Double, double, toil and trouble…

Double, double, toil and trouble has been my theme since the end of last year. I haven’t posted a blog since then because, you know…LIFE happens. And death. Unfortunately, in January, my hubby’s mom suddenly passed away and we’re just now coming to grips with it and re-emerging from our grief.

For months I was unable to do anything creative and whenever I did try, it was pathetic and made me feel even less motivated. Then Russia started the war in Ukraine and, of course that triggered my anxiety for my family overseas and only piled on. I barely made it out of the house to my part time job and just wanted to stay under my rock and hide. However, one good thing I learned from past bouts of depression is that nothing lasts forever, good or bad times! And, of course, it turned out to be true.

Slowly, I emerged from my self-imposed abyss, but man, it was ROUGH! I saw the first glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel at my birthday bonfire and was touched by so many friends coming to celebrate with me. You have no idea how much that meant to me! Then, first weekend in April I went to WonderCon in Anaheim and felt myself thriving and really coming out of my shell, finally! I met and re-connected with lots of creative people and found my motivation again! As a matter of fact, on my second day there, I decided to start my ‘daily doodles’ again! I had to force myself a few days in between, but it didn’t take long until that creative urge settled in again and made itself at home in my daily life. I can’t recommend it enough: Do something creative every day – paint, draw, write – even just for ten minutes! Make it a habit and watch what happens! I first did this about 8 years ago; and besides painting it also inspired me to write my first scripts and then it just snowballed into so much more! My mistake was letting it go when I thought I didn’t need it anymore because I was always involved in at least one type of project. Learned that lesson!

So, let’s get to the fun stuff – I have lots of updates!

• First off, I’ll return to the San Diego Comic-Con Art Show and this year it will be in person again, yayyy! SDCC runs from July 21st – 24th. Stay tuned for more details down the road!

You can now watch all three of my short films: The Appointment, Things We Dig and The Test on YouTube! Go ‘like’ them and feel free to share on social media! It never hurts to get a few more eyes on them.

• Speaking of short films….Things We Dig won the Silver Award in the Horror Short Film section at the Munich Independent Star Film Fest late last year; and it finally arrived in the mail – thank you to my sis in Germany for safeguarding it!

Congratulations again to my rockstar cast and crew! Prost!

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You can now get licensed images from my Picfair store at piathrasherfotografie.picfair.com. Buy my photos as printed products or digital downloads for marketing including editorial purposes. Check them out and bookmark the page!

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• I decided to start a fun newsletter giving my two cents on finding your own creative ‘dark side’ and whatever updates on current projects I’m working on – in part to hold myself accountable and keep a schedule. My plan is to publish one every two weeks. Can I keep it up? We shall see! Depends how much interest there is, too – maybe you wanna subscribe? If yes, please do it here. Otherwise, keep checking this blog (which you can also subscribe to, but fair warning: it’s not updated regularly). Come on…what’s a little more email spam? But seriously, if you DO subscribe…might wanna check your spam folder cause Gmail isn’t messing around and might relegate my stuff to the dustbin of history before it even gets a chance to shine!

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• Oh, and one more thing – most urgent and time sensitive! I will display/sell art at Secret Morgue: Witches’ Night Edition on Saturday, April 30th – also known as Walpurgisnacht! Secret Morgue is such a cool annual event here in San Diego! It hasn’t been held since 2019, thanks to the pandemic, and the theme was aliens, as in sci-fi creatures. I had such a blast and can’t wait to see what the Film Geeks and Beth Accomando are conjuring up this time! This year it’s all about witches… and of course, when Beth asked me if I had any art relating to this theme I just couldn’t resist! There will be six films (which you won’t find out about the titles until you get there, but they’re all witch-related…hence “secret morgue”, get it?), two meals (Bombay Coast returns!), a talk about witches in history from SDSU professor Dr. Elizabeth Pollard, art show, and raffle prizes. You will also have a chance to purchase a ticket to the Comic-Con Museum for 50% off and there will be a raffle for witchy prizes too! Get your tickets here before they sell out …(they have every year so far)!

See you there!

That’s it for now – phew, it felt good to get all that out! Till next time – or subscribe to my newsletter mentioned above! Have a great weekend!

Ppppia

Spring Update

Hi all! I just realized I haven’t written a blog on this site for the last 5 months! Holy crap, time flies! That’s probably the longest gap in between posts since I started it. I think it’s high time I write an update on my latest doings and such. So, this is what’s new..

…on the Acting front:

• I worked on the upcoming horror movie ‘Penance‘ (dir. Dante Moran, Inferno Productionz), actually for its Kickstarter campaign. I’ve been cast as a man-eating, pant suit-wearing, tough bitch detective; and I can’t remember last time I had so much fun playing a character. We rehearsed one of our scenes (it included two more actors) on two different days and then filmed it in one late evening. Oh, I SO want to do more of that type of character! I loved it and can’t wait to return to being ‘Helena Gruber’! Didn’t know I had it in me, haha! This is one of those times that rehearsal really brought that out.

Just last week we did a photoshoot in support of the Kickstarter campaign and the movie’s (upcoming) website. Bonus: I got to pose in all these ‘action’ positions, making me feel like a badass!

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Get ready to hear more about this project and I’ll post about it again once the campaign starts. This is a fun one with lots of great talent and loads of enthusiasm!

Other Acting-Related News:

• ‘Zero‘ (dir. William Wall, Halo Cinematic), a short film for which I recently did some voice-over work, has been entered into several film festivals and has already started winning awards! It swept the San Diego Film Awards and will be screened at the Sci-Fi-London Film Festival on April 27th.

• ‘Ghostline‘, a feature film in which I play ghosthunter Marina Hoffman, is still in post production. Last I heard was that “picture is locked and they have moved on to music and sound”. It is still expected to premiere this year, as far as I know. Again, stay tuned! In the meantime, you can view trailer, cast info and such on the movie website here.

• In between, during the last few weeks, my awesome agent also got me some local TV commercial gigs that are now airing.

 

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..on the Writing front:

• Still working on my novel and finished chapter three. This one’s gonna take a while. At this rate, it’ll take another year at least…but at least I’m making progress again after a lengthy pause to focus on film projects.

• Wrote an outline for a horror short. Gonna be a gory one, yay! Next up: actually writing the script for it.

• Polishing up my script for a short film (genre: dark humor), starring yours truly and my acting buddy Mike Burnell. My goal is to produce and direct it by the fall of this year. I will be looking for crew and supporting actors soon.

• I finally registered with goodreads.com – a great social networking website for readers and writers alike! My profile is here. Are you registered? Let’s be friends and  compare booknotes!

 

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…on the Painting front:

• I started a ‘self-imposed’ challenge that I call ‘daily doodle in 30 minutes or less’. The commitment is for 66 days and I have to create something on paper every day. Be it charcoal, watercolor, pencil, ink, mixed media – whatever hits the spot. There’s a longer story behind it and it has to do with creating a new habit, but that might become another post, possibly after the 66 days have passed. I’m also still debating if I want to post the art pieces on Etsy or some other public domain, since they have garnered some interest on my private Facebook page, where I post the painting/drawing result every day. (Also on Instagram, btw.)


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Some of my ‘daily doodles’

• I’m almost finished with my paintings for this year’s Art Show at San Diego Comic Con in July. Those pieces will be mostly acrylics.

 

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…and last but not least, on the Photography front:

I’ve never mentioned it here before, but I think it’s time…I have a secret…

I run a whole other blog, about my photography, which I have gotten more serious about lately. Well, you know me – I love the visual arts…I can’t help myself. I’d love it if you gave it a click and maybe even ‘follow’ my posts there! ;)

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So, you see – I haven’t exactly been sitting around and twiddling my thumbs. Three cheers to productivity, yay! Thanks for reading and thanks for your interest! Have a fantastic day!

xoxo,

Pia