MEN'S FRIENDS - I Can't handle You This Way, Man

WE"RE NOT GOOD FRIENDS ANYMORE BECAUSE YOU CHANGED

Eros - artist in studio

Eros performing at Encuentro

It's hard to handle big changes in your friends' lives. Dating, marriage, new group of friends, shift in attitude, financial states - there are some hard changes men try to stay away from when meeting up with other male friends for their usual buddy time. A quick, "so how's the new job/wife/thing you were doing.." is enough to demonstrate that you are aware, but really just want to see you to hang out like we always do.

Eros during our film project - overnite graf artist

My friend Eros is artistic, eccentric, passionate and very talented as a painter and performer. I was so impressed by him that I made a short film about him.

But he changed his personality too much for me during our shoot, and it really pissed me off. Was he just putting on a performance? Was he joking with me? Was he going through an artistic crisis and needed to force himself to work in some other direction?

The admirable and unique artist who I knew and thought I had a connection with, decided on the night of our shoot; after he saw and approved the script I spent time on, after we scheduled time and had a perfect location set, after I made my way miles to meet him with equipment; after all this careful pre-production and genuine concern for the project, decides to be a graffitti artist all of a sudden who wants me to tape him tagging on the streets and talking about the streets dressed a-la-hip-hop-artist hanging out by some other real graf.

"I have warrants," is all I thought, while he started climbing up a street pole in the busy evening expecting me to get it on tape. I don't think he could name a single graf artist and as he proceeded stubbornly to continue this act, my heart just broke for the real artist who I knew that was so interesting just the way he was, and would have given a perfectly inspiring interview in his own studio.

Eros Obregon is an exotic talent waiting to be discovered. He has been discovered by some local collectors, but his real ship hasn't come in yet.

I still must love him for his talent and for his charm. I saw his innocence when he pulled this stunt on me. But I knew at that point that I couldn't continue being friends with him anymore.

"Conquistador" by Eros

 However, I still would promote every scrap of drawing or even doodle he ever made if I could represent him.

Here is his website, review it yourself:

http://www.artedeeros.com/

The thread that keeps men's friendships together breaks easily when too many changes occur. I've seen this happen before, not just with me, but with other men who can't invest more than they already have in getting to know another person who keeps changing and expecting you to follow. It becomes a game, and then the game gets old.

Eros came from Mexico, and I was always sensitive to the kind of identity searching he must have been confronted with, living in Hollywood. He spoke to me in Spanish and cooked me Mexican food that my Mexican mom never made me. His work was very Mexican to me, in the sense that it was rough but natural, colorful and flavorful, dreamlike and confrontational. I really saw him in his work, but could not see him in front of a camera.

Everybody changes when you point a camera at them. I shouldn't be so upset. The movie was a school project and I aced it. If I meet him around town, I'm sure he is the same go-with-the-flow bohemian fella I met over a year ago. Maybe I'm too bossy. I don't need to talk about me.

My friend changed for the last time and I will always want to know him the way I liked to know him. Otherwise, we can't be friends.