(These are Laurie Simmons’s real-life journals.) “Did you ever have a job that wasn’t taking pictures of stupid tiny crap?” the employment-challenged Aura yells at Siri. Aura has discovered Siri’s diaries from when she was Aura’s age, and they mirror many of Aura’s own preoccupations with love, her identity as an artist, and soothing her general worry about her destiny. In their two-tubbed bathroom in a giant Tribeca loft (their actual home) the two women artists, mother and daughter, are sometimes seen soaking simultaneously across from each other, as if they were reflections. But, in compensatory fashion, there is cute homoerotic flirtation among Dunham and her female friends to warm and console.ĭunham’s mother, the artist Laurie Simmons, known for her work with miniature decor, plays the mother, Siri, in “Tiny Furniture.” Dunham plays the daughter Aura, and Dunham’s real-life sister, Grace, plays Aura’s teen-age sister. Which may be what life in one’s early twenties often is, and if we have forgotten, Dunham means to remind us. It looks like careless cruelty between nudists. In the pages of this magazine, Rebecca Mead referred to the sex scenes in “Tiny Furniture” as “ dispiriting,” which seems to be only the tip of Dunham’s psychosexual iceberg.

One imagines that Dunham is hoping that you’ll also find it funny, but in middle-aged viewers a protective, parental feeling toward these young people might make this impossible.

Painting is a vehicle that brings mindfulness, clarity, and understanding.The youthful sex of educated, family-funded drifters that Dunham puts on the screen is mostly heartless and degrading, and not remotely exuberant, which is her point. Through the layers of paint and textured surfaces, intimate truths about life are revealed. It is only when I am painting from my heart, connected to my soul and to the Universe, that the art can flow through me. During the process, if my mind jumps in and begins to question or direct me, I am immediately shut down. Most of the time, I have no idea what I am painting until the piece is finished. I am guided each step of the way, down to the brush that I use, the colors that I mix, and the strokes that I apply onto the canvas.

Moving to its own cadence, my art is about trusting my inspiration. In quiet surrender, I let my brush take me on a journey. Each painting has a unique energetic vibration and meaning that can speak to us at different junctures of our lives. With a background in Eastern philosophy and eclectic healing traditions, Lena's work is grounded in a theoretical, intuitive, and experiential exploration of life. An explosion of color that invigorates the senses, Lena's work captures raw emotions and glimpses of awakenings. Lena's vibrant pieces are expressions of her journey.

Protective Artist by Lena Little