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Dear WWL – Bring Penn to New Orleans

Posted on November 30, 2006 by Varg

To whom it may concern, I am writing to kindly ask that WWL consider adding the Penn Jillette radio show to their afternoon line-up. I have been listening to the podcast on Itunes for some time and think that the programming would find a large audience in the New Orleans and surrounding areas. It’s that…

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Be the Editor of the Daily Jolt!

Posted on November 30, 2006 by Varg

All I ever wanted to do was write and/or edit for a media outlet. It didn’t have to be anything fancy. Just an avenue for myself and other like-minded people to better the world through our collaborative creative efforts. I had the opportunity to write for and edit a weekly paper for four years and…

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Liens du Moment: 11/29

Posted on November 29, 2006 by Varg

Hurricane season ends tonight. Alberto, Beryl, Chris, Debby, Ernesto, Florence, Gordon, Helene and Isaac, we hardly knew ya. Tell your buddies next year how much fun you had in the North Atlantic. Thanks for the quiet season. Hurricane season ends quietly Nola.com While everyone was predicting the watery end to coastal civilization as we know…

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Fair-Weather Friends

Posted on November 29, 2006 by Varg

Making the rounds tonight is an item about a poll released by UNO that stated (with a whopping 7 percent margin of error) that 60 percent of the current population of Orleans and Jeff Parish have considered leaving the city since Hurricane Katrina. One-third of Orleans, Jeff residents polled may leave in 2 years That…

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Dirty Indeed!

Posted on November 27, 2006 by Varg

According to the AP: Michael Vick apologized for making an obscene gesture toward Atlanta fans as he walked off the field after the Falcons’ fourth straight loss Sunday. Vick used both hands to deliver the gesture and flashed an angry look toward the handful of fans remaining in the Georgia Dome. Those who hung around…

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Seven Shot on Thanksgiving Night. Wait, What?

Posted on November 26, 2006 by Varg

I was checking the news Thanksgiving night on Nola.com and read these headlines: “Two dead after Mid-City shooting.” Then… “Thursday night gunfire kills two more.” Then… “Sixth Ward violence claims another.” Then… “Two men shot in Mid-City” All separate headlines but three of them were about the same incident – a Mid-City shooting in which…

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Good Job Ed!

Posted on November 21, 2006 by Varg

“McCormick had been released from jail on Sept. 8 after a judge ruled that the district attorney’s office had run out of time in bringing him to trial on a 2002 first-degree murder charge, records showed. A 2003 trial in the case ended in a mistrial.” Four dead in three hours in N.O., Jeff Good…

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Barbarians at the Gate

Posted on November 19, 2006 by Varg

I just finished a search for any plans that may be underway for coastal restoration in Louisiana. I’ve heard talk but wanted something visual. Like a pretty drawing or something magical and innovative that would inspire me. I didn’t find anything. Perhaps more time. The sad thing is that, from what I have gathered speaking…

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Blogspotting 11/18: Everyone Else Is Doing It So Why Can’t We?

Posted on November 18, 2006 by Varg

I just wanted to add a few pics and point everyone to this excellent post over on Ashley Morris about how we stack up against the world in terms of flood protection and land reclamation. Pretty pitiful we are. This was also touched on in this Harry Shearer post and the ensuing comments. Palm Island…

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A Dying Breed, Cause They Are Old You Know?

Posted on November 17, 2006 by Varg

This is a questionable headline in today’s Times-Pic and Nola.com in reference to aging Greatest Medal of Honor recipients: Heroes by any reckoning, the soldiers who helped win World War II are a dying breed. Now, I understand that these decorated octogenarians (who defeated Hitler, Mussolini and Tojo) are passing away at an accelerated rate….

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3 Noble Truths

Know yourself. Know the Universe. Know yourself in the Universe.

Rev. Varg’s Artist Statement

Rejoice!

I say that a lot. I sign many pieces with it. I do this because I believe our lives are a true happenstance. A brilliant occurence from nothingness. We are so rare. We are so unlikely. And simply being born isn’t enough. From there we must survive, endure. So each morning, after our Sun departs and is reborn again. Please, for the sake of your ancestors and the Universe in general, hoist that cup of joe up and say, “Rejoice.”

Ours is a soulful existence. No matter how many McMansions, polyester fabrics, auto-tunes, modified foods and social networks we surround ourselves with, we are all still native, passionate beings made of ancient matter. We are organic and we have soul.

Wood also has a warm, soulful quality. Wood has a memory. It retains smells, traumas, events. It even has a calendar. This is why I have chosen it as my medium, for its old soul. I like to think the wood in my work is in its third incarnation. First a tree, then a home and now art. If you have a room that needs a little soul, get a piece. A room can never have enough soul.

My inspiration and subject matter comes from many sources, among them: Humanism, old ballads, trickster tales, flora and fauna, science, myths and folklore, stringed instruments, brass bands, amber spirits, lady vocalists, general relativity and quantum mechanics. Some of my pieces are there just to make a short, simple statement about what’s important in life. Some are more diffuse and abstract in meaning. A personal drama, an enduring line from a poem or novel, a poignant song lyric, the legacy of an important person, a fleeting thought … these are the subjects of my art.

I use hearts often because they are a very abstract way of depicting the human soul without also employing the very subjective human form. The symbolic heart is an apt representation for a person’s experience and essence. A body can immediatly conjure happiness, sorrow, youth, age, anger, bliss. These emotions can get in the way. Sometimes it’s simply about the experience.

I am the son of a sailor and a social worker, the grandson of a gypsy, a dancer and a nurse. I spent my youth moving from port city to port city, watching a lot of road go by and reading World Book Encyclopedia. After my parents settled down on the Gulf Coast, I was a miscreant youth, destroying cars and taking the wrongs things too seriously and the right things not serious enough. Eventually I began replacing my imagination with experience.

I will use any salvaged wood but prefer swamp cypress and longleaf heartwood pine.

I despise waste. Particularly the waste of organic matter. Trees are magnificent. They were here before we arrived and they’ll be around after we are gone. I’m making an effort to save as much wood as possible. Creating art is fun too. But beyond communicating with folks, but beyond making money ad providing for myself, beyond rescuing flooded parts, beyond reveling in the ethereal aroma of heartpine that hasn’t seen the light of day in 400 years, beyond all that, I am trying to make a simple comment on waste.

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