Life as a creative, as an artist, is full of all sorts of weird things that are tangential to the making, yet make for a full and arty life.
I count amongst these the work I do researching, planning, thinking and prepping for teaching. Recently I wanted to update some thoughts about how to progress work when it feels stalled; or where you think you might have got the perfect solution really quickly. I came across some of my learnings from a workshop six years ago and refreshed them, added to them and printed them.
And as I so often do - I reckon I got the its v it's thing wrong again here! Why oh why doesn't it have an apostrophe for the ownership bit??? A do-over won't hurt. Sigh.
Fixed it!
And today I got to use the cards as I taught another workshop on Building Narrative in Artists' Books. It was such a joy and delight! It's a small group - only four folk - and we get to go deep, think hard, and explore a lot.
I get to teach in Kim Herringe's beautiful space The Studio here in Maleny, with so many lovely things around us how could we not be inspired?
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One of the things I teach is about how to read an artists' book and we have some lovely, lovely examples to dive into.
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A few weeks ago we did a short evening workshop with Kim on Marketing and Social Media for Creatives. It's never easy for me to do the marketing thing, but Kim offered sensible and clear ideas and information about how to go about it. And I think I can do some of it! It was so good in fact that I started my homework the very next morning!
And to share some small good news...the State Library of Queensland recently purchased my small Grief is Stone book-ets. In fact they bought two of the editions so that one could go in the Education Kit to share with visitors, school children and the like. I am thrilled to know they have a public home; and will also get the chance to be shared and talked about more.
So I packed them up and posted them!
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An artistic life is full of this and that, and oh what fun it can be.
Firstly, congratulations on Grief is a Stone being bought by the Queensland Library, especially that it will go in the education kits. It's such a beautifully expressive "book-et" and I think the words are especially helpful to those grieving.
ReplyDeleteAs to your prompt cards, they are a brilliant idea for that point where work has stalled, for whatever reasons. I think anything to propel us forward, to re-gain some traction, is bound to be helpful. Finally, the one line really caught my eye in your own teaching, that of teaching people how to read an Artist's Book - it hit home to me that though I love them I've never actually made one and I bet that's the reason why... the story may be there for me, but I don't know how to "read" one and that may be what's held me back. I'm having a good think about that now so thank you for the insight!
Thanks so much - this post was an eclectic bunch of thoughts and moments! I love the prompt cards - they feel like they give permission to try something a bit out there when you are stuck, and as you say any way to crack through that stasis is a help. I also like that several of them feel like the opposite of each other! Sometimes you just have to do weird things to find the way through. Ahhh reading an artists' book....I have thoughts! I have also come to think about it about it as reading into an artists;' book. Will share some thoughts soon!
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