May Already?

Since I last posted about chi-stipation, I've made some inroads. I can now actually walk straight into my studio, without worrying about a shower of glass shards, (although it's still far from neat and organized) I've finished two large mosaics, one which I submitted to a national juried show, the other to a show themed "American Dream" for a local gallery here. I'm working on a commissioned piece (not a mosaic) and several other things that will end up being travel posters for the summer library program.

In other words, I'm busy. And this is a good thing. But...(and isn't there always a "but"?) I still feel like I'm not doing it right. Which makes me wonder, what is doing it "right?" What do I expect from myself that I'm not getting?

I've always struggled with this. When I'm writing I feel like I should be making mosaics, when I'm making mosaics I feel like I should be doing more cut paper work, and when I'm doing cut paper work I think about painting more or quilting more or just something else, more.
And I ALWAYS feel like I should be spending more time with the kids, gardening more, exercising more, and just, in general, being a better person. When it gets like this I never think I should be watching more television and yet somehow, I always manage to find time for that.

I've read lots of books on how to be more creative. I learned a lot from Julia Cameron and "The Artist's Way." I loved Anne Lamott's "Bird by Bird" about the writing life. And I believe that Stephen Pressfield's "The War of Art" should be required reading for everyone aspiring to the creative life. And virtually every book, article or random piece of advice I've ever read or heard has one element included in it.

If you want to be a...insert artistic pursuit here...focus on doing that. Don't allow yourself to be distracted by other things you could be doing. And yet that is exactly what I end up doing.

But what would I give up? See. That's the real question. It's not so much that I'm distracting myself away from my "true" goal, which may or may not be true, but that I have such a hard time letting go of the other things. I can't imagine not writing. I can't imagine not making mosaics or painting or cutting up gorgeous little bits of paper.

I almost managed to walk away from quilting. I gave it up for several years. But this spring, when my family received a particularly cruel blow, I found myself making a baby quilt for the friend of my son. It was like comfort food, flexing the scissors and threading the machine.

So like it or not, I'm going to be doing these many things that I do. And I'm resigned to that. I just need to find the balance that will allow me to be productive and yet not feel as though I'm missing out on some other great adventure.

Since I'm on a roll...

Thought I would add in some other work that I've done in the last few months, but which I haven't put out there. All in preparation for updating my website with the latest and greatest stuff...

This first piece is another cut paper piece. I have been working in this media on and off since design school. I'm on again right now. I'll have a few more pieces in the weeks to come.

Chi-stipation

I knew I'd been gone a long time. I might even have admitted to six months, but it's been nearly a year since I've updated my blog. Now, one the one hand, I know that there were very few out there pining for my pearls of wisdom, but, on the other hand, I believe that when I was making (more) regular entries, I was getting down some things. So, my Spring resolution is...doesn't everyone make resolutions in the Spring, when the grass reappears and the world is fulfilling it's promise to let you out of the damn house again?...that I will go back to blogging and that I will update my work on my website.

There. I've said it. Work. Out there. For people to see. If my art career grew on mystery I'd be famous by now. I seem to have an even harder time showing people my art than I do sitting down to create it. But both of those areas have been better lately, and I think I know why.

One of my favorite guilty pleasure movies is "Big Trouble in Little China." Yes, it has Kurt Russell and Kim Cattrall in it. Yes, it's horrifyingly full of demeaning cultural cliches. And yes, the production values make Conan movies look like art house cinema. But it also has a string of one liners, mostly delivered by Kurt, that just ache to be made into a self help manual for sound bite editors. And one of my favorites is when the shaman is explaining to Jack Burton about eastern religion, during the course of which he compares it to "your American salad bar." I first saw that movie thirty years ago (much as I hate to do that math!) and I still remember that line, complete with cheesy chopstick punctuation gesture.

So one of the things I've picked up from my trip to the world religion salad bar is the concept of "chi" or energy, more specifically (in my mind) energy flow. When the chi is flowing all is right with the world. You feel good. Things happen they way they should and you are movin' to the groove. When the chi is blocked, well...I have never read this specific analogy in any philosophical manual but it seems to be akin to a massive case of energy constipation and when it happens there is irritability, bloating and general peevishness for all. I'm sure I'm mangling this venerable and respected concept, but to me basically it means the more crap cluttering up your life, the harder it is for the chi to flow (and the chi is what gets things done baby!)

And I've had some chi issues. Perhaps it isn't unusual that I haven't posted in a year, and that my last post was about the death of my father-in-law. Dealing with death in the family, even when, superficially, it seems to be over and done with, takes more than you might think. More than I would have thought, even a year ago. It's not that we were so set adrift by grief that we were unable to function. There was functioning taking place, I'm pretty sure. It's more that we were set off course for a time. We had to readjust to the new state of the world, and it was harder to do that it seemed as though it would be. Time passed and the need to return to purpose was perceived but, at the same time, it was as though we couldn't quite find ourselves.

And, in the middle of all that, in my studio there was a large mosaic, a little less than half completed.

Understand that my studio (lovely grand word that) is a small, converted bedroom in a 100 and some year old farm house. It was converted to a kitchen for a miniscule upstairs flat probably around the time soldiers were returning from the war in 1945 and then converted to a studio when my husband and I moved here to get a little more elbow room. Unfortunately, we had both underestimated the size of our elbows and had limited funds for the massive warehouse that was what I apparently needed to corral all my crap (remember crap? The stuff that keeps the chi from flowing?) and so my studio began overstuffed and just progressed from there.

Place into the middle of that limited space a folding table with a mosaic that is roughly a yard wide and two feet tall, covered with enough broken glass to create some sort of torture chamber with the single misplaced bump of a generous hip, and you have the perfect recipe for chi-stipation. (My hips are so generous you could even call them philanthropic.)

Well, a few weeks ago I realized that I had to make a change, and part of the change was to get that mosaic done and out of there. I actually love making mosaics. There is something so fine and fiddly about finding just the right snippet of glass to express a curve of shadow or the glint of an eye. It is quite satisfying to labor in so close with pieces of glass the size of a baby aspirin or a grain of rice, and then step back and see what those tiny bits of color come together to create. But, for some reason, despite loving the process, I have a hard time with mosaic making. It taunts me. I become fearful at times. Most often when I am close to creating something that I really love, and I become more and more aware that with a single bad decision, in the too close moment of placing the small, I lose track of the larger picture and it all goes bad.

I freeze then, within that moment of fear, and have trouble moving forward. Pressing through to finish the work, where there is freedom of movement and the joy of creation. And the point at which I can get the damn thing out of the middle of my studio!

So maybe this is all part of the same thing. Maybe the fear of making mosaics is just the reflection of the larger fear that has been freezing me in place for the better part of a year. The placing of the small obscuring the larger picture. So I went back in there. Into the moldy chi corner of my life, and I started putting small pieces of glass onto the wood again. I made a few shelves and organized some more glass. I sorted and separated and broke glass into small pieces (a satisfying step all by itself) and, in essence, packed my mosaic making bags for the continuation of my journey down that path. And it worked.

I feel better. I feel positive about what I'm doing with my life again. I feel like the work I do is getting done and I'm back in the pattern. And I'm kick butt proud of my latest mosaic. So here's to Spring, and grass and longer days and more sunlight and an undeniable urge to move some more chi around.

Rituals

I attended a small presentation today. Suzanne Vega, the lovely singer/songwriter, is performing tonight at our local performing arts center and she agreed to give a free workshop on creativity today. Okay, so the words "free" and "workshop" and "creativity" each have their own pull but combine them together and I'm in the front row. (Actually the third row but who's counting.)

So there we were, a small group of about 50 artists, surprisingly few of them actual musicians, but all admitting to being artists, ready to hear the low down from some who's made it. Not surprisingly, she started out with the disclaimer that there is no magic formula, no one special task that will make it all happen.

I knew that. But it bears repeating.

She had some other good points. She suggested that you carry a pen and notebook with you, everywhere you go. And write things in it. I wrote that down in my notebook that I carry everywhere with me, with one of the dozen pens floating around in the bottom of my bag. I started doing that while in school and the habit, fortunately, has stayed with me. It made me smile a little bit.

She said that you need some space to work. Maybe it's a chair. Maybe a room or a corner of a room. Someplace where you can sit and think and no one gets to ask you if you know where something is or if they can eat this. My chair for the last year has resided at Panera Bread but I got the point. I didn't write that one down.

Maybe this is only surprising to me, but the most relevant point she made, in my opinion, was that you have to connect with people, and stay connected, and these days that means on the internet. It means Twitter and Facebook and MySpace and Blogging. I wrote down "Blogging - rituals." because when she said that I remembered where I had been just over 24 hours earlier and thinking about rituals.

My father in law died two weeks ago. It was not sudden. It wasn't unexpected or tragic. It was the passing of a man who had lived a long life into a different part, the last part, of the human experience. But we couldn't hold the ceremony until yesterday. There were any number of reasons for this, not important ones, but we all seemed a bit in limbo for those two weeks.

It didn't seem like it should matter, and maybe in the long run it didn't. Sometimes, when I thought about it, I even felt like it was a good thing. The extra time gave us room to process, time to reflect and think about how we felt. Except for the fact that once we were there, in that small chapel in the Veteran's Cemetery, it seemed all at once like we'd just lost him. Again.

It was a military ceremony. The family had a few minutes to say what they wanted to say and as I listened to his children talk about their father, I both knew him again and knew him for the first time. We laughed a little and cried some. I was proud of them all, these people who were my family through another ritual and a shared lifetime. They were good people who stood to honor their father.

Then, polished and poised young soldiers moved with erect precision through a ritual that has been witnessed by millions of families at this time. The salute, the unrushed and precise unfolding of the flag, then holding it out over the soldier, covering them in the flag of their country while the sharp and strange 21 gun salute is made, and then the even more precise refolding of the flag and it's presentation to the next of kin.

The soldier folding the flag was a young woman, dark hair in a tight bun at her neck and her face solemn and nearly expressionless as she folded the flag. Each bend of the fabric smoothed deliberately with a white gloved hand before moving to the next fold, down the entire length of the flag until the solder at the other end, a young man with a round, young face, tucked the ends of the flag into the triangle, taking time to carefully smooth and secure every bit, every wrinkle.

This was a packet that was not going to come undone. This was a duty that was not going to be rushed. This was a ritual that was as carefully and deliberately performed for an old man long away from his service and his uniform, just as it was for the young soldiers who might have died recently. At the end they gave it to his wife, who wanted to protest, and maybe didn't want it at all, but who took it, trying earnestly to tell this young man, this stranger, this soldier, that Will had been a man of peace. As if that meant that he couldn't be here, in this military place.

Everyone was very respectful to us as we filed out, to complete the ceremony and then complete the ritual, with the breaking of bread and the celebration of life.

And on and off during this entire event, this entire day, I thought about ritual. I thought about how we place ourselves in the context of ritual and custom, to ease emotion. To create space for our minds to work through whatever we have to do now. I thought about the meaning of the senses, the sharing of photos, the sharp report of seven guns firing together three times, the food we eat as we spend time together and the touch of a hug.

How did we develop rituals? What is it about us that creates rituals to deal with the events of our lives? As I listened to Suzanne talk about the use of prayer, meditation and sometimes even things like Tarot cards to access the archetypes of our nature, of our waking dream space, I thought about the rituals of art making.

I read an article recently where an artist, talking about his work and his method, said that the Jewish philosophy is that art is as much about the materials used as what you do with them. That you invest, through your time and attention and intention, added meaning to the materials you select and that you use to create your art. To make important art, you use important materials.

Subject matter, thought process, that zen state when you are working and your hands just seem to be doing what they're doing without you even knowing exactly what it is that you are doing or why, these are all made relevant through the ritual of creating art.

It seems to me that once you go through something like that, the question of whether or not anyone else likes it is actually irrelevant. Someone will see it and understand. Someone will recognize the layers of intent and attention wrapped in and around the work, like the thick waxy coating on an encaustic painting, deepening and coloring the subject. And you will have succeeded, even if you never make a dime.

But its more than that. Because the same is true of your life. Intention, attention, respect for your materials, love of the results, fearless movement in your own direction, listening for the voice of inspiration and heeding the delicate, tentative, almost invisible call of intuition, of the pattern. These are the things that create value in a life, just the same as in a work of art.

And it is a wise person who, at the end of their life, has given that to those around them. Freely, and without reserve.

What is the difference between someone who wants to be an artist and someone who is? I believe it is the person who has incorporated the ritual of art, not merely the act, who is the artist. Suzanne is right, there is no one magic formula or task. There are many. And, like any ritual, they only become more powerful, more meaningful with repetition.

Too Long

I must admit that there are many other things I should be doing right now, but sometimes you just have to write. I've been working on a project for some time now, a retelling of a Norwegian fairy tale, and while I think I have a good handle on the written part, even though it's still not completed, I've struggled with the illustrations. I keep going back and forth on how I want the story to look.

This is something I tend to do. If I have an external deadline (somebody wants it from me) I have no problem deciding on an idea and pursuing it. That's fortunate I suppose because otherwise I'd constantly be in trouble with the people who expect me to produce things for them. But, if my deadline is internal, for some reason I feel comfortable with extended the deadline, sometimes indefinitely. Well, maybe "comfortable" isn't the word, it's more like I have thought in the past that it's okay to extend my own deadlines, because I'm the one setting them. And I justify it by telling myself that I haven't decided the direction I really want to go in, I need to do more research, it's not quite there yet, blah, blah, blah. What I've been trying to do recently is to create the same sense of urgency for my internal deadlines as I do for my external deadlines. And artistically this means choosing a direction and going in it, full on.

To that end, I finally started one of the illustrations I've been envisioning for Tatterhood for some time. One of the key elements of the story is that she and her sister embark on a journey. It is a journey of salvation and restitution and I've chosen to make the ship they travel in more than just a means of transportation but also a symbol of who Tatterhood is internally. The ship represents her own need to move outside the bounds of her defined role, and also her ability to do so. With all that riding on it, I really wanted the ship to represent this in a visually cool way.

Pretty big order. And this week I started the ship. Whew. It's not ready to show you yet. Still looks pretty odd. But I'll post some pictures soon. And the process of creating the ship has been really interesting for me. I'm exploring a lot of my own ideas about making things.

Even though I've been thinking about this story for so long, living with it, if you will, I'm only just starting to feel like it's becoming real as I create the miniature version of Tatterhood's ship. It's as though the physical act of building the ship is helping me to see her character even better, and making it easier to write her actions and thoughts down in the pages of the story. The two are becoming more closely tied together, something I didn't anticipate when I started to work on this story a year ago.

I probably should have begun this process long before now, realizing this today, but we learn what we learn when we learn it. I am very excited about the prospect of seeing this through to the end now and seeing both the words and the images on paper. It's quite empowering to be working on something that is my own, start to finish, idea to execution.

I love the process of creating design work or illustration to make other people's ideas visual. I always have. It's one of the reasons I did so well in school. I can take an idea and run with it, and I love the interaction with the client. I think one of my particular strengths has been to find out a particular angle or idea unique to that person and create something that speaks to that idea. But with Tatterhood, I'm starting to really get a taste of what I can do when I combine my own ideas and talents to that same end. And it's exciting.

In the art world they call this "finding your own voice." And it makes sense because it's when your art really starts to show you, as opposed to showing the myriad of images and ideas that have influenced you. I know that some artists never really do find their own voice. And I know that I've felt close to finding it for years, but never really felt as comfortable as I do now with this direction.

We'll see where this goes. Maybe Tatterhood's ship will be the thing that helps me break through my bad habit of shortchanging my own work. That would be really cool.

Man oh Manifesto

A few weeks ago, I came across an article about writing a manifesto. I had a vague idea of what a manifesto was, sort of a “rules to live by” meets “wild-eyed fanatic” mash-up (another new word that’s already overused.) So of course I immediately thought, ahh, here’s some blog material. Because that’s how I usually think. (Not really.)

First, I imagined what sort of manifesto I would write. Clearly, it would be funny. Very moving and deep, in a funny way. Perfect, actually. Except that I don’t usually write things like manifestos. They’re too concrete and directive. And they use big words. Bigger words than I use because I’m not very deep, or a concrete thinker, or inclined to issuing directives. I mean, really, how am I to know what others should do? I barely know what I should do.

Second, I realized that if I actually had a shot at creating a moving, deep and yet pee-your-pants-funny manifesto, I better see what one looked like. Or even maybe just look up the definition. To be honest, this is always what I realize at this point. It's my "go to" second step. Research. I research. A lot. Because that’s a great way to act like you’re working, while not really actually working.

So here’s what I found. There are 23,700,000 Google results for “manifesto” with the first one being the Wikipedia definition. (That's twenty three million, seven hundred thousand for those of you, who, like me, tend to lose count after two, maybe three, zeros.) So of course I went to the Wikipedia site, and learned the definition of manifesto, which is “A manifesto is a public declaration of principles and intentions, often politcal in nature. However, manifestos relating to religious belief are rather referred to as credo. Manifestos may also be life stance related.” It comes from the Latin word "manifestum", which means clear or conspicuous. But, given some of the examples of manifestos I found, I don’t think everyone looked up the definition in Wikipedia.

Wikipedia lead me to some interesting stuff. For example, out of all the manifestos they could have chosen to quote they selected an excerpt from the Maintenance Art Manifesto written by Mierle Laderman Ukeles in 1969. Here is the quote they included:

"Maintenance is a drag: it takes all the fucking time (lit.) The mind boggles and chafes at the boredom. The culture confers lousy status on maintenance jobs -- minimum wages, housewives - no pay. Clean your desk, wash the dishes, clean the floor, wash your clothes, wash your toes, change the baby's diaper, finish the report, correct the typos, mend the fence, keep the customer happy, throw out the stinking garbage, watch out don't put things in your nose, what shall I wear, I have no sox, pay your bills, don't litter, save string, wash your hair, change the sheets, go to the store, I'm out of perfume, say it again - he doesn't understand, seal it again - it leaks, go to work, this art is dusty, clear the table, call him again, flush the toilet, stay young."

After I read this I realized I probably didn’t have to write a manifesto, Mierle was pretty darn close to universal. But maybe there were others that would come even closer to representing my personal manifesto. (Although that was before I actually read Mierle’s entire manifesto, wherein she proposes to live in the museum and do the maintenance as an art exhibit – and then extends it to the disposition and cleaning of other maintenance objects such as garbage trucks – I don’t see myself doing that.) I got to Google result number 750 before I realized that I was just polishing the rocket, (um no, wrong metaphor) before I realized that I was already done with my research and further googling would be silly. Here is my list of things I learned about manifestos.

Things I’ve Learned About Manifestos

1. Other people are more likely to read it if it has a great name, no matter what it actually says inside. Probably the best example of this is the Peanut Butter Manifesto. I doubt I would have read it if I’d known it was about what Yahoo isn’t doing right and not peanut butter, as I’d originally thought. Although it’s certainly worth a read. Second best is The Awesomeness Manifesto, written by Umair Haque for the Harvard Business Review, which in no way lived up to its title (the Awesomeness Manifesto, that is, not the Harvard Business Review.)
2. Umair Haque is crazy for manifestos. I found four within the first 50 or so examples of manifestos. The aforementioned Awesomeness Manifesto, The Builders Manifesto, The Generation M Manifesto and The Smart Growth Manifesto to name a few. And it made me wonder. Can one person really write more than one manifesto? Shouldn’t there be some sort of limit on the number of times you can tell the world how it should behave? Or am I the one that’s crazy here? Although, to be honest, the salutation at the beginning of "The Generation M Manifesto" is my favorite. Like many manifestos, it is written like an open letter, but this one is addressed to all the old people who run the world. How precious is that?
3. Manifestos generally manifest as a series of rules or points. Shorter is usually better here. Five Rules for Life actually limits you to five rules, but on the up side, you get to pick your own. The Simple Living Manifesto has only two rules, but then they give you 72 more rules to clarify the two simple ones. Some of the additional 72 include “Be present.” “Learn what “enough” is.” And my personal favorite “Declutter before organizing.” (emphasis mine) Oh man. I’ve been doing it all wrong!
4. There are many resources available to you should you decide to write your own manifesto. These include “How To Write A Manifesto” which handily explains what size paper you should use and gives a nifty example of a possible format, and a remarkably concise document also titled “How To Write a Manifesto” found on the Scottish Parliament site which suggests that you include pictures of desired outcomes, either drawn by yourself or found on the internet. I like the homemade quality of that idea. Plagiarist.org gives specific examples about what not to do and suggests a reasonable number of pages (2 – 4. Max 5, please.) Lance Whipple in his blog creatively titled “Lance Whipple” covers a wide territory when giving you advice on creating your manifesto, including guidelines for the appropriate number of rules to live by and suggesting advice from the Air Force little blue pamphlet on “Core Values”. The “How To Write An Avant-Garde Manifesto” by Lee Scrivner, goes into great detail about the use of caffeine as a brainstorming aid and the now famous (I’m sure) no quotations imperative, but I have the sneaking suspicion he’s not completely serious.
   
5. Manifestos do not have to be about earth shattering subjects. The winner in this category clearly has to be “really. tights are not pants” although the runners up are “Tank Girl: Post Feminist Media Manifesto” and “The Gobbledygook Manifesto.” Although, to be completely honest, the “Tank Girl: Post Feminist Media Manifesto” went mostly over my head, I just liked the movie and the Gobbledygook Manifesto is here because I liked the Gobbledygook Volume Analysis Chart. Oh and an honorable mention goes out to The Cloud Appreciation Society.

And that’s five things, and I have it on good authority, or at least sort of by consensus, that a list of five things is perfectly adequate for anyone. Any more and you’re just showing off.

If you’ve stuck with me so far, here’s your prize, a lovely three part series of interviews on The Transom Review with Ira Glass, on what makes great radio. It’s long but well worth every minute.

Ira, who’s name is practically synonymous with his show, This American Life, (which, in fact, I can’t even sit here and type without hearing Ira’s distinctive voice saying in my ear “This American Life presented by Chicago Public Radio”) talks at one point about the Big Idea and how what often makes radio stories worth doing is how well they can tie into that Big Idea, the universal idea or concept that makes a story bigger than itself. So maybe that’s the takeaway here, that manifestos are simply an attempt to tie into that Big Idea, the one that makes sense out of nonsense, creates order out of chaos and a map in the wilderness.

Or maybe not.

As the days get shorter...

I start to think about the holidays. More specifically, I start to think about what to make for the holidays. I can't help it. Starting in October I turn into a very large elf. And I wouldn't have it any other way. And it's genetic because my sisters are all the same.

I remember childhood Christmases. We would make ornaments for the tree and simple gifts at church. One year we knitted simple slippers. We made Christmas cookies and fudge and painted pictures.

I love to shop, don't get me wrong. Shopping is pretty darn fun. All those wonderful things out there, shiny new, wrapped in layers of plastic wrap, packing foam and nestled in their fabulously decorated cardboard boxes, just waiting to be wrapped in more paper, prettier this time and accompanied by ribbons and/or glitter. But the problem is, I only have so much money, so the shopping is pretty short lived.

As for making gifts, now that lasts much longer and is, in the end, a much more satisfying gift giving event. I get to spend hours thinking about the possible gift ideas. Poring through books and magazines crammed with ideas. Thinking about each person on my list and what I think they would like to receive. Then I get to go through my stash of supplies (and believe me, there is quite a stash of supplies to be gone through - sometimes I even find supplies for gifts I intended to make in previous years but never got around to) and pull out the things I will need to make the gifts I've decided to create.

Some years I know I will have limited time. Last year, for example, I was in the middle of preparing for my portfolio show, so my gift making was limited to jam. Other years I decide I must make one item that is so big, so glorious, and so time consuming that no one else will make it onto the home made list. They still get gifts, of course, but the recipient of the one gift is just lucky that year.

After all the lovely planning, which is much of the fun, I settle down to the actual creation. This is when I really start to feel the spirit of the holidays. I put on some holiday music or a fun holiday movie, and start to work. In some ways it's like a magic spell. Hours of labor spent, while thinking about the person who will receive the gift. Pursuing small creative impulses and embellishments. Thinking about presentation and purpose. All of this ties in to the process of gift making and creates a memory that stays with me, long after the glow of purchasing a great gift has passed.

My husband laughs at me because I'm almost always more excited about others opening gifts I've chosen for them, and especially gifts I've made for them, than I am to open gifts for myself. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE getting gifts, but there is something about seeing someone enjoy a gift you've made that just gets me going. I can barely restrain myself. Especially when I really think I've gotten it right.

My parents and sisters and their families all live far away from me. We don't usually spend the holidays together. So it is a little disappointing to pack the gifts in a box and send them off, to be opened unseen, although I do still enjoy the gift exchange. And it doesn't have to be elaborate, or expensive. It's not about that for me. I just like to send my loved ones a little something to remind them that I think about them, even when we're not together.