Some Things

There are some things. First, I am very excited to report that today marks the official release of the online issuu publication Reflections on Second Life (see http://issuu.com/nordanart/docs/reflectionsonsecondlife), which can be read for free online. This work contains Second Life reflections, which are also part of this blog. The publication is a collaboration between Huckleberry Hax and myself and it serves as a memory book, a closure of sorts for me and, perhaps, as a Second Life reference guide for others. Second, this blog will from now on rarely contain Second Life related material. So far, it has served as a transitional forum for me, a space where I have been able to process with my writing the fact that I left Second Life. It will serve this purpose no more. Finally, I will reactivate my Second Life avatars today. This does not mean that I will return to Second Life. It simply means that I don’t want to lose my avatars, they are too meaningful to me.

Photo above by Flora Nordenskiold.

SaveMe Oh Continued

As predicted there was an outburst of negativity, lies and bashing in response to my SaveMe Oh blog post, written on March 1, 2012. The response, however, did not come from SaveMe herself, but rather from a small group of loyal supporters, who all seemed quite agitated about the post for several reasons (http://savemeoh.wordpress.com/2012/03/06/sweet-words-from-my-dear-friend-flora-nordenskiold/#comments). The main reason was that some of these angry fans seemed to chose to identify themselves as “attention seekers, social butterflies, who rose to pseudo-fame,” perhaps having failed to read further down in the blog post where there was also mentioned “a group of people who genuinely favored her approach and supported her [SaveMe Oh].” There were also several comments related to me being an “ex junky of SL (she is now in rehab),” lead by the always toxic appearing Rose Borchovski. Obviously, I don’t identify as an “ex-junky;” Second Life was taking up too much of my time, I left and I processed the leaving in this blog. Perhaps Rose herself has addictive tendencies in relation to Second Life that she is in denial about? Who knows. Maybe the consistently irritated and angry seeming Cat Shilova should simply refrain from reading this blog if she has a problem with me processing leaving Second Life in this way? Perhaps she has nothing else to do. Who knows. Above is a photo of Rose, SaveMe and myself in front of Nordan Art some time after we had first met in Second Life. I like it because it reminded me of a simpler time. Peace.

Photo above by Flora Nordenskiold.

Second Life: Writing

When I first came to Second Life I was intrigued by the writing community. I wanted to write a novel, set in Second Life. I started writing it several times, but was never motivated enough to finish. I felt discouraged by this, I thought writing was my thing; in Real Life I had been writing poetry, short stories and academic work all my life. So instead, religiously, I went to book reading events and writing forums, perhaps looking for inspiration. But I found these events dull. Until the day when I encountered Huckleberry Hax. He was reading a chapter out of one of his books at an event. I found out that Huck had written several novels set in Second Life. Needless to say, I became a great admirer. It was also around this time that I met Igor Ballyhoo and I became involved with the art community, which for some reason appealed to me much more than the writing community. I gave up on wanting to write a novel and started working on Nordan Art and the blog writing began. I invited Huck to read at Nordan Art. At some point we partnered and Second Life writing and reading became a big part of my life again. We went to Second Life reading events together and I no longer found them so dull. Through Huck I have learned that in order to be a Second Life fiction writer you had to be driven; Huck wrote all the time, he couldn’t help himself, he just had to do it. He wrote Second Life novels, short stories, poetry, AVENUE Magazine articles and blog posts and had found a way to make it all seem easy and natural. Writing was clearly his thing. Huck was well-known in the Second Life writing community. He was also invested in getting his written work published and found ways to do this. All of his books were published and available online. Obviously, writing was hard work and if you wanted to get your work noticed by larger audience you had to invest time and energy into properly promoting yourself. It became clear to me that writing fiction in Second Life involved so much more than simply half-heartedly beginning drafts of a novel.

Photo above by Flora Nordenskiold.

Second Life: Fantasy

I always thought that one of the people who was the most invested in incorporating fantasy into her art was Maya Paris. I was immensely drawn to her work and blogged about it often. Her installations were colorful and interactive, making the observer a big part of it. I thought of Maya as an adult Pippi Longstocking; the stuff she created was free of restriction and filled with imagination. It usually happened that I went to check out her work on my own, to write about it for my blog. I would read her detailed note cards and put on a costume and then I would dance like nobody was watching. See, this was the thing with Second Life in general though, you could really always dance like nobody was watching. Since we were always in front of computer screens, never present as a physical person, we were all wearing masks of sorts, we were invisible. We could be who we chose to be and there was no need to feel self-conscious or shy about it at all. I think we were generally aware of this on superficial level only. It was usually when we involved fantasy that we truly became aware of how limited we had been without it; we then became like children playing and we pretended. It was an utterly freeing experience. There were many other artists who made great use of fantasy in Second Life, like for instance Kikas Babenco and Marmaduke Arado, or The Wearers, with their shows The Extraordinary Adventures of Kikas and Marmaduke. I went to their show twice and I had a blast. And of course one made use of fantasy on one’s own in Second Life as well. When being creative, using my imagination, I always felt liberated; building, terraforming, creating photo collages, taking photographs or writing set me free.

Photo above by Flora Nordenskiold.

Done

I have two more Second Life reflection blog posts to write and then I have reached my goal of twenty and we can start putting together the issuu publication. I am ready to leave Second Life behind now; it took me about a month to get to this point. I no longer feel the pull to log on to Second Life in the mornings and the evenings. I have found other things to do in real life that are equally satisfying. When I think back at Second Life I am no longer only tempted by the wonderful things I experienced there, like my friendships, the gallery, the blog and magical things like flying or teleporting. I also remember the things that were not so great now, like the pull to always log on (even if I didn’t really need to) and the incredible amount of time I invested and could have used for other things. When I look at photos I took in Second Life, I usually get butterflies in my stomach, remembering specific moments. I suspect this will always be the case.

Photo above by Flora Nordenskiold.

Second Life: Dreams

Second Life was a place where dreams were made. Some aspects of the dream were already in place and others one could dream up oneself. Already present dream parts were things like flying, teleporting, falling off a high cliff and not dying, breathing and talking under water, dancing in the sky, getting dressed and undressed in two seconds and eternal youth. Then there was the personal dream. These dreams, of course, came in all shapes and forms. Some people dreamt of making money and opened businesses and became rich. Others looked for love and married and maybe even had children. There were people who wanted to live out some sexual fantasy, like engaging in BDSM. There were others who made art and excelled at it. Then there were people like me, who initially didn’t have an agenda, but whose dream developed over time. My dream was about creativity. It was lacking in my Real Life and I found an outlet for it in Second Life. At first, I created things myself, which I loved, but wasn’t very good at. Then I started writing the blog, which seemed to come easier to me. After that, I became involved with creativity only indirectly by exhibiting the works of others. Gradually, then, I had created my Second Life dream; a gallery, Nordan Art, from which all kinds of related creative efforts emerged. Ultimately, I spent most of my time writing about and showing the art of others, which I found tremendously satisfying. If anyone would have told me when I first haphazardly joined Second Life several years ago that I would make come true my dream to become a gallery owner and curator I would have laughed out loud simply because at that time I did not know that this was my dream. But this is the thing with Second Life; via fantasy and creativity one gets access to a deeper level of experience which otherwise might never have been known.

Photo above by Flora Nordenskiold.

Second Life: Art

What is art in Second Life? There was a power struggle surrounding Second Life art and it was about who defined what Second Life art was, social status and money. A few self-appointed specialists who had been successful in integrating Second Life art with Real Life art took it upon themselves to decide what was art and what it was not. In fact, there seemed to be a widespread notion that Second Life art could only be taken seriously and be considered art if it had also been recognized in Real Life. In other words, only Real Life artists were also Second Life artists. Ultimately, of course, if Second Life art was recognized in Real Life it was considered a success not only for the artist but also for the Second Life art community as a whole. But this was only one part of the story. There were challenges, like the UWA challenge, who promoted Second Life art within Second Life. Here we saw incredible works, most or all of them only created and shown in Second Life. Then there were the people who downloaded a photograph of a flower from the internet, put it on a prim, hung it on a gallery wall and called it art. To them, this was art. There were artists who showed large artworks on an empty sim. Their work was not restricted by a gallery wall, it simply stood alone, a part of the space that surrounded it. Then there were others who just did their own thing. The photograph above is of Axis Mundi, by Igor Ballyhoo, a beautiful work, full of meaning, that is suspended by itself in the air.  Art in Second Life was not well-defined. There were attempts to categorize things as art, which often failed since everything in Second Life had been created by someone. To narrow things down, one could certainly categorize basic things like grass, walls, clothes, cars, etc. as craft, separating these from more specific objects intended as art. These specific art objects, however, were considered art by some, but not by others. Generally speaking, art in Second Life may be considered an expression of creativity as seen in non-craft objects.

Photo above by Flora Nordenskiold.

Second Life: Style

Style came in all shapes and forms in Second Life. At a Nordan Art opening, for instance, you could be surrounded by a faerie, an otter, a robot, a purple haired punk rocker and someone dressed as a box. People would make their own outfits or purchase them at specialty fantasy outfit stores. There were also avatars who were dressed in regular clothes, like myself. Hair, skin, makeup, eyes, eyelashes, nails, clothes and shoes were available to us everywhere. But it seemed style went beyond avatar appearance. Appearance was only one part of a bigger whole. Type of Second Life home, type of Second Life profession, type of Second Life community one associated oneself with and, yes, type of communication style with others in Second Life, where some of the other parts that contributed to a person’s overall style. Come to think of it, time of arrival in Second Life also contributed to a person’s style; someone who had arrived in 2004 would look and interact markedly different than someone who had arrived in 2011. I usually had a lot of respect for people who had been in Second Life for more than five or six years, and I think, perhaps, I was even a little envious. Mostly, these people wore old-fashioned Second Life outfits and AOs; it was immediately apparent they had some experience under their belt. Their style was in some sense historic. To me, one of the most stylish people in Second Life was my friend, Paola Tauber. Her appearance was just right, her home was simple yet sophisticated, her job as Creative Director at AVENUE was cool, her gallery containing her art was very fine and the art itself was beautiful with a slight edge to it. I could go on and on. But most of all, interpersonally, Paola was funny, sweet, smart and kind; she was always ready to lend a hand and there when you needed her. Paola did her own thing and had a unique style.

Photo above by Flora Nordenskiold.

Second Life: SaveMe Oh

SaveMe Oh deserves her own blog post here. She was someone who put in a lot of energy, enormous effort and careful thought into her Second Life role; she was a performance artist and griefer in Second Life. SaveMe’s work as a performance artist was not remarkable, but sometimes not bad. She was, however, an excellent griefer; brutal, ruthless and feared by many. Some people became her friend simply because they were scared of being ridiculed. I think these individuals genuinely feared her, but were also attention seekers, social butterflies, who rose to pseudo-fame in the company of SaveMe. Others, mostly those who did not know her, would try to stand up to her. These poor individuals were easy targets for SaveMe, who would simply humiliate them until they broke down. Then there was a group of people who genuinely favored her approach and supported her. But most of us found SaveMe irritating and would avoid her like the pest. She was banned from sims on a regular basis for her obnoxious behavior and seemed to thrive on being banned from as many sims as possible. SaveMe distorted people’s chat conversations and posted them on her blog. Predictably, people would be upset and respond and then a griefer dialogue would ensue on her blog, attracting people to read her blog and her monthly blog-clicks would peek. I was griefed by SaveMe Oh on a regular basis and one incident turned into a very difficult situation that went on for days, if not weeks. I learned to ignore her completely then, but it took me a while to get to that point. I predict that SaveMe will comment on this post, either here on this blog or on her own blog, but she may not. If she does, be prepared for some significant bashing, intimidating threats and outrageous lies. I would expect nothing less.

Photo above by SaveMe Oh.

Second Life: Exploration

There was no limit to the places available to explore in Second Life. There were the well-known places that everybody knew of that should of course not be missed, like the works of AM Radio. One would go there once in a while, stand on the train or perhaps float in the air. In my early Second Life days, when I didn’t yet have a home, I would head over to AM Radio’s wheat field and just stand around. Predictably, I would get into conversations with people, perhaps even make a new friend. At some point it become clear that “regulars” visited this place. To most of them I did not speak, but I was always aware of their presence; they had sort of become part of the landscape. If they for some reason would not show for a few days, things would not be the same.

It was great to go to a beautiful place that most people knew of, but I loved even more to discover a place on my own. Roche was one of those places; a simple place, really, but for some reason it struck a chord with me. Once I had teleported in, I might jump on a bike and bike around on the narrow roads for a while. If I remember correctly, one could hear the sound of the bike wheels as they touched the ground. I would also take friends to Roche, we would sit in the house on the hill and chat, at times for hours. Sometimes we would just sit quiet for a while and listen to the music. Occasionally, random people visiting the place would enter the house and stare at us for a while, perhaps say hello, but then take off and leave us alone.

Then there were the places that other people took me to, like the Missing Mile. This was a place were I would be guided around and not only be excited about what I saw but also witnessed  the pleasure of the other sharing what they had previously discovered themselves. Missing Mile was an incredible place, there was tons to explore; I would take many other people there, sharing with them what had been shown to me previously. Each time I brought someone new there, I would be reminded of the first time I had been there myself.

Places would come and go in Second Life. One friend would not get very sentimental about it when one of his favorite places would suddenly disappear, saying, “It’s just pixels!” But I felt differently. Each place was meaningful to me in its own way and simply knowing that I could no longer go there because it was gone was at times sad. Later on, talking about certain places with friends, one would say, “Oh, remember that place!” and we would compare what we had seen and experienced. And in the end, that’s all that remained of those places we had explored. Memories.

Photos above by Flora Nordenskiold.