram post
• Like and re-blog this post if you’re a WordPress user

You can do all of those, too!  One note, if you choose to retweet any of my tweets, each new retweet will count as an entry.  I’ve given you quite a lot to choose from, mainly because I couldn’t narrow it down myself any more!  😉  So, for example, if you retweet all 11 tweets, that will count as 11 entries for you.  However, if you retweet the same tweet more than once, that does NOT count at as extra entry.  The maximum possible Twitter-related entries you can get is 11.  The same idea goes for the other social networking sites too.  If you share my Facebook post, that’s an entry.  If you share the same post twice (which I’m not sure you can do, but let’s say for argument’s sake that you can), then you still only get one entry.

And lastly, whichever social media platform you decide to use to enter the contest from, you must like/follow me there (and here on the blog) for the entry to count!

We Rise Again – © Sarah Allegra, a self portrait

And a couple of other ways to enter –

Now, those are all very important ways for you to enter the contest to win a gorgeous print for yourself.  A large part of why the entries are based in social media is to help raise more awareness about ME (and other invisible illnesses) by word of mouth.  However, there is another way you can get more entries for yourself.

Any purchases on ANY of the items I sell from today, May 4th, through midnight, PST, May 27th will count as entries!  This means that EACH INDIVIDUAL ITEM that you buy counts as its own entry.  If you buy five t-shirts from my Red Bubble shop, that’s five extra entries for you!

And on top of the purchases going toward extra entries for you, 25 PERCENT of ALL PROFITS on ALL ITEMS purchased will be donated to the Microbe Discovery Project!  The Microbe Discovery project is a wonderful organization here in the US actively looking for a cause and cure for ME.  I strongly believe in what they do, which is why I have chosen them to benefit from my sales.

It’s a very win-win situation!  You get to buy whatever it is that you’ve had your eye on, you get extra entries into the print giveaway and ME research is supported at the same time!

On May 29th, I will randomly pick one winner from all the entries and that person will receive the print!  It will be signed and numbered and shipped to wherever you live, even if it’s the other side of the world!  🙂

One last note about purchases, if you make a purchase, please leave a comment here on the blog and tell me what you purchased and where it was from.  Some of the sites I sell through hide the buyer’s info from me, so I won’t always be able to tell who bought what.  I want to make sure your purchases are properly accounted for!

Martyrs To A Name © Sarah Allegra – models: myself and Aly Darling

This is what I sell –

So, that probably leaves you wondering, what is it that I sell?  Well, quite a lot of things, actually!

I sell museum-quality fine art prints both through my Etsy shop and my gallery representative.

Prices are the same regardless of where you buy, so there’s no need to worry about having “hiked-up gallery prices” 🙂  My Etsy shop also has a few pieces of “wearable art,” some of which is inspired by DreamWorld characters and some of which was inspired by The Last Unicorn!  There’s also a whole section of ME-inspired images from my Enchanted Sleep series!

Through my Red Bubble shop I sell all of the following items with my images on them:

• Blank greeting cards/postcards (very inexpensive… and you could grab a couple for yourself and a few to give away!)
• Stickers (again, very inexpensive; grab some for yourself and some for a friend!)
• Tshirts and hoodies
• Laptop skins
• iPad covers
• iPhone covers
• Galaxy phone covers
• Throw pillows
• Tote bags (so, so useful, especially here in Los Angeles where plastic bags are banned!  Slide your purchases into one of these babies :))
• Zippered pouches in two different sizes
• Mugs (who doesn’t use mugs?)
• Travel Mugs for liquid on the go!

Aly took and sent me this lovely shot of her carrying her tote bag!  It was a bit strange at first to see my friend carrying a bag with my face in it 😉  We we both quite thrilled with the quality and according to Aly, it’s been getting tons of compliments and the straps are the perfect length!

And for something even more special, I also host a very unique online photography class,  INTROSPECTIVE: A Photographic Quest.

INTROSPECTIVE is much more about self-discovery than it is about knowing what f-stops are or having fancy equipment.  You don’t even have to have an actual camera; your phone will do perfectly well!  The course emphasizes self portraits as a way to get to know yourself better, but the definition of “self portrait” here is quite loose.  You never have to appear in an image unless you really want to.  What I mean by “self portrait” in this case is simply any photograph which shows me something about who you are as a person!

This is a very relaxed, reflective class.  There are no grades and no wrong answers!  For eight weeks, you will receive a new theme each week and your assignment will be to create an image around that theme which reflects you.  Love, joy and fears, for example, are all things you would be asked to create around.

This class is very unique!  I modeled it after my own journey of self-discovery as I started taking self portraits.  The art therapy was so helpful and healing to me that I wanted to give that back to the world in some way, so I created INTROSPECTIVE!

And as an extra bonus, here’s a special coupon code for INTROSPECTIVE!  Use the code May12ME25 to take 25 percent off the cost of the course!  Now that’s a win-win-win!!

Silenced © Sarah Allegra: model Travis Weinand

Wrapping up –

I know you guys hear me talk about ME quite a lot, but here’s the thing.  It matters.  It really, really fucking matters.

There is so much confusion, misunderstanding and so many flat-out lies about ME that we all need to work extra hard to shine the light of truth on it.  It’s not all the public’s fault; after all, they’ve been lied to by medical professionals for decades.  It all came unraveling  in the 80’s when ME’s name was intentionally changed to “Chronic Fatigue Syndrome” and given the belittling nicknames of “the yuppie flu,” “the disease of depressed, menopausal women” and, more recently, “fat, lazy housewife disease,” just so insurance companies could deny patients coverage.

ME does not discriminate.  It does not target people by color ,gender, social status or age.  It attacks anyone and everyone it can.  It destroys lives.  It brings promising careers to grinding halts.  It is not a way to “get a free ride;” we struggle just to sit up and get out of bed.

It could be your sister.  It could be your boyfriend or girlfriend.

It could you.

How many more lives have to be sacrificed on the alter of insurance companies’ desires to not pay out before we get change?  How many more patients have to take their own lives in despair?  How many more seriously ill patients have to endure the most hateful slurs you can imagine being thrown at them?  How many doctors will sigh, roll their eyes and tell us there’s nothing wrong with us psychically, that our problems are all in our heads?

No more.

We cannot let this happen to one more person.  Too many have endured this already.

We have the power to make radical changes.  We have the power to change society’s view of us, to force the government to give us proper funding, to stop treating us like Cinderella instead of their own daughters.  We have the power to unlock the mystery of ME and find a cure.  We CAN do this.  But we must come together, make our voices heard and DEMAND it.  It will never be easily handed to us.  Too many huge companies are invested in not spending any money on those with ME.  But while history shows us many ugly truths, it also shows us that we, the common people, have great power in our hands to bring about the changes we want.

We just have to ask for it loudly enough.

Please join me in demanding change for patients with ME.  Things cannot continue the way they are any longer.

And as you help me advocate for invaluable change in the world, you’ll also be giving yourself a chance to win a gorgeous, fine art print 🙂  Help me with this.  And thank you.

Embedded tweets are just below!

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3 Good Days © Sarah Allegra, a triple self portrait

Footnote

[*Because the United States does not officially recognize the name “myalgic encephalomyelitis,” despite decades of public outcry for change and hundreds of thousands signing petitions, they continue to stick to “Chronic Fatigue Syndrome” or “fibromyalgia.”  Depending on which doctor of mine you talk to, I may have three different diagnoses.  The US is especially complicated in how it defines – or, rather, it’s lack of definition – the differences between the three so it’s impossible to talk about one in the US without talking about all of them.  For the record, they are NOT all the same disease, but that is essentially how the US treats them.  I know that what I have is ME and not the other two, but many of my doctors had not have heard of ME until I told them about it.  ME has scientific, diagnosable guidelines, which I fit, but the country still refuses to adopt the name and its excellent guidelines.  If you’re interested in learning more about why this is, here’s an article for you, but for this post, I will leave the subject there.]

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Instant Chaos Nakedly Obvious – Marriage Equality

The following was originally posted on Unsinn Image’s Instant Chaos blog on Tumblr and is reprinted with his permission.  I very, very, very rarely post other people’s writing on my blog; in fact, this may be a first.  But it’s an important subject, and one I felt he summed up much better than I could have.  Please check out the rest of his blog!

* * * * *

This image was created for my social justice passion project “Nakedly Obvious.”  The model is the incomparable Playboy model Stephy C.

The Supreme Court is currently hearing arguments for and against gay marriage.

One of the Court’s considerations is whether we should upset a heterosexual tradition of marriage which has persisted for thousands of years.

But, how has that tradition been perpetuated?  Through religion.

Religion…which has no place in a secular debate about civil rights.

Remove the illogical, archaic, religious doctrine from the debate and there is absolutely no justification to deny adults of sound mind the right to be legally bound by their love.

Define a group in any other way, then try and make the argument they shouldn’t marry.  You would sound ridiculous.

BANK TELLERS shouldn’t be allowed to marry.

FARMERS shouldn’t be allowed to marry.

LEFT-HANDED PEOPLE shouldn’t be allowed to marry.

CHRISTIANS shouldn’t be allowed to marry.

Would anyone in their right mind go all the way to the Supreme Court to defend the position that Christians shouldn’t be allowed to marry?  You’d be laughed out the front door.  And that is exactly what should happen to those who oppose gay marriage.

This question is, and has always been, a matter of equal protection and civil rights.  And when history reflects on this era in our social evolution — as it has over past judicial missteps involving segregation and slavery — it will judge us most harshly if we fail to insure equal protection and civil rights to all of our citizens.

And rightfully so.

Two people in love committing to each other is not harmful to marriage.  That is what marriage IS…or at least, what it should be.  Defending the right of one person to marry and denying the same right to a similarly-situated person is unlawful discrimination.  Period.  And if the Justices can keep clear eyes and heads and not be blinded by religious fervor, defending the rights of EVERYONE to marry who they love will be an inevitable outcome.

A New York Times article on the deliberations can be read here.

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Turning Leaves

I think it’s fair to say that 2014 has been something of a tumultuous year.  A lot of very good things happened!  And a lot of rather shitty things have happened to.  Let’s touch on the bad first and get that out of the way.

Reuniting With The Stars – detail © Sarah Allegra; read on for the full image!

There was a heavy dose of bad this year.  Some of this has been discussed on the blog; three months of colds, sinus surgery, sinus surgery having dramatic and frightening complications, etc.  A lot of it has not been discussed on the blog, however; this does not feel like the proper forum for a lot of the more personal matters, especially ones which involve people other than myself.

The Oracle – © Sarah Allegra

Geoff and I have to move.  We are really, really, really not happy about this.  I’m not going to discus the reasons for the move here, except to say that no one did anything wrong.  We always paid our rent, etc.  This is a heartbreaking blow; our neighbors have become like true family to us.  And while we won’t live too far apart after we all move to our new homes, it will never be the same as when we all lived together on the Compound, as we called it.

We Rise Again – © Sarah Allegra

When my first surgery complication began and I started bleeding profusely from my nose to the extent that I was truly concerned that I might need an ambulance, our neighbor John came rushing home to make sure I was ok until Geoff could get there.  Once John and I decided an ambulance wasn’t needed, he sat on the floor with me and kept me calm and distracted.

Sleight Of Hand © Sarah Allegra, featuring my neighbor, John

When I found myself suddenly clutching a whole litter of baby opossums and in charge of their safety, Donna came to the rescue and helped me keep them safe.  (They were eventually taken to a no-kill shelter which would rehabilitate them then release them into the wild when they were old enough.)  These are not your average people.  When we all found out that we’d no longer be living together, everyone cried openly.

One of the baby opossums

And good heavens, it’s been so good for Calantha to be there!  Having a “pack” next door which she can come and go from as she pleases helped her put on a needed five pounds, which she’s maintained the whole time we’ve been here.  Basically, absolutely everyone is extremely unhappy about this for a lot of reasons, but there’s nothing we can do to stop it.

Calantha, modeling the Lady Death bonnet

And of course I’ve been able to do a LOT of shooting there!  There are SO MANY trees; it’s very easy to make the background look like a forest if you just frame around the tell-tale signs of human habitation.  When you’re dealing with ME, being able to do an entire shoot without leaving your yard, or even getting out of your PJs if you want, can be an incredible boon.

This has also been an extremely tight year financially for us (which a move isn’t going to help).  Again, I shouldn’t go into exact details here, but a large part of our income vanished early this year and we’ve been trying to stanch the metaphoric bleeding ever since.

The Eye Of The Storm © Sarah Allegra

Those are the biggest highlights of the bad, of the things I feel I can talk about here.  It’s been a really difficult year and there have been many times when I’ve dissolved into tears over one more bad thing happening.  The world has felt completely against us most of the year, no matter what we’re planning or how noble it might be, which of course feels terribly unfair.  I’m holding out hope that this is all happening for a reason and that things will change soon.  Some days that’s a very difficult hope to hold on to.  I’ll talk a little more about this when I discuss this year’s new image.

Let’s move on to happier topics for now.  Let’s talk about some of the good things that happened this last year!

Inside Looking Out © Sarah Allegra

I was able to promote a lot of awareness about myalgic encephalomyalitis, or ME, with images (which go in my Enchanted Sleep series), interviews, articles, videos and blog entries.  During ME Awareness week, I wrote a blog entry for each day of the week and held a print giveaway for those who helped spread awareness about it.  The Microbe Discovery Project asked for people to share their ME stories, so I recorded a short video for them.

I got to work with some really fantastic new models, Dan Donohue and Travis Weinand.  They were both wonderful; the kind of models who make you want to come up with new concepts just for them.  I’m looking forward to working with both of them again!

Where Black Stars Rise © Sarah Allegra

Lost Pride © Sarah Allegra

 

I lost Dedeker Winston to the FOX show Utopia for a while, and I’m selfishly glad to have her back again 🙂

Water For The Free © Sarah Allegra

I was really pleased to have been included in quite a few online magazines, blogs and sites.  Photo Focus named me their Photographer of the Week.  Millennial Magazine gave me their Self Portrait of the Week spot.

Phlearn, one of my very favorite photography sites, included me in their Weekend Inspiration blog three times during the year, with the images Lady Death, The Shadows Lengthen and The Light Is Winning.

Lady Death © Sarah Allegra

I was able to have brushes with both of my favorite authors, Robin McKinley and Peter S. Beagle.  Robin McKinley was gracious enough to let me write two guest posts for her blog and talk about DreamWorld!  In addition to the ongoing work I’ve been doing with Peter Beagle and Connor Cochran, Peter’s manager/publisher as well as my business manager, they had a special showing of The Last Unicorn in Santa Fe, NM, in a theater George RR Martin has helped restore.  Since George RR Martin was going to be at the screening, Connor asked for some of my prints to hang in the theater, which led to this amazing moment caught on camera between the two beloved authors.  While I have been credited as taking the photo, I was unable to be there in person although I would have LOVED to have been there!

Peter S. Beagle and George RR Martin with unicorn and dire wolf plushies, in front of my prints!

My dear friend and frequent model Katie Johnson started a video series interviewing some of the wonderful photographers she works with called Artist Profile.  Katie was kind enough to start the series interviewing me; you can see the video below!  The series has been really interesting to watch grow and I’m very honored to be a part of it!

Many of you will have heard me talk about how intensely I love Sundance’s original show Rectify.  If you’re new to the party, I LOVE IT.  Go watch it right now.  Both seasons are streaming on Netflix!  For those who have seen it, I gathered my courage, reminded myself that it’s just a show and that these are actors, not the actual characters, and asked Jayson Warner Smith (Wendell on the show) if I could interview him for the blog.  He is actually a lovely and not at all icky, creepy person and kindly sad yes to my interview request!

Tell Me A Happy Story © Sarah Allegra

One of my images was featured on Etsy‘s front page which made me squeal like a little girl.  Luckily I got a screen capture of it before it changed to another treasury!

Etsy’s front page 08/08/2014

After I released Where Earth Meets The Sky, it was requested that I make a video showing how I’d created the image.  Happy to oblige, I made the following video:

Through the kind help of my friend Handy Andy Pandy, I learned how to make animated gifs showing the whole editing process of an image, which I’ve had a lot of fun doing!  I don’t do it for every image just for time reasons, but I think it’s fun to do when I can.  Speaking of Andy, he included me in his recommended artist list both for his part of the Blog Hop, and also on the article he wrote for FStop Lounge titled 3 Photographers You Should Follow.  I blushed and couldn’t have been prouder!

The Blue Ribbon © Sarah Allegra

I wrote an article for In My Bag titled 5 Reasons Why Creative Self Portraiture Will Help You Become An Epic Photographer.  Brooke Shaden was the guest judge that month and felt my article was good enough that she created a third place spot just so my article could be crowned third!  Talk about feeling good!

I’ll try and wrap up this year’s big interviews and features… there was the one Lens People did, a lovely and in-depth interview with Ezra Magazine, and another feature from Dodho Magazine.  The wonderful publication Photography Monthly included one of my self portraits in their October issue from this year.

Where Earth Meets The Sky, model Katie Johnson. © Sarah Allegra

The esteemed Photographer’s Forum chose one of my images, Where Earth Meets The Sky, modeled by Katie Johnson, as a finalist in their 2014 Best of Photography Contest.

Photographer’s Forum Best of Photography 2014 book – click here to get your own copy!

Perhaps one of the best online feature I’ve had so far came this year when BoingBoing ran a feature on my “dreamy, trippy, fantasy photography” after seeing it come up in their Flickr stream!

Singed Wings © Sarah Allegra – an image to honor the Granite Mountain Hotshots

But I think the feature I’m most proud of came from winning a contest from Good Light! Magazine, hosted by Viewbug.  The contests’ theme was “People and Water.”  My image “A Drop of Blood” was chosen as the winning photo, which of course was just thrilling!  But the prizes were really meaningful to me; first, a feature on View Bug’s blog about how I captured the image.  Next was a really lovely article in Good Light!’s magazine about why the image was chosen:

Good Light Magazine Feature, image © Sarah Allegra

And then my very favorite part was watching the short video where you can actually hear from the contest’s judge himself (and hear it in his lovely accent!) about why the winning images were chosen.  It was truly thrilling and embarrassing to hear someone say such nice things about my photograph!  Although I will gently note that the title came first and the image was built around it, not the other way around, but I can certainly see how it could confuse people!

Now, in less photography-related news, Geoff and I got to see the Breaking Bad House.  We also celebrated out 3-year anniversary of being married, which Geoff worked hard to made special despite me being deep in the hell of every-three-week-colds.

Happy anniversary!!!

At the advice from Patti Penn, my Reiki teacher, and Geoff, I started making an important mental shift.  I realized that I was looking at my future with ME as written in stone; that it was a pre-determined fate for me to always be sick with it to some degree.  Sure, you hear about some people who go into remission, and even more rarely, are cured, but it was too painful to hope for that.  I tried to not expect that I would always get progressively worse, even though that seemed to be the direction everything was heading in, regardless of whatever diet or lifestyle changes I made.  It was less scary to expect that I’d always be dealing with it to some degree; opening myself up to the idea that I might get better some day was making myself vulnerable to extreme disappointment.

The Fragile Blossom That Opens In The Snow © Sarah Allegra

But I slowly started realizing that if I expected to always be sick, it would become a self-fulfilling prophecy and I would always be sick.  So as frightening as it might be, I had to start letting the idea of being healthy enter my life.  And it was very scary, very difficult.  Knowing you’re going to be fucked for the rest of your life is something you can adjust to, prepare for and learn to accept.  Having the possibility of healing destroyed the mental plans I’d been preparing myself for, and while it would be a very, very good thing to find myself well, the risk of shattering disappointment was so great, I didn’t want to even entertain the idea.

But I needed to embrace that idea, as terrifying as it might be.  Geoff and Patti both brought up the same idea to me, completely independent from each other and without knowing what I’d been thinking through.  It seemed like a very clear sign.  So I’m taking a deep breath and plunging into the frightening unknown.  The unknown where I could get better some day.  And if I don’t get better, it certainly will be heartbreaking.  But if I don’t allow myself to be vulnerable in this way, then I definitely will not ever get better.

Toward The Boiling Sun © Sarah Allegra

This is one of my big plans for 2015.  Every day, instead of dwelling on what I couldn’t or didn’t do, focus on what I did do.  Even if 99.9% of me feels like complete shit, focus on that .01% where I felt good.  Instead of being frustrated, angry and disappointed with the limitations of my body and mentally say nasty, demoralizing to it, I’ll praise it for the good it did.  I’ll tell it that I know it’s working so hard, that it’s trying its best and that I appreciate all the effort it goes to.  It will take time to make this mental shift, but it’s worth making it.  And I will practice grace with myself, both in what my mental dialogue is and with however long it takes me to heal.  I believe this is the only way I have any hope of getting completely better some day… and no matter how painful that hope can be sometimes, I will commit to it.

Spring’s Awakening © Sarah Allegra

I’ve got a lot I’ll be working on through 2015.  I have big plans for my Glass Walls series, which explores animal rights, along with continuing to build DreamWorld.  A couple burners are being kept busy with Peter Beagle/Conlan-related plans.   And I’ve got numerous projects at various points of completion which I’ll be sharing with you when I can 🙂

The Light Is Winning © Sarah Allegra

I’ve scattered some of my favorite images taken over the past year throughout this post (many of which you can find in my 2015 calendar, on sale here!), but I wanted to leave you with something to inspire you in your own photo creations!  So, in no particular order, here are some of the photographers I recommend you start following right now, if you haven’t already!  There may be some nudity, so just keep that in mind.

Jessica Trinh/Sprinkle Happiness

David Talley

Helen Warner

Chris Arnade

Tim Andrews

Kindra Nikole

Kirsty Mitchell

Brooke Shaden

Robert Cornelius

Handy Andy Pandy

Unsinn Image

And lastly, though she is not a photographer, I highly recommend following Katie Johnson, one of the models I work with most frequently.  She writes blogs for several site which cover a variety of subjects and angles.  If you’re interested in modeling or pole dancing to gain confidence, you’ll find her a kindred spirit.  If you’re a photographer, many of her articles are directed at you and will help you improve your photographer/model relationships.  Plus, she’s just the loveliest person and one I am happy to have in my life and call a friend 🙂

Carried Away By The Wind © Sarah Allegra – a rare image without a human subject

So… this new image.  As I’ve said, it’s really been a pretty rough year, all around.  I watched a movie with my mom recently, on a day she came to visit me after my surgery and make sure I actually laid down all day (something I have trouble doing).

Winter’s Tale ended up being very much a “Sarah movie” as Geoff calls them.  Critics weren’t overly taken with it, and I can see their arguments, but at the end of the day, I still really enjoyed the movie.  It’s hard to make mythic, hopeful movies which are sweet without being cloying or heavy-handed, and I felt that Winter’s Tale balanced itself well.  It’s also very beautiful visually and several of the themes inspired new creations of my own.

Richness In Winter © Sarah Allegra

One of the movie’s main points is that “everything happens for a reason” (even the bad things).  This has been such an incredibly trying year; right now I can’t imagine good reasons for the numerous bad things which have hounded Geoff and me this year.  This image is sort of a peace-offering in a way.  A symbol to the universe to say I don’t know what the purpose of these things could have been, but I’m going to trust that there is a reason.  And not just any reason, but a good one.  One I will look back on later and smile, thinking of all the heartache and knowing it had been worth it.

This is the attitude I want to start 2015 off with.  A humble admission that I don’t have all the answers, and never will, but that I am continuing my direction of my life in the hope that tremendous good will be found along this path.  At the moment it feels a bit like a blind faith, but I have decided this is the mindset I need to start off 2015.  I am taking my leap; I hope the universe catches me.

Reuniting With The Stars © Sarah Allegra

Thank goodness Byron was around to lend me his opinion while I edited Katie 🙂

Vegan “burger” patties, mashed garlic cauliflower and baked potato, in case you’re curious what I was eating for dinner that night 🙂

 

What are you holding onto for 2015?  What plans are you making?  What hopes do you have?  I’d love to hear them!

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Cacti And Sinuses

“She twines her spine up slowly

Toward the boiling sun

And when I touched her skin

My fingers ran with blood”

-True Detective’s Theme Song “Far From Any Road,” by The Handsome Family

Toward The Boiling Sun – detail- © Sarah Allegra

It occurs to me that Cacti and Sinuses sounds like a weird band name 🙂

Here we have another True Detective-inspired image for my Pop Culture set of images.  This one was inspired more directly by the song used in the show’s title sequence, Far From Any Road, by The Handsome Family.  The song’s lyrics tell the story of a cactus which blooms once every thousand years.  Anyone who witnesses the rare event is driven mad by it.  Which, considering how much inspiration the show took from Robert W. Chambers’ The King In Yellow, a short story collection about a fictitious play which will drive any viewers or readers  insane, feels perfectly fitting.  It also is a brilliant pairing in mood and style for the show; the images and beautiful double exposures all work in such harmony… it’s the most beautiful pairing of music and television.

I don’t think my imagination is anywhere near being done inspired by True Detective though!  It’s the show that just keeps giving and giving 🙂

I’d like to clarify that I did not actually force Katie Johnson to sit nude in the middle of a cactus pile.  No models were harmed in the making of this image!  I composited an image I shot of Katie from a high angle with images I shot of my neighbor Donna’s cacti and blended them together in Photoshop.  Thanks to Geoff for steadying the ladder I was on shooting the cacti and helping to make sure I didn’t get stuck by any of their needles!

Changing the subject; at this point, I’ve had eight colds since the end of July, one of one which lasted for 3 weeks, two ear infections with the colds and strep throat another time, so I am having sinus surgery tomorrow.  Apparently my sinuses aren’t draining like they’re supposed to, the germs are never really leaving and they keep taking over my body again and again.  Despite my generally poor health with the fibro and ME, my sinuses haven’t really ever been an issue up till now, so I’m hopeful that the surgery will clear things out and this will stop being an issue.  On average, I’ve only had about two to three weeks between colds for the last three and a half months and I can’t tell you how VERY TIRED I am of having colds.  Lots of acute illnesses of top of chronic illness feels terribly unfair.

The last couple months have been rough health-wise, but I’m very eager to let the doctor clean me out and hopefully set me down headed the right direction!  I’ve been told to expect to feel extra crappy for a while after the surgery, and I was able to get a few simpler images edited before today in case I’m feeling really terrible for a while, so there shouldn’t be any big break in images being posted.  I will also have my wonderful husband Geoff to help me through my recovery; he has had this exact surgery before, which I’m sure will be very handy to help me figure out how to best deal with whatever negative effects I feel from it.  He’ll be with me the whole day of my surgery and the next, and after that I should be ok to be on my own.  But I’ve got my wonderful neighbors right next door in case anything comes up!

I’m chomping at the bit to get the surgery over with so I can start actually feeling better, but of course I’m also a little nervous about it.  So wish me luck; your good thoughts and energy will be very welcome!  I’ll try and update the blog when I’m feeling up to it.

Anyone else here on Instagram?  I just joined recently; let me know if you’re on there!  Also, if you missed it, please see my last post about the near extinction of wild lions, as portrayed through Travis Weinand in DreamWorld; a cause very important to me!

One of the things I love about working with Katie is how her heavy dance background translates so beautifully into her modeling.  She is just always so graceful and effortlessly aware of every part of her body, able to emote even through her fingers and toes.  With that said, please enjoy Katie’s beautiful work in this latest image of her!

Toward The Boiling Sun © Sarah Allegra

Toward The Boiling Sun – detail- © Sarah Allegra

Toward The Boiling Sun – detail- © Sarah Allegra

Toward The Boiling Sun – detail- © Sarah Allegra

Thanks, Katie!  You’re always beautiful!  And thanks to everyone in advance for your well wishes!

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Dedeker’s Utopia

I first met Dedeker Winston over four years ago, when I was just starting out as a photographer.

Yggdrasil – © Sarah Allegra

She was one of the first models I worked with and we clicked so well that we’ve been working together ever since.  She is one of my go-to models, one of the best and most reliable I have.

All Of Winter In A Day – © Sarah Allegra

She instinctively understands what I’m wanting from a shoot and she delivers every time.  Of course, I adore my other models too, I have the best group of ladies and gents willing to pose for me, but this post is specifically about Dedeker.

Mark of Cain – © Sarah Allegra

Because, you see, Dedeker was chosen to be on Fox’s new reality show Utopia, which airs tonight.  Their sites describes the show’s premise well, so I’ll let them explain it:

La Belle Dame Sans Merci – © Sarah Allegra

“Behold UTOPIA, a bold new series based on the hit Dutch program. Watch what happens as 14 pioneering Americans wave goodbye to the lives they’ve known, move to a remote location, and set out to create a society from scratch. They’ve got limited supplies, wildly diverse backgrounds, and zero bathrooms.

What could go wrong — besides everything?

The Utopians will make every decision about how they live and work. Will they choose democracy or dictatorship? Capitalism or socialism? Fidelity or free love? Which religion, if any, will prevail? Will they punish or forgive? Keep or share?

Are those chickens friends….or food? If not now, when?

It is all up to them.

This is not a game. There is no prize. This is UTOPIA: reality TV in its truest form.”

Shades We Weave – © Sarah Allegra

It will certainly be interesting to watch how the show evolves.  And of course I’ll be watching to support my girl Dedeker 🙂

Wings For Marie – © Sarah Allegra

One of the unique qualities about the show is how long-running it’s intended to be; the contestants have to be willing to stay there for up to a year; perhaps even longer.  While no one is guaranteed to stay that long, it’s a possibility.  And I’ll admit, I was very sad to think about not having one of my favorite girls around to shoot spontaneously as the desire came up.

Alone In The Wilderness – © Sarah Allegra

But I’m more interested in supporting Dedeker.  This sounds like a really unique opportunity for her and she’ll definitely come out with the story of a lifetime to tell!

Are You The Beast Again? – © Sarah Allegra

So in the spirit of supporting her and promoting her being on the show, I decided to put together a post with some of my favorite Dedeker images from the last four years of partnership!

Potion – © Sarah Allegra

All of the Utopia contestants have their own catch phrase/tagline for lack of a better term.  Dedeker has been billed as the professionally-belly-dancing, polyamorous, nude model who has no fears of being naked – a trait I can personally attest to.  I have many images of her, both clothed and unclothed, but for the purpose of this post, I’m going to celebrate more of her nude work.

Water Birth – © Sarah Allegra

She is equally skilled at both kinds of modeling, even when it involves wearing hand-made, noxious-smelling, tea-dyed dresses, heavy crowns of branches which have to be strapped to her body to support them, with decorative ribbons biting into her flesh because her photographer was too busy focusing on other details and she was too much of a pro to complain.

The Court Of The Dryad Queen

Dedeker has been instrumental in the building of my most-beloved photography series, DreamWorld (my own Utopia, if you will).  She has portrayed countless characters, including dryads, oracles and deer-people to name a few.

Water For The Free – © Sarah Allegra

The Oracle – © Sarah Allegra

So good luck to all the Utopians!  But most of all to Dedeker 🙂

Coming Over Like A Storm – © Sarah Allegra

And De, let me know when you’re back so we can shoot again!!

Fledgling – © Sarah Allegra

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The Storm-Bringer

Time for another DreamWorld character!

The Eye Of The Storm – detail

I like to think of the Storm-Bringer as the counterpoint to the Wind Goddess:

Where Earth Meets The Sky

They have similar powers and both rule over the sky, but one brings the weather we like, while the other brings that which we don’t like.  Which is not to say that the Storm-Bringer is an evil character; not at all.  Storms are useful to the world in a variety of ways; bringing rain is just one of them.  While me might prefer one over the other, both are needed and they balance each other.

This image was actually not one I’d set out to create.  Katie and I were shooting something else entirely, which had nothing to do with DreamWord, but when I sorted through the raw images, one of them really caught my eye.  I was shooting about Katie (from the second story of my mom’s house) and an image where she was flipping her hair around sparked something in me.  I looked at the next few frames where her hair continued its circular flip and thought it would look cool if I blended them all together.

Just for the hell of it, I brought the images into Photoshop and started playing around… and I played some more… and some more, and then I had a finished piece which I really loved!  As I looked at the finished image, I realized I’d created a new DreamWorld character without having planned it, but her story quickly formed inside my head.

We cannot have a world where there are only beautiful, sunny days.  Even an imaginary world.  The dark needs the light and the light needs the shadow, otherwise it would be a flat, saccharine depthless place.  DreamWorld started initially as an escape, and more importantly, not something I expected to turn into such a long, rich, detailed place as it has.  It is still my escape, but I can now fill in some of the darker areas along with the joy and sunlight.  A story isn’t a story without a conflict, without a villain.  Using a religious metaphor pioneered by Carl Jung and Joseph Campbell, a trinity (father, son, holy spirit) is inherently incomplete.  And one more facet to it, making it a quaternity (father, son, holy spirit and devil) and it becomes complete and self-sustaining.  The dark and the storms enhance the light, but the light will always defeat the dark.

Though, if we’re speaking purely of wish-fulfillment, I would never have a bright, sunny day.  I would fit in very well somewhere like Portland or Seattle, since my favorite days are the gray, overcast ones, a little on the cool side.  In my perfect world, every day would be like that, but even I realize the need for a storm now and then to shake things up 🙂

Check out the making-of gif below the main image!

The Eye Of The Storm

The Eye Of The Storm gif

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