CE Hunt

Stacy’s Gift to Steve (or be open to the little things)

See anything in the above photo of Julia Street in New Orleans?

Yeah, I didn’t think so. But you could have…

This is Steve’s acknowledgement to Stacy that she had opened his eye to new things. Let’s go back and drill down in the above photo a bit more.

Let’s take a bit closer look at this unusual, tiny structure.

A few interesting features start to pop out. For one thing, the grill work is extraordinary.

Now, I’m not saying this is unqualified beauty, as if there were such a thing, but I’m sure almost every driver fails to see these nice features, probably most pedestrians in fact.

And this being New Orleans, something totally unexpected and inexplicable MUST happen. I never expected the Queen to wave at me through the grilled window!

Slow down, let a little of Stacy rub off on you, if of course, you’ve read the book.

If you haven’t, there’s a way to make this happen. It might make you a better person. Okay, well maybe, … I mean, it could happen.

Enjoy and be inspired!

Galería del Sol

Steve’s art gallery is introduced early on in A Moveable Marfa, page 7 to be exact. I thought it might be interesting to give the reader a little insight into my inspiration for it to be an important venue in the story.

It was actually back in 2006-2008 when I first started hanging out in Marfa to write the Marfa part of the story. There was this oddly shaped building near the railroad tracks on S. Austin St. that caught my eye. I decided over time that this would be one of the buildings that Uncle Clive would leave Steve. In the novel, Steve lived on Austin Street on the other side of the tracks.

Here’s a picture I took of the “Gallery” to be in January of 2007. C E Hunt All Rights Reserved

Now, of course, this building is known as the Crowley Theater, a cultural arts center, but in 2007, I saw the Galería del Sol. A place where Steve would grow in his relationship with Stacy and Pilar and meet the formidable “Paco.” Some of these characters are loosely inspired by real people, but for legal reasons, I won’t say which characters are based on real people and which ones are purely fictitious. This is true of many of the characters in the book in Marfa and France. Anyway, I saw the gallery being full of interesting art with maybe a studio or two in the back.

To give you an idea of the overall setting, this cool building sits across the tracks from the Crowley Theater today.

NOLA by Night

New Orleans has a very different personality by night. Far from Bourbon Street and the French Quarter, a somber, dignified city awaits, reflecting an interesting blend of old and new. Many of the buildings of the Warehouse District and Central Business District were built throughout the 1800s. Many were added in the 1900s and some are very new, but often at least somewhat sympathetic to their surroundings.

Sadly, many tourist never see much of this side of New Orleans. Maybe because of the quiet and lack of crowds, one can better get a real sense of place.

Don’t forget to peer inside places as well.

Art galleries evoke a strange loneliness late at night.

My mind races thinking about writing a short story about a mysterious character slowly walking down the rain soaked street pictured below!

Spend some time across this great city. Inspiration is everywhere.

The 10 Bar

A couple of scenes take place inside this unusual bar near Jardin de Luxembourg. This bar has pretty much been miraculously preserved since 1955. Originally started by a dude from Spain named Mariano, it’d be hard to find a more authentic, vintage “dive” experience in Paris than this place which can hold about three dozen people. It is kind of like a musty, “Belle Epoque” cave covered with a mixture of Belle Epoque posters and a few touches from the 1970s, especially its 1970’s era juke box.

In A Moveable Marfa, Monique sat in the bench, second from the right, and watches Steve. You’ll have to read the book to find out what comes of this. I wrote this section of the book actually sitting where Steve sat on a rainy night a few years ago. I tried to capture the feel of this special place.

I recommend you check out the 10 Bar if you find yourself in Paris. The sangria is very good and the setting will stick with you for a long time.

Don’t let the rustic exterior deter you! At 10 rue de l’Odéon,

Round Midnight

Music can be a powerful inspiration. For me at least, it’s important to carefully select a “soundscape” when writing or painting. I sometimes find the music I am listening to guiding, or at least coloring, where I go with my project. It can definitely give me energy and either lift (or lower) my spirits. I have many, almost “curated” playlists depending on the mood I want to set–

Jazz (name of the playlist is “Cocktails on a rainy night in 1969.” Don’t ask me why. I’m a writer maybe?)

Round Midnight (Sonny Rollins)
Darn That Dream (Dexter Gordon)
Remember (Hank Mobley)
Soul Station (Hank Mobley)
Blue and Green (Miles Davis)
Kind of Blue (Miles Davis)
Blue Train (John Coltrane)
September Song (Django Reinhardt)
Just One Chance (Dinah Washington) See page 74 of A Moveable Marfa
Please Send Me Someone To Love (T-Bone Walker) Okay, that’s really blues
Embraceable You (Sarah Vaughan)

Modern (relatively, okay some are a bit old)

Hayling (FC Kahuna)
Syndicate (The Fray)
Outro (M83)
Je Reviens (Autour de Lucie)
Le Tournesol (Autour de Lucie)
Take a Picture (Filter)
Jupiter 4 (Sharon Van Etten)
We Are Fine (Sharon Van Etten) Will see her soon in concert.
The Stars (Moby)
Crush With Eyeliner (R.E.M.)
High Hopes (Panic at the Disco)
Primadonna Like Me (The Struts) I want to see the Struts in concert.
Kiss This (The Struts)
On My Own (Ulrich Schnauss)
Malibu (Hole)

Western (Not a huge fan but I occasional get in a mood for “Honky Tonk”, good roadtrip music, see page 251 of A Moveable Marfa ).

I’ll Be Leaving (Kristin Diable) From near New Orleans, Baton Rouge, plays locally
My River (Kristin Diable) She’s worth seeing live.
I Want To Know Her Again (The Wagoneers)
Stout and High (The Wagoneers)
Guitars, Cadillacs (Dwight Yoakam) Saw him in Knoxville once, the best concert!
Honky Tonk Man (Dwight Yoakam)
Long White Cadillac (Dwight Yoakam) Perhaps the best Country song ever! Think of this song playing as Steve goes to pick up Pilar in El Paso. Click the link to see a pretty good video.
The Streets Of Bakersfield (Dwight Youkam) I know, sorry, I love Dwight
Just Call Me Lonesome (Radney Foster)
Burn Me Down (Marty Stuart) Perhaps the “honkiest” Honky Tonk song ever.

NOLA Nightclub (Think of this playlist playing very loudly in the underground Bar on Avenue Foch on page 175 of A Moveable Marfa. Remember? The guy chugging Vodka from the bottle? I really saw it.)

Crazy (Felon, Lauren L’aimant)
Timeout (Felon)
Hide & Seek (Felon)
My Friend (January Embers featuring Lauren L’aimant)
Run Free (Apres featuring Lauren L’aimant)
Deny My Love (Kingdom 7 featuring Lauren L’aimant)
Back Where We Started (Mark Mckenzie featuring Lauren L’aimant)
Swell (Dub Mix, Mark Mckenzie featuring Lauren L’aimant)
Lounge (Chill Lounge Music Cafe)
Hiding (Icarus)
Moments (Felon featuring Lauren L’aimant) Okay, I also love Lauren L’aimant.

Atmospherics (Music that just really affects your mood, if you have a pulse)

Breathe Me (Sia)
Drops of Jupiter (Train) Saw then twice in Paris.
Open Your Eyes (Snow Patrol)
Spiritual Spiritual (B Tribe)
I Just Tell Myself (Balligomingo)
Tiny Vessels (Death Cab for Cutie)
Letoile featuring the Max the Sax (Parov Stelar)
Blacking Out The Friction (Death for Cutie)
She Moves Through The Fair (B Tribe)
Coy (Wild Colonials)
Middledistancerunner (Chicane)
Saltwater (Chicane)
Brothers On A Hotel Bed (the ultimate atmospheric song), love the spare beginning, click to check out an incredible video with Lauren Mayberry

Okay, well that’s too many, but really it only slight scratches the surface of the music that inspires me.

…Oh yeah, I forgot, practically anything by the Rolling Stones! Saw then in July, they are the BEST. I didn’t even include my Classic Rock list. It’s kind of predictable.

Street Art as Inspiration

Tonight I noticed a sculpture I had seen countless times, but this time was different, very different. In the “neutral ground” as New Orleanians like to call a median, there she was, dancing away. I thought she was supposed to be a gymnast, but tonight on this cool evening in the Crescent City, she was dancing beneath the palms.

Enrique Alferez’s Gymnast — C E Hunt All Rights Reserved

I made my way to the neutral ground and sought to capture her from every direction.

She was a thing of beauty, and the palm fronds gently swaying in the night breezes only added to the choreography.

I hope you can see her dance sometime. You could say she performs nightly…

Note on the Artist: Given my interest in Art, Mexico and History, I find Enrique Alferez intriguing as well as inspiring. He was the son of a Mexican artist and spent part of his early life in the army of Pancho Villa during the Mexican Revolution before coming to the United States. He studied art in Chicago in the 1920s, then moved to New Orleans in 1929, where he lived until his death in 1999. His sculptures and reliefs adorn many parks, buildings, and landmarks in New Orleans and throughout South Louisiana, including the wonderful Helis Foundation Enrique Alférez Sculpture Garden.

Bullfighting, Seize and Pauline

A bar in Saint-Côme-et-Maruéjols, a village of about 700 in southern France, plays a pretty important role in A Moveable Marfa. At the Bar Tabac L’Alambic, Steve meets a most intriguing woman named Pauline Ferrand. Here’s a short excerpt–

“To overcome loneliness, I occasionally rode my bike into the nearby Saint-Côme-et-Maruéjols in the evening and had a beer at the Bar L’Alambic. It was a little like a bar, but they sold a few food items and locally baked breads. They also sold some deli sandwiches on the freshest baguettes. The ham, croissant and butter sandwich was so good. I’m sure all the ingredients were from local farms or butchers. But the small shop mostly sold cigarettes, lotto tickets and beer—primarily Kronenbourg and 1614, or seize for short. Bar L’Alambic was a clean place that had a family feel to it. Creamy, yellow walls were covered with a few old black-and-white photos of soccer matches from an earlier era. François, the bartender, and his wife, Anaëlle, were pleasant, and always patient with my French. …

On certain nights, the bar would be filled with guys watching a Ligue Un or rugby match. Marseille was the local favorite soccer team, so it was all about rugby and soccer for the menfolk here. For an American, I thought I was really into soccer, but by French standards, I was ignorantly indifferent. It was almost a cult more than a sport. I learned several additional curse words watching games on TV in the café to complete that part of my education in French. …

It was there I met Pauline, who was a local, sort of. She lived in nearby Sommières and did contract work at the training center. I welcomed female attention; actually, I welcomed almost any attention. I’d been in southern France for over a week now and talked, really talked, to no one except Emil and Father Mike, a local priest, whom I befriended at the boulangerie, the bakery, in town.” — A Moveable Marfa, p. 185-186

You’ll have to read the book to see what happens next.

Photo of Saint-Côme-et-Maruéjols by Daniel VILLAFRUELA

Philosophy by Juan Miro concerning Human Action and Souls

“I am far more interested in, much more by, a human action than by all the museums in the world. As far as I’m concerned, there are only two kinds of people: the ones who have soul and the ones who don’t.”

twitter.com/fundaciomiro/status/1224641475205566466

Follow me on twitter for more inspiration–

https://mobile.twitter.com/CEHunt2

Ah, Inspiration! Food…

One can be inspired by food. Taste can be a very powerful sense. Mardi Gras season is reason to celebrate all the senses. One often hears about King Cakes, but one of my favorite culinary celebrations involve Louisiana Strawberries. The season is very short but very sweet. Louisiana Strawberries are some of the best I’ve ever had.

They are grown around a number towns, including Independence, Amite and Tickfaw, LA. Below is one brand.

Note the Italian name? In the 1800’s a large number of Italians, especially Sicilians, came to Louisiana. Initially it was largely the importation of Sicilians lemons that brought them, but later many came for other reasons, including providing labor for the sugar plantations. Some Italian families left the sugar cane fields to farm some of the best fragole (strawberries) imaginable. Justin A. Nystrom briefly shares this history in his recent book, Creole Italian. I recommend it if you want to learn the fascinating story of how Sicilians came to Louisiana and how they greatly impacted our food ways.

If you are lucky enough to come to New Orleans for Mardi Gras, see if you can find some of these “sources of inspiration!”

Inspiration at Night in New Orleans

Inspiration is critical to any artist. Walking around New Orleans at night is an incredible source of inspiration to any artist with a pulse.

NOLA Sunsets can be Inspiring — C E Hunt All Rights Reserved

Whether writing a novel like A Moveable Marfa, a short story or painting, nightscapes awaken within me a mood or feeling that can launch a burst of expression.

A character can spring from someone you see or a setting you spy.

The Napoleon House — C E Hunt All Rights Reserved

Or maybe a painting you see. The below painting inspired, “The Girl in the Green Dress” short story, part of my short story collection slated for publication later in 2020.