Tuesday, October 29, 2013

Interview with Monica Munster.




Full Name:
Monica Munster

Birthplace:
Anaheim California

Current hometown:
Same as birthplace, but I am moving to Las Vegas, Nevada very soon.
Why the move to Las Vegas?
California is expensive to live in. I love it here it's my home, but it's just very overpriced just to live in. If you're not making much you're not making enough to even live off of.


Favorite city and why?
If we're talking about places I've been to and loved it would be Morro Bay, California. If we're talking about places I'd love to go to, I'd say Paris, France, just because a Museum at every corner seems like a great place for artist's brain crack.
Have you ever been to Museum Mile in New York City? It’s pretty amazing.
Plus Washington DC has some great museums all within walking distance of each other.

The only places I've been to on the east side of the US are Kentucky and North Carolina. Strangely enough for visits with family members originally from New York. I will definitely add those to my bucket list.
You definitely should. Visiting the Guggenheim and being arm’s length away from an original Francis Bacon painting is a real life-altering experience.

Birthday / Age:
8/13 I am just barely in my twenties, at that age you start lying about your age.
I decided when I turned 25 that I’d just say I was 25 for the rest of my life.
Nice I really should do that too. I had originally wanted to do that around 21. 21 does seem too young of an age to pass off as a mature adult. I'd like to hopefully make people mistake me for a mature adult, because I can be super immature and I need the validation. 25/26 seems like a good age to pretend I am.

The first thing people notice about you is…
Eyes and/or eyelashes. My eyelashes are super long.


Hair Color/Eye Color/Race?
Brown, Green, and race is a bit more complex. My father’s ancestry is the standard generic American whose European ancestry immigrated a long time ago: Irish, English, Welsh, and Cherokee. My mom is from Puerto Rico and her father is Ecuadorian, and both sides have questionable origins for the most part Spanish???
Works for me!

Sexual orientation?
Straight-ish.


Religion, if any?
That's a little complicated as well, I was raised a curious atheist. Whenever religious friends of different religious backgrounds invited me to their churches, probably in part to convert me, I would go because I wanted to keep an open mind. I stayed an atheist for most of my life up until my mid-twenties, when I started believing in Karma and good energy, which probably doesn't make me an atheist anymore. So I'm not sure what to call myself, I guess an agnostic? Maybe?


Are you superstitious at all? Any phobias?
No superstitions other than my rule of not wishing anything bad upon anyone. Phobias, tons!!! I'm such a neurotic about everything almost. I have a supreme fear of spiders, except for jumping spiders for some reason. I fear heights, people who are way too perfect, and I fear freak accidents especially car related.
Jumping spiders are the worst!
They're not so bad, compared to wolf spiders…yikes. Seriously youtube wolf spiders with babies. You will not sleep for a week.
I YouTubed Wolf Spiders with Babies and it was pretty creepy. But then I got distracted by a spider bite boil cutting video. And then I spent a half hour watching cyst extraction and pus explosion videos. I am, apparently, still a morbid eighteen year old with the attention span of a gnat.
 
Do you smoke/drink?   If so, what?   Any bad habits?
I do not smoke anything. I drink beer on a rare occasion when I really really need one. My worst habit is my on again off again addiction to Soda. We have a bad romance, me and soda drinks. I quit yesterday again though so, that should be over.
Not that I’m trying to trigger your addiction, but what is your favorite soda?
Diet Dr. Pepper.

Current occupation / Dream job:
Freelancer, or I guess more specifically a Generalist Freelance Illustrator. I say "Generalist" because I take whatever comes my way even if it's not drawing sexy cartoons. I have tons of dream jobs I'd love to do, I'd love to work in animation, gaming, fine arts illustration, movies, children's books, and even in fashion design. Hell I'd even like to get better work in freelance!
What are you doing to work towards your dream jobs?
You know I already worked pretty hard for quite a few years now begging people and interviewing and posting on online artist/freelancer sites. I've even sent out random e-mails to companies and applied to internships. I'm not sure what more I can do at this point. With the jobs that I've ever had I've never actually actively pursued them, they found me.


What do you like to do when you’re not at work?
Lots of things and nothing sometimes. Usually more drawing makes me happy, along with copious amounts of movie and television watching, and the internet. And many moooore….


What is your zombie outbreak survival plan?
Kill other people for their supplies and find a library to live out the rest of my days in. Great dramas of the world!!! BOOKS! BOOKS! All the books I'll need!!! All the books I'll want!!!
“Time enough at last.”
One of the best episodes of television ever.


Weapon of choice:
Sniper rifle, and/or chemical farts. I'm Lactose intolerant so I'll stock up on dairy for the end of days.

 
Do you have any special skills?
I have a weird gift of coming up with weird ideas or really good ideas for almost anything.
That’s a pretty handy skill.
 
Did you go to college and, if so, what for?
I did go to college and I can't say that it did unfortunately. I wish that it had.


If you went to college, did you manage to pay off your student loans?
God no, and I have no idea when I will.
I’m in the same position.
Having a cyclic sleep disorder that makes it difficult to hold down a 9-5 gig has made it really tough for me to make regular payments towards the balance.
I had it down from $40K to $15K by the time I graduated, but that crept back up to $20K that interest is a killer.

Yeah my problem is I had a bank that just didn't want to work with me at all, and that ended up screwing me up more than anything. They even tacked on a large amount of money to what I had originally taken out, after I stopped going to school for 6 months.

Any pets?   If so, what are they and what are their names?
I have two birds, one is Paco the other is Pepe.


What is your favorite animal?
Birds I guess. I like all of them, they're kind of funny animals with really strange personalities compared to other animals. Plus they've been around since dinosaur years and they're evolved physiologically from raptors and T-rex. But I like tons of other animals too so this is a tough question.

 
Speaking of pets, any pet peeves?
Too many pet peeves. I don't like people who go to extreme efforts to piss you off and pick a fight with you, and then when you confront them they act like you're the crazy one who wanted to fight. I had a recent experience where a guy did that to me at a gas station, only for me to approach him and ask him what his problem was. He told me to "go away" and that I "seemed weird" even though he spent 20 minutes getting angry with me.
I had a girl blow up at me at a convention a couple weekends ago.
I was working the booth for The Arkham Film Society and a girl was checking out a poster we had screenprinted for a Demons/Popcorn screening we did a couple months ago. She was just looking down at it and kind of touching it, so to start a conversation I said, “Nice poster huh?” She said, “Yeah, I’m a big fan of both of those films.” I replied, “Yeah, we had them screened custom for a screening we did a few months back. It was a good screening. You should’ve been there.” In a calm and level voice. She got a weird look on her face and then walked briskly off.
A minute later she came back all flustered and talking fast and upset and said, “Are you having a bad day or something? Because I really like those movies and I want to support what you guys are doing but the way that you acted towards me makes me really question how I feel about it, so are you having a bad day or something? What’s your problem?”
I took a breath and calmly replied, “I’m not having a bad day. I’m not in a bad mood. It really was a decent screening event. You really should have been there. I am legitimately sorry that you missed it. I’m sorry that you felt like I was fucking with you, but I assure that was not my intention. The rest of it was all in your head.”
I worked in the field of mental health for eighteen years so I’m well used to dealing with unbalanced people so I just called her out on her crazy point blank.
She calmed down a bit and thanked me and left, but it was a bunch of psycho-emotional static that I didn’t need on what was a long, boring convention weekend.

Yeah well seemed like she was projecting a little, like she was really the one having the bad day.
Totally. My least favorite people are the kind that try to make their insanity your problem.

Favorite / Least favorite Food:
Oh but I love so many foods. Korean Barbecue and Kimchi soup right now is by far the most recent and most continuous food addiction. I absolutely hate Swedish Licorice, sorry Sweden, but it tastes like a mouth full of ocean water, and I'm not talking beautiful clear caribbean ocean water. I'm talking like Huntington beach with the sewer outlet.
There’s a sewer outlet that dumps into the ocean? That’s gross.
There's quite a few here, that's why the oceans are toxic most of the year round. Recently scientists did a study and found that you could literally get certain STDs just from being in the ocean too long when it's most toxic. People still swim in it.
Makes me glad I only went in ankle-deep the one time I visited the Pacific Ocean.


What is your favorite quotation/motto/saying?
I have tons of favorites on this one too, one being: “Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited to all we now know and understand, while imagination embraces the entire world, and all there ever will be to know and understand.” -Albert Einstein.

What is the best thing that ever happened to you?
I'm not sure that's happened yet. There have been many good things, but none that I'd say have been the best.


What is the worst thing that ever happened to you?
Well aside from my awesome childhood which will honestly be a whole book of horrible things, recently I was a founding member in a girl artist group collective. It was supposed to be all about talented artists and creatives. Then for whatever reason I got secretly not invited to participate in shows because I'm not willing to dress up or look like or act like the other women in the group. I ended up just flat out leaving secretly, which I think is what they all hoped. That was pretty heartbreaking in a weird way, probably more so because I didn't leave sooner and didn't see the early signs of what it really was.
What did the other women in the group dress up or look like or act like?
Well they were all the typical hipsters that are into steampunk, which don't get me wrong I like steampunk too. They'd go to the edwardian balls and stuff and always dress very sexy and trendy, they even wanted women to cosplay in sexy outfits for art shows. One time they even went to an event, which I was also not invited to because they told me there wasn't enough room for me to paint (which I found out from a friend later that wasn't true), and they all wore bikinis. I guess they felt like I wouldn't or couldn't wear a bikini, so I was not invited. Because apparently the idea of talented female creatives just wasn't a good enough selling point. It essentially became more like sexy girls drawing painting sexy girls. You know they could have just been honest with me, I think that was the biggest rub.
I like steampunk… in theory. But in my experience it seems to attract the worst ren-faire types that I really can’t stand being around for any extended amount of time. It’s always obese autistic types in tiny top hats and ill-fitting brass-fitted corsets. I’m all for people expressing themselves in whatever way they want to and exercising their freedom of expression, but I don’t necessarily want to be around them while they’re doing it. Also, in my experience the whole “Women in…” phenomenon often goes the wrong way. In my opinion, and not that my opinion seems to matter, it always seems to be like women cashing in on the fact that they are women to try to get a leg up on their male counterparts and skew the playing field. I know that the playing field is already skewed and there are a lot of misogynists out there that don’t take female artists seriously, but I’m not one of them. If instead, the “Women in…” trend addressed this misogyny directly and was a true expression of uncompromising feminism it’s something I could get behind, but, instead, as you mentioned, it always seems more about female creative types getting dolled up and smooshing their tits together to add to their cleavage and trying to brand themselves as a “female” artist which I never buy into. If you want to be taken seriously, do good work, and if, as a female, it means you have to work a little harder than the boys, then I’m sorry about that, but accept it, and work harder and blow the boys away. Show them how it’s fucking done. Don’t whine about the bias against women. Destroy it.


Ever had your heart broken? Is there a story worth telling behind your answer? Yes check the answer above. It’s tough to have a group of people that needed you only to throw it back in your face because you're different, and unwilling to fit a mold. I don't know if that's a California thing, or an everywhere thing. I think it’s an everywhere thing. Iconoclasts are often ostracized. Being truly unique is often a lonely path, but if it’s all you know how to do you walk it with pride with your head held high.
Yeah at this point it's over and done with. I wish them all the best, and I'm sure they'll be successful in their ventures without me. I just don't need to be in a group of people that needs to lie to me or to "OH so secretly!" leave me out of things. I was clearly not the right fit, and it just would have been nice to know right away.
Well, like most relationships, it’s better to find out that it’s not going to work out earlier rather than later.


What is the worst thing you’ve ever done?
I don't really have a worst, but I often have foot in my mouth syndrome. My humor and my weird thoughts can be abrasive and mean when not taken into context, or just in general too. I have to reel it in sometimes, and I forget.
I totally relate. When I got back from ARMY Basic Training for my senior year in high school I was on this real intense “no compromise/all real/all the time” kick that took a few years to rub the hard edges off of. I still have that solid center of uncompromising integrity that I judge myself against but I had to learn that not everyone can live up to my rigid guidelines for personal behavior and that not everyone can keep up with my work ethic. It took a lot of disappointment and figuring out how to deal with people to find the right level of intensity to use with people. I’m still trying to figure out why people don’t say what they mean and mean what they say and do what they say they’re going to do.
That's awesome. I wish I had that attitude around that age.
I’m not sure you do. I’ve been told I’m kind of hard to be around and difficult to date because I don’t take any shit from anyone unless there’s money involved.

If you could kill one person, consequence free, who would it be and why?
What do you do?
I don't know why but Miley Cyrus has got to go. I'd feed her many steaks, which I think might kill her. Delicious red meats I'm pretty sure are her kryptonite.


How did you get started doing what you do?
You mean day by day? Or do you mean in general?
I’ll take it either way or both.
Well I honestly started drawing cartoons from my crayon holding years. I drew a lot of Pacman Ghosts. From there the love of drawing cartoons continued, until I think I found out at age 10 that the animation industry hires and lays off people all the time. I got very disgruntled by this information and realized that drawing cartoons as a forever type of living might not be possible. So I think after that I went through several other interests, while I still took art classes and drew cartoons for myself and friends on the side. Then by the time I hit community college I realized I really liked drawing and couldn't live without it, and that's when I started making plans to go to a very expensive art school.

What projects are you working on now?
Mostly personal projects. There was a lull in my freelance recently, and since I've been working on 3 stories for several years now that I'd like to release as comics and/or animations. One should be aired soon hopefully, the other two still require some more visual research. I also have a few other non-comic personal project ideas that I'd love to tackle soon too.
Keep me posted about when your projects go live and we can do a follow-up interview to promote them.
That would be great thanks so much!

What are you watching?
Too much. Too much watching.

I used to have a piece of masking tape stuck over my TV with the question, “Do you want to be entertained or do you want to be famous?” while working on my first book. I’ve finally learned how to balance my work and entertainment ratios in my spare time.
I like that, I might actually steal that idea. I hope you don't mind.
I don’t mind at all, that’s why I put it out there. It’s how I got my first book written. Every time I’d go to fire up the Xbox or throw in a DVD I’d see that piece of tape and I’d work on editing a chapter of my book instead. These days I can watch a movie or TV show in the background or listen to some music and still get my work done. For example, I’m rewatching the first season of Dexter as I edit this. I’m a multi-tasking machine!


What are you listening to?
Everything, which is probably not healthy.


What are you reading?
I don't know why and it was on a pure whim to buy this book, but City of Bones by Cassandra Clare. It's your typical YA vampires and werewolves and fairies and woodnymphs and woodchucks all shipping. Serious serious shipping going on, all the time. I have plans to do something fun with this after I'm done reading it.
Shipping?
What are you planning on doing with it when you’re done reading it?

Shipping…it's the internet fandom's term for "Relationship + ing". Where fans and people try to put various characters together in relationships.
Oh my plans with it are to do some fun animations based on what I read.
Oh! Like “Slash fiction”! I get it.


Favorite author / book?
Candide by Voltaire, I read it in high school first, and I still love it.


Favorite band / song?
Everlong by Foo Fighters.


Desert Island Music / Movies / Books: You know the deal. Five of each.
Music: Roy Orbison's "In Dreams", The Bird and the Bee's "Diamond Dave", Bitter:Sweet's "Dirty Laundry", Blue October's "Into the Ocean", and I don't' know why but Electric Six's "Danger! High Voltage”.
Movies is a tough one since I like so many but here goes: Pans Labyrinth, Metropolis (either the Fritz Lang version or the Japanese Anime remake, both are equally beautiful and wonderful), Willow, Legend, and Labyrinth.
These books I haven't read but I'd like to: Catch 22, Dune, The Divine Comedy, Heart of Darkness, and the Chronicles of Narnia.


If you could do anything other than what you do now, what would you do?
If I could go back in time I would have gone to school for either fashion or film.


Who would you want to meet that you haven’t met? You get three choices:
Alive:
Robert Crumb. Dead: Three way tie of Moebius, Frank Frazetta, and Will Eisner. Fictional: Batman.


What’s the best and worst job you’ve ever had?
There definitely hasn't been a best job yet, but the job that suited me the best was when I worked in a small "game" company working on app games. It was definitely not the best job or situation though at the end of the day. I just liked the development team aspect of it. The worst job I had was just about any of the retail jobs I worked, especially Mervyn's my first job way back when.
What’s a Mervyn’s?
Well it's extinct now so it doesn't matter much anymore. It was a retail place at one time similar to the species JCPenny.

Are there any questions that I didn’t ask that you wished I had asked that you would like to answer now?
I hate to repeat Corey Benhatzel's question, but  I'm curious too since I'm extremely under the radar. How did you find me?
Each time I do an interview I try to remember to check out their Facebook friends and add a few artists/musicians/film-makers, etc. If I hover over someone’s link and they list themselves as an artist or their profile and cover pics are cool art I send them a Friend Request. I know it’s a bit invasive, but I haven’t had anyone complain yet and I haven’t reached the point where people are asking me to be interviewed yet so I’ll keep doing what I’m doing until I start getting enough interview requests that I don’t have to ask people if they want to be interviewed anymore.



Anyone you recommend I interview that you can put me in touch with?
BlakeMCD, I'll send you his Facebook. He's amazing and also pretty under radar! Mike White, Danny Beck, Anna Brittell.
Please do!
 
Got any questions for me?
You ever think to do this interview on yourself?
I knew someone would ask me eventually, and my 24th interview subject did, so I let him turn the tables and interview me for the 25th interview.
http://youareentitledtomyopinioninterviews.blogspot.com/2013/10/you-are-entitled-to-my-opinion_9724.html

Nice I'll check that out.

Follow-up questions and thanks:
Thank you!
Thanks for letting me subject you to being interviewed!
It was fun, thank you again. I don't do these very often.


Pitch parade:
Give me all of your links for things you want to promote.   All of them.
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/emmmteee
Twitter: https://twitter.com/MonicaMunster

Website: http://dominimus.com/
Blog: http://sketchiepoos.tumblr.com/
Deviant Art: http://monicamunster.deviantart.com/http://monicamunstertoo.deviantart.com/

 
About the Interviewee:
I am just a creative person trying to figure out my place in this universe. I have had shit jobs, and I went to community college, then my dream school, then I had health issues and dropped out. And now I'm on the search for a place to belong creatively. I am sometimes an on again off again lifetime student because I love to take classes for things that interest me over the years, like French, Industrial design, Fashion/sewing, History, etc. I love 60s 70s and 80s era Scifi and Fantasy, especially the 80's British/American creative love baby movies. I also really love true crime, the old wild west, victorian era, the Rennaisance, circus shows, the internet, internet culture, other artists, dinosaurs, monsters, zombies, people who are con artists, and so many many things that are interesting.

About the Interviewer:
Scott Lefebvre has probably read everything you've read and can write about whatever you want him to write about.
Mostly because when he was grounded for his outlandish behavior as a hyperactive school child, the only place he was allowed to go was the public library.
His literary tastes were forged by the works of Helen Hoke, Alvin Schwartz and Stephen Gammell, Ray Bradbury, Richard Matheson, Stephen King, Clive Barker, Edgar Allan Poe, and H. P. Lovecraft.
He is the author of Spooky Creepy Long Island and a contributing author to Forrest J. Ackerman’s Anthology of the Living Dead, Fracas: A Collection of Short Friction, The Call of Lovecraft, and Cashiers du Cinemart.
His reviews have been published by a variety of in print and online media including Scars Magazine, Icons of Fright, Fatally Yours and Screams of Terror, and he has appeared in Fangoria, Rue Morgue and HorrorHound Magazine.
He is the Assistant Program Director for The Arkham Film Society and produces Electronic Music under the names Master Control and LOVECRAFTWORK.
He is currently working on a novel-length expansion of a short-story titled, "The End Of The World Is Nigh", a crowd-funded, crowd-sourced, post-apocalyptic, zombie epidemic project.
Check out the blog for the book here: theendoftheworldisnighbook.blogspot.com
Check out the Facebook Fan Page for the project here: www.facebook.com/TheEndOfTheWorldIsNighBook
Check his author profile at: www.amazon.com/Scott-Lefebvre/e/B001TQ2W9G
Follow him at GoodReads here:
www.goodreads.com/author/show/1617246.Scott_Lefebvre
Check out his electronic music here: soundcloud.com/master_control
And here: master-control.bandcamp.com
Check out his videos at: www.youtube.com/user/doctornapoleon
Check out his IMDB profile here: www.imdb.com/name/nm3678959
Follow his Twitter here: twitter.com/TheLefebvre or @TheLefebvre
Follow his Tumblr here: thelefebvre.tumblr.com
Check out his Etsy here: www.etsy.com/people/arkhamscreenings
Join the group for The Arkham Film Society here:
www.facebook.com/groups/arkhamscreenings
Stalk his Facebook at: www.facebook.com/TheLefebvre
E-mail him at: Scott_Lefebvre@hotmail.com


OPTIONAL: Prove you’re not a replicant.

Question 1:
A tortoise lays on its back, its belly baking in the hot sun beating its legs trying to turn itself over but it can't, not without your help, but you're not helping. Why is that?
Because I'm going to but I'm busy taking video footage of it for future reference. Sorry Michelangelo.

Question 2:
Describe in single words, only the good things that come in to your mind about your mother.
Strong, private, strict, smart, funny, courageous, hardworking.
Question 3:
It's your birthday. Someone gives you a calfskin wallet.
I'd probably use it. No one gives me wallets anymore, probably because they all know I don't have money.

Question 4:
You've got a little boy. He shows you his butterfly collection plus the killing jar.
What's the question? Do I drink out of the jar or do I clean it and put paint in it? Not sure here, it's his hobby, maybe i'll gross him out by drinking out of it.

Question 5:
You're watching television. Suddenly you realise there's a wasp crawling on your arm.
I probably scream and run and leave the house, the wasp can have it. I'll come back when it moves out.
Question 6:
You're reading a magazine. You come across a full-page nude photo of a girl. You show it to your husband. He likes it so much he hangs it on your bedroom wall.
Then I tell him I'm in love with that picture and not him anymore we're moving out and we're going to get legally married. Maybe a three way marriage between me and the real woman.

Question 7:
You're watching a stage play. A banquet is in progress. The guests are enjoying an appetizer of raw oysters. The entree consists of boiled dog.
I am frightened but I'm hungry so I'm going to try it, and then just pretend I had never done such a thing ever again.

No comments:

Post a Comment