Ways to Simplify Your Budget and Get Back to Doing What You Love

"Danae and the Shower of Gold," Orazio Gentileschi, 1621-1623. 
Digital Image Courtesy of the Getty Open Content Program.

Hello friends,

I recognize that finances and budgeting are not the first things that come to mind when we think of factors informing the creative process.  But the reality is that monetary considerations are intrinsically linked with the creative process, whether we like it or not.  There's the obvious, concrete aspect of needing to be able to pay for our creative endeavors: supplies, space, time.  But there's also a profound psychological impact that financial concerns can have on us and the mental state that financial worry creates can easily translate over into our art.  We've all heard the sorrowful stories of professional artists having to compromise their vision to make their work more marketable, rather than having the financial security, and thus the artistic freedom, to be uncompromising  with their work.  And financial worry can drive hobbyists to view their creative endeavors as potential sources of side income and treat them like stressful business obligations rather than enjoying them for fun, relaxation, and creative expression.

But beyond the greater cloud of financial worry itself, there's also the mental energy that pretty much of all of us, financially secure or not, have to expend on mundane financial concerns.  Budgeting, paying bills, saving where we can, investing if you are lucky enough to be one of the privileged people who have money left to invest after covering your everyday expenses.  All of this takes away from mental energy we could otherwise be spending delighting in our creative pursuits, and always creates a little bit of a crack in the ethereal serenity of creative bliss. 

What I have discovered over the past few years is that there is an elegant solution to be found in pre-paid subscription services, or in apps and services that otherwise automate financial decision-making.  The joy of pre-paid subscriptions is that budgeting is a cinch.  You know exactly what it will cost each month and can factor it into your monthly expenses the same way you would rent or car payments.  It takes the consternation and comparison shopping and uncertainty out of the picture.  And as long as you do the work and research on the front end - making sure you're getting the right subscription service for your needs and that it really is cost effective as opposed to buying as you go - it can be a very responsible choice. If you're skeptical, remember your Netflix/HBOgo/AmazonPrime/Hulu/Spotify subscription and how simple and easy it is.

Admittedly, pre-paid services pose their own problems.  What if you don't end up using it?  Then you just wasted a bunch of money.  And there's also a cash-flow issue that gets at the larger fact that it's expensive to be poor.  Let's say you want to purchase a thingermajig and you use one thingermajig a month.  If you only have $100 to spend right now, and a year long monthly thingermajig subscription is $110, but a buying a single thingermajig is $20, you're clearly going to just buy one thingermajig and forgeo the subscription, even though the subscription would end up saving you $130 in the long run - more than the cost of the subscription itself. 

For people who don't have the cash flow to subscribe to everything they'd like to subscribe to, I unfortunately don't have a perfect solution.  Other than to call your congresspeople (if you're lucky enough to live in a jurisdiction that isn't D.C. or Puerto Rico or an island territory and actually have meaningful representation in Congress) and tell them to change our economic and tax policy, there's one other thing you can do to make this work.  Stagger your subscriptions.  Subscribe to one thing first, something that will be a real game changer.  Take the money you save over time through that subscription and put it away (below you will see there's an app for that), and then use that to buy the next subscription once you have enough money saved, and repeat.

In any case, below are some of the budget-simplifying discoveries I have found in the past few years that have made all the difference in my energy and worry levels, and freed up my mental energy to be redirected to my work and my creative pursuits.  Some of these discoveries have saved me money, but all of them, and this is what I'm really aiming for here, have helped me to simplify my financial life.  These, for me, have been game changers.  And, just so you know, I have not been paid, or even asked, by any of the companies I'm about to mention here, so you can be sure that if I'm recommending something it's because I use it myself and genuinely believe what I'm saying.

Mealpal 

Mealpal is one of three pre-paid products that opened my eyes to the fact that living in a big city + having the Internet means that there are services available to me that can significantly simplify my life and reduce the time and energy I have to expend on mundane spending decisions.  Mealpal is a prepaid, monthly lunch plan that allows users to obtain workday lunches from local restaurants at a discounted price.  Depending on the plan you select, meals will cost you between $5 and $7.  Granted, it might still be cheaper to make and bring your own lunches, but then you would have to make and bring your own lunches, a habit I kept promising to get into but never actually got into.  It's significantly cheaper than just going out and buying lunch, which in DC can easily cost between $10 and $15 or more. 

But more than just saving money, it saves time and mental energy.  You pre-select your meal the night before, you choose only between participating restaurants, and each restaurant puts out one meal each day.  You can use the search filters to further refine your options, and then you select your meal and a time window.  Mealpal also lets you skip the line to order and go straight to the pickup window, where your meal should be waiting for you if you show up during your set time window.  Now, it's not perfect - this approach creates limitations.  But to me that's what makes it appealing.  Before Mealpal I would spend a ridiculous amount of my workday debating where to go for lunch, and then thinking about how much I would end up spending to get what I actually wanted, and worrying about how far I would walk and when in my day I should go.  Now, by the time I start my workday, that decision has been made.  Granted, the limited selection led me to eventually switch from the 20-meal-per-month plan to the 12 meal plan, especially because I'm pescetarian and the vegetarian and fish options are especially limited.  This also saves room for days when I do feel like splurging, am out sick, or have a work-related lunch event. 

One final note on Mealpal is that, now that I have been using Mealpal for a while, my habits have changed.  I don't look at lunch the same way.  I would like to think that if I ever stopped using it (like let's say if I moved to an area where it wasn't available) I would still retain the good habits I've developed  of not spending so much time and energy on figuring out where to grab lunch.


Qapital

This is the other product that made me realize the Internet is magic and can do things for me automatically.  Qapital certainly isn't the only app that does this, but it's the one I use and am most familiar with.  Qapital is a smartphone app that you give access to your banking account and credit card history (which you may not be thrilled with, but Qapital is affiliated with well known financial and banking institutions, which you may also not be thrilled with (heh) but at least it means that federal banking regulations are in place to protect you).  You tell Qapital your savings goals, and can have as many as you want, and then you can set rules based on your own spending patterns which in turn remove money from your bank account and put that money in a separate banking account where it is earmarked toward the goals you have set.  So, for instance, let's say your goals are "save up for art classes," "rainy day fund," and "trip to Morocco."  You set a rule that if you spend less than $20 on Uber or Starbucks in any given week the difference is removed from  your account and earmarked toward art classes, a rule that $70 a month automatically goes into your rainy day fund, and a rule that the app will round up to the next dollar on all your credit card transactions and place that money in savings toward your Morocco trip.  You can set caps on the goals or not.  And it's easy to transfer money back to your bank if you need to.

The best thing about Qapital is it's automatic and you can do it in small increments so you literally don't even notice it happening (just make sure to monitor your checking account balance, which you would presumably be doing anyway).  And then after a few months all of a sudden you've saved hundreds of dollars and you're like whoa, how did that happen?  I saved $2000 in one year using Qapital without noticing.  And believe me, I am not rolling in dough.  For me $2000 is a lot of money.  So to not have even noticed it happening is pretty incredible.

I also like the fact that Qapital (assuming you remember it's even happening) can also encourage good habits.  I could go spend $5 on a fancy latte, but I won't because I know that money is going toward my savings.  I could take an Uber or I could walk or take the Metro because I know that money will go toward one of my goals.  Granted, I personally don't take any of that into account anymore and just let the app work its magic, but if you did take it into account you'd be doing even better.

4pfoods

A third game changer in my life has been a subscription to a local CSA that delivers food to my house every week.  There are other CSAs in the DC area, but I chose 4p because it delivers, I enjoy its commitment to local growers, and the customer service people are passionate, available, and super friendly.  Like they know me by name when I e-mail them and we have ongoing conversations because it's literally the same three people.  If you're in the DC area I highly recommend them and if not then there are likely CSAs in your area with a similar vibe.

What I like about the 4p subscription is that it takes all the work and thinking out of grocery shopping.  Once a week they send out a reminder e-mail and, like Mealpal, I log into their system and make my selections.  I am presented with a limited but sufficient selection of local, seasonal produce items to include in my bag - I also have the dairy and egg subscription (and there's a meat subscription available if you're carnivorous, and if you must eat meat I'd rather you ate meat from these folks than big corporate farms) - and the ability to skip that week if I so like, I decide what I want, and then all I have to do is wait for delivery.  It's subscription style and they keep my card on file so I get a weekly automatic charge for weeks where I don't skip and I always know what that charge is going to be.

What I enjoy about this is that it exposes me to new vegetables I wouldn't necessarily have worked with before.  Rutabaga, parsnip, kohlrabi, actual ginger and tumeric root rather than stuff in a jar, mizuna, varieties of raddish I didn't know existed, sunflower microgreens (which are DELICIOUS who knew), tomatillos, Asian pears, hydroponic lettuce varieties that are way tastier and more nutritious than store variety iceberg.  All of this is stuff I never would have considered before and is now a part of my regular repertoire.  I literally cannot remember the last time I went to a grocery store.  I occasionally go to Trader Joes to pick up non-perishables from time to time (but not wine, as I also have a wine club membership - basically a subscription - at local Virginia winery Hillsborough Vineyards, which has the best rose wines I have ever tasted).  Pretty much everything else, including my white bread, I get as needed at CVS, which brings me to...

Target Subscriptions

CVS is everywhere around here but sometimes getting there still takes me out of my way and is a pain in the butt, and I end up paying premium prices on things I could get more affordably at a larger superstore in a more suburban location.  I've always considered it worth it to buy my toilet paper there, though, because it's still cheaper than owning a car, which I'd need to schlep out to Target or WalMart - though both are making inroads into the cities, painfully aware of the "reurbanization" (read: gentricifcation) by America's younger middle class.  Still, the WalMart and Target locations in D.C. are far out of my way.  Target has also begun opening a smaller version of itself in urban areas called Target Express, which is an interesting model, and is clearly geared toward urban millenials.  For instance, it has a slimmed down clothing selection with a focus on work clothing and fashion forward selections, with no kids' stuff to be found.

Nonetheless, enter Target subscriptions.  Having gotten so much bang for my buck with MealPal, 4p and Qapital I recently began looking for other timesaving and brainsaving prepaid services.  And I discovered that I can subscribe to toilet paper.  There are many services, in fact, that let you subscribe to toilet paper.  I landed on Target because it carries the brand I like with the website functionality and price I like.  And with a subscription you receive free shipping plus a 5% discount.  So now, for under $20 a month after tax, I receive a massive shipment of Charmin Ultrasoft Mega Plus at my house.  This is almost the same price I was paying for half as much at CVS, and, without a car, I would have to go out of my way to walk to CVS on my way home to buy it and then lug two giant packages of toilet paper with me back home.

You can subscribe to other household items from Target, as well, including certain food items like Cliff bars.  Unfortunately, I have yet to locate a subscription service that will send me white bread.  GoPuff will bring me wheat bread - and apparently also a full sized hookah and an aluminium trash can - but apparently not white bread.  *shakes fist*

Membership at the Phillips

So, with my love of subscriptions, it occurred to me that I can apply this same concept to entertainment.  Not all memberships are worth it, but they are if they end up paying for themselves.  The Phillips Collection is America's oldest modern art museum and is a beautifully curated, small museum located in the Dupont Circle area of Washington D.C.  It is a delight and is much more intimate and hidden than the Smithsonians, and honestly I think their collection is nicer than that at several of the Smithsonian art museums.  I mean I could go on about the difference between private and public collections but that's a different post.  Mostly, their programming is thoughtful, and easier to figure out and access than anything on the Smithsonian calendar, plus it's in a part of DC that Washingtonians actually go to and that isn't spilling over with tourists. 

Membership at the Phillips is $60 a year, and offers free admission plus two guest passes plus discounts on concert performances and other ticketed events plus a discount at its cafe (run by Tryst, a DC institution) and its delightful gift shop.  Admission is usually $12 so 5 trips makes back the price of membership.  And you'll use them because that includes admission to member's only viewings and Phillips After 5, a monthly event in which the museum stays open and allows folks to browse the entire collection, plus enjoy a live music performance.  This membership is more than worth the price and once you have already paid it means there will always be something to do in the city that requires no additional spending.

Rosetta Stone Online Subscription

You may know Rosetta Stone from those mall kiosks of yesteryear where they sell you sets of CD-Rom for hundreds of dollars.  It has always been an effective language software, and no more expensive than paying for involved language classes.  But it has always been cost prohibitive enough that buying it just to dabble in a new language to try it out, or trying to gain a cursory knowledge of multiple languages that interested me was never possible.

I recently discovered, however, that Rosetta Stone has adapted to the fact that few computers today even have disc drives.  It now lets you subscribe to an online go-at-your-pace language learning program.  Cost varies depending on how many months you subscribe, but I just picked up a one-year Hebrew subscription for a little over $100.   I've always wanted to learn Hebrew.  I'm really into Jewish liturgical music and the current Israeli music scene (regardless of what my political feelings about Israel may be), especially since in the past several years there has been a surge of amazing Jewish artists of color bringing rich cultural traditions from all over the African and Middle Eastern world to a previously Eurocentric music industry.  And I perform a lot of Jewish music, and have even taught on the subject of Jewish music.  So being able to learn Hebrew in a way that is cost effective is making a huge difference in terms of my creative life.  It also goes back to the notion of having something "free" to do.  Now that the subscription is already paid for, for the next year I can log on whenever I'm looking for something to do that's enriching and doesn't cost me any additional money.  So if I find myself bored one night but have already overspent my going out budget for the month, I can log on and learn some Hebrew and be very, very content.


One final note on subscription "boxes."

I'm still figuring out how I feel about these things, and haven't used many myself.  I did try out a Globein subscription for a few months and didn't renew.  I love the concept of Globein, which sends you a small package of fair trade artisan-made products from around the world, helping to support makers in developing countries.  The items I received were nice and high quality, and it was lovely receiving a little gift in the mail every month.  But I ultimately found that I was getting a lot of things I didn't really need, and for me in particular it wasn't helpful because it kind of assumed that box recipients had their own nice households and weren't urban millenials living in an apartment with multiple roommates.  The batik table runner and olive wood cheese spreaders I received were lovely, but when am I ever going to use them when the constraints of my lifestyle mean I don't have family dinners and  rarely ever entertain?  Plus it was a significant monthly charge each month, for an amount I couldn't justify for things that were pretty but probably wouldn't get much use, rather than a single year-long subscription.  This might be the right box subscription for somebody else, but not for me.

In a similar vein, I've been curious about clothing boxes like M.M. LaFleur and StitchFix.  These subscriptions charge you a monthly fee for the box, and then you decide what you do and do not keep.  What you keep you pay for.  M.M. Lafleur is absolutely cost prohibitive, without question, for boring stuff that isn't anything special.  I have one friend who uses it and likes it because she hates shopping for work clothes, and has the kind of job where she's constantly traveling and just doesn't have time to worry about it.  She's also tall and thin and well paid and could care less about looking fashionable as long as she looks appropriate.  It's basically a service for highly paid and very busy professional women and that's all it's for, and I'm also kind of offended by some of the snooty sounding interviews and pull quotes I've seen from its founder about how women shouldn't be using their clothing to make a statement, as someone who loves colorful statement clothing.  I've received mixed reviews from friends on StitchFix.  One friend, a very very busy and overworked and highly paid attorney loves it because she literally doesn't have time to go shopping.  The other, a graduate student looking for help growing a work appropriate wardrobe, canceled her subscription after one box because she asked for work clothing and found that they had sent her sheer blouses and leather leggings, kept nothing, and resented paying for the privilege of having a bunch of stuff sent to her that she didn't want.

There are additional subscription boxes that I'm curious about and may try one day.  There are several witchy themed boxes available from Cratejoy that intrigue me.  And when I eventually have the type of lifestyle that allows me to have a dog I will be spoiling it with a Barkbox (and I do have friends who rave about this one).  But I'm not in any rush.  To me these don't necessarily feel like life-simplifying measures the way that some of the previous products have been.  They just feel like accumulating stuff, which I'm perfectly good at doing all on my own, and actually enjoy doing on my own - perhaps a little too much.  That said, getting a little treat in the mail every once and a while is really nice.


So what about you, readers?  Have you found any life-simplifying products or services not mentioned here?  What do you do that keeps you from having to think about dealing with mundane problems or chores and gives you the ability to expend more of your time and energy on things like your career and on creativity?  Share in the comments.

A Creativity Break Versus A Break from Creativity

"Reverie," John William Godward, 1904.
Digital image courtesy of the Getty Open Content Program 

Hello friends,

For a long time I've always thrived on creativity breaks.  Breaks from everyday life doing boring, non-creative things where other people are the boss of me when I can tell all that stuff to chill out and take time to just sit down and make something awesome.  Something that's completely under my control, purely an expression of my feelings and desires.  These creativity breaks have been essential. Sometimes what gets me through my workday sometimes is knowing a project I'm in love with is at home waiting for me.

But sometimes being creative can get overwhelming, especially if you put constant pressure on yourself to do so. That includes keeping a creativity blog (heh - note recent respite).

For the past several weeks, I have been swamped.  And in a way it can be good to be swamped - it means you're active, needed, and not bored.  It can even be invigorating, but only when that swampedness is being counterbalanced with a healthy dose of R&R.  I have not been so much with the R&R having lately and what I have learned about myself is that for me, creativity is kind of like work more so than R&R.

Part of it is because I put pressure on myself and create all these internal deadlines that really don't need to be there (honestly, Emily, nobody cares if you get that scarf finished this weekend, including the person you say you're making it for).  And part of it is that I view my creative pursuits and crafting as a kind of twin-from-a-parallel-universe career, the career that I would like to be having if I thought I could make any money at it and weren't totally risk averse instead of my actual one that's not as fulfilling as I would like it to be.  Maybe that's why I put the unnecessary pressure on myself.  Or maybe it's that my bedroom has been completely taken over by craft supplies and I'd like to finish some projects and get them out of there!

In any case, while crafting is certainly fulfilling it isn't necessarily fun. And, low on time and energy and emotional resources, I haven't been doing much of it lately.  In fact, I just spent the last week in Florida having a non-vacation helping out my parents, and I brought several creative activities down with me that I didn't even touch.  Instead I spent what little alone time I had on my phone playing this silly cartoon choose-your-own-adventure romance game, and another one where you have to save up to buy furniture and then enter into realistic looking interior decorating challenges (that's actually kind of creative, right?)

In the past few weeks I've also bought a new computer - long overdue - done some networking, severely neglected my poor boyfriend, dealt with work drama, taught a music class that I had been preparing for months, started attending choir rehearsals again, attended a launch party for an amazing new natural beauty shop in Georgetown, gone to several Mary Kay parties and participated in a poker tournament.  And I'm pooped.  And I keep coming home and taking a look at my new loom that I was so excited about and I just don't want to do it.  I don't even want to cook.  I want to order delivery, crack some wine, and play Dice Smash for three hours.  Is this what adulting looks like?

I'm trying to tell myself that this is self care and not failure.  And I'm getting better at it every day.

Am I abandoning creativity?  Certainly not.  I'm sure one day I will wake up and be excited again. But right now, I'm tired!  So I'm giving myself some time off.

To be frank I think I've always labored under the misconception that every moment should be spent doing something productive.  People ask me how I manage to do everything that I do and I explain that 1) I don't sleep (true) and 2) I don't watch TV.  Or rather, I only watch TV if I'm doing something else in front of it, like making jewelry or knitting.  And I think that's part of why I don't read for pleasure - can't hold a book and craft at the same time.

This is the first time in my life that I've finally understood that this is bullshit.  Maybe this is just the first time in my life that I've been this tired.

In any case , I'm confronted with a new kind of challenge, one that is in its own way creative: What is this R&R I've been hearing so much about?  Or, rather, what does it look like for me?  Bubble baths? I hear it's supposed to involve bubble baths.  Sounds kind of boring.

I'm inspired here by my friend Kim's recent blog post on the importance of fun breaks.  She talks about what she does (or would do) to just have fun and be silly, and encourages others to share their thoughts on this.  I, however, suck at this, so I've created my own exercise: just a list of things I like to think about that make me happy - without me having to do anything or put any pressure on myself. Baby steps, you know.  And not just vast, obvious categories like "puppies" and "chocolate."  Oddly specific, idiosyncratic, utterly me happy things.  Weird stuff.  Frivolous stuff.  It's tough if we're talking about this in the context of taking a break from creativity, because the stuff that makes me happy is inevitably linked to creative projects and ideas I have, whether as supplies or photography subjects or inspiration sources, but in my head I will do my best to separate them out and just appreciate them for themselves.

So here we go:

1. Farmers Markets
2. Lavender branches
3. Alpacas, specifically the caramel colored ones, especially with funny haircuts
4. Marble surfaces
5. Space cats, especially space cats posing with burritos
6. Scented candles that smell either like men's cologne or fairy tale forests
7. Walking through the perfume, beauty and accessory departments at high end department stores
8. Shooting bobas through the big straw like a spit ball (have done it, will do it again)
9. Metallic gold nail polish
10. The 1920s


How about you friends?  What do you do to take not just a creativity break but a break from creativity?  And what is on your list of things that make you happy just to think about them?  Discuss in the comments.

Emily

Similar but Different: Synthesizing Multiple Crafts Into One

"The Weaver (La Tisserande)," Francois Bonvin, 1861.
Courtesy of the National Gallery Art Open Access Program.

Hello friends,

As you may have gathered by now, I love fabric.  Not sewing so much, not crafting garments, but making fabric itself.  I love all things tactile and textile.  I started off as a knitter, when I was still in elementary school.  Convinced that all grandmothers *must* know how to knit, I asked my grandmother to teach me.  She had no idea, so she bought a book, some knitting needles, and some cheap pink yarn, and sat me down on the love seat in her condo in Florida.  She consulted the book, performed a step, and then handed the needles to me to instruct me on what to do, so on and so forth.

Later on I decided it would be helpful to learn a little crochet to supplement my knitting with lace edges.  Crochet allows for a much more freestyle, sculptural approach and isn't confined to lines and rows of stitches the way that knitting is.

These skills taught me an appreciation for fabric.  Colors, fiber types, density, tension.  I found myself caring less about what the end product would be and much more fascinated by the process and the minutia.  What happens when I blend these two yarns together?  These two colors?  Using this stitch, or that one?  What if I use this needle size, does that change the texture and drape of the fabric?

I think this fascination comes through in my finished work.  You'll note that my pieces themselves tend to be simply constructed with few bells and whistles, mostly flat rectangular shawls.  But the fabrics themselves are highly detailed, with lots of focus on texture and the play of the different colors and fibers.

#handknit #cashmere and #silk #shawl by yours truly! #cozy #handmade #nevernotknitting available at coupcoup.etsy.com #acreativedc #yarnporn

A post shared by Bring The Art In (@bringingart) on Dec 25, 2016 at 8:13pm PST

The above piece, for instance (which happens to be available for sale in my Etsy shop) features three different yarns - two different colors of super fine silk and cashmere blend yarn, and a hand-painted pure silk that alternates between many different colors.  I alternated the different fibers and selected a slip stitch pattern that causes the different rows of stitches to peak and trough into one another.  But quite frankly, I couldn't have cared less about the length or shape of the shawl.  That was totally eyeballed.


As I grow as an artist I find myself fascinated by more and more fabric techniques.  I have learned to dye with natural indigo, using the ancient Japanese art of shibori.  This technique allows me to focus less on the construction of the fabric itself, relying on pre-finished silks and other fabrics, and to instead turn my attention to the color and surface design of the piece.

Can't believe I made these #shibori #silkscarves myself with #indigo. All thanks to @waxandwanefiber and @thelemonbowldc. Love them and planning to make more (many more) at home. #vividblue #diyfashion #acreativedc #madeitmyself #madebyme #madeindc

A post shared by Bring The Art In (@bringingart) on Mar 25, 2017 at 4:24pm PDT

These scarves are also available on Etsy and are also for sale at my favorite Washington area boutique, Proper Topper (where they've been selling like hotcakes!).


Even when I'm not planning to apply a new technique I've picked up to fabric at the offset, I end up thinking about ways to apply it to fabric.  I took a block printing class many moons ago so that I can learn to carve my own designs to apply to my cards and journals instead of using pre-made stamps (See my mother's day cards I made using my own carved "Mom" block here). My instructor mentioned that the inks we were working with could be used on fabric, and that notion has been stuck in the back of my mind ever since.  What if I were to block print designs on top of my shibori designs?  And then add a little embroidery on top of that, maybe to outline the designs or add details?  What kind of fabric would that create and would it actually be a fabric that anyone would want to use for something functional?





Most recently, however, I turned to the ultimate fabric-making craft: weaving.  I have been curious about weaving for years, especially after I learned about the existence of "knitter's looms" designed specifically for use with knitting yarns.  As serious knitters are wont to do, I have accumulated an impressive yarn stash that is taking up a dramatic amount of space in my home.  Knitter's looms are touted as the ultimate stash-buster.  These looms are tiny versions of the big fancy whoosh whoosh looms that have the uppy downy things (known as "heddles"), made to accommodate standard thickness knitting yarns.

But I have also noticed that another form of artistic tapestry weaving has become all the rage among the crafting community recently:

Test run of our new giant looms complete. I'm really happy with the results. I used probably 500grams of our giant merino and then the tassels are out of our new cotton which was supposed to be for my macrame, but couldn't resist. Hope you like the results 😊 #weaving #weekend #weavings #woven #wovenwallhanging #interiors #interiordecor #interiordesign #wallart #walldecal #walldecor #dreamcatcher #loom #looms #loomlove #loomweaving #woolcouture #handmadebyme #handmadewithlove

A post shared by Wool Couture Company (@woolcouture) on May 6, 2017 at 1:09pm PDT

A custom piece with loads of charm. Peaches + cream 🍑👌🏼 . . . . #weavebynight #wovenwallhanging #weaversofinstagram #fiberart #peachesandcream #textileart #homedecor #decor #bohemian #fringe #buyhandmade #handmadeisbetter #makersgonnamake #flashesofdelight #thatsdarling #pocketofmyhome #wallweaving #weaving #laploom #lostpondlooms

A post shared by Kelsie Detweiler (@weavebynight) on Jun 27, 2017 at 12:46pm PDT

This personal project was created without a plan! I usually don't do it this way... but I challenged myself to not sketch or even pick out colors. I had no idea what it would look like right-side-up until I took it off the loom! It was so much fun! I'm planning on keeping this piece for myself... even though I don't have a wall to hang it on yet 🤔 . . #weaving #weaveweird #yarn #loom #fiberart #yarnlove #livethelittlethings #dshappy #dslooking #cylcollective #craftsposure #creativityfound #ohwowyes #todayslovely #pursuepretty #flashesofdelight #thatsdarling #ABMhappylife #girlboss #livecolorfully #makersgonnamake #dspattern #dstexture #thenativecreative #instart⠀#keepmaking

A post shared by Lindsey Campbell (@hellohydrangea) on Jul 3, 2017 at 9:44am PDT

These pieces are made on a frame loom, which forgoes the heddle and instead relies on the weaver herself to interlace the weft fiber (the horizontal fiber) through the vertical fibers of the warp manually with her hands.  It's much more rustic and slower going, but offers so much more flexibility in terms of shape and experimentation.  It's basically freestyling it.

Well lo and behold, I found myself a loom by an independent businesswoman on Etsy that converts from frame to heddle loom and works with regular knitting yarn.

My #loom from @funemstudio on @etsy just arrived! Assembly was a breeze and the best part is it converts from a #rigidheddle to a #frameloom ! Can't wait to take it for a spin! #diy #etsy #handmade #weaving #crafting #crafty #makersgonnamake #craftersofig #makersofig

A post shared by Bring The Art In (@bringingart) on Jul 5, 2017 at 8:18am PDT

And here's my first project!  I'm starting off with the frame loom and working my way up to the
heddle.

My first #weaving with this gorgeous #loom from @funemstudio! Not thrilled with how much it's pulling in on the sides, but loving how the #fringe is turning out! #fiberart #wallhanging #homedecor #makersgonnamake #makersofig #weaversofig #yarn #diy #crafty #crafting #bythings #acreativedc

A post shared by Bring The Art In (@bringingart) on Jul 8, 2017 at 9:07am PDT

What has been really interesting about this adventure in textiles is the degree to which all these crafts are similar and yet also different.  My one day fantasy is to synthesize them into one big project or personal artistic style that incorporates a multimedia garment or wall hanging made up of my own woven fabric, knitted embellishments, and my block printed and/or embroidered shibori.

A synthesis:



In many ways, it has been easier to pick up each new craft than the previous one, kind of like learning new languages.  Certain building-block skills are the same.  Understanding color and how fibers of different colors blend together.  Understanding the structure of different fiber types, for instance the fact that silk is always going to drape differently than wool.  Understanding the concept of "tension" (how tightly you hold your yarn or thread), which is a near universal factor in all fiber crafts.  Too much tension and your thread will snap or your fabric will pucker.  Not enough and things will be too loose and your piece will fall apart.  Just having a natural feel for running fibers and strings over my fingers, feeling comfortable pulling yarn from a ball without getting it tangled, holding a needle. The crochet hooks and tapestry needles I already use to finish off certain aspects of my knitting have come in very handy as I use them to add fringe to a woven piece or pull the weft back and forth between the warp strings respectively.

And yet so much is new.  And those new challenges that I have to handle like a beginner really throw me off because I have come to develop a certain expectation about the ease with which I'll be able to tackle a textile-related project.  Shibori is messy. Learning to deal with indigo dye splatter all over the floor (and walls) was a real challenge, since I don't have a yard.  With the weaving, getting a sense of exactly how much yarn I need to complete a shape is totally new because weaving uses totally different amounts of yarn, plus I'm struggling to keep my loom from dipping in on the sides where I pull too tightly.  You would think this wouldn't be an issue for me since I mastered the art of evenness with my knitting long ago.

But perhaps the greatest thing about this is the differences on my physical body.  I have carpal tunnel syndrome, and my hands go painfully numb sometimes when I'm knitting.  Weaving doesn't do that at all!  But it hurts my back.  So I can switch back and forth between the two, giving my hands and wrists a break when I weave and my back a break when I knit.  Block printing I do standing up.  Indigo dyeing - with all the different steps that involve dunking the fabrics in different buckets, rinsing, hanging, blocking, stirring - is a full body exercise.

I really do feel like I'm at a place in my artistic non-career where every new skill I learn is with an eye to integrating it into my existing work style, improving the things I'm already working on.  I'm very excited about the idea of watching all these different elements coalesce until I've woven (haha see what I did there) them all into a single, uniquely personal artform.



How about you readers?  Have you ever synthesized multiple skills/crafts/art forms together to create one, singular type of project?  What new skills would you like to learn that you feel could improve upon artistic activities you're already doing?  Do you also find that you tend to gravitate to crafts or other hobbies that share a lot in common or are you more inclined to go after something totally new because that itch has already been scratched?  Discuss in the comments.

Challenges that Occur When Teaching Your Passions

A Young Scholar and his Tutor, Rembrandt Harmensz. van Rijn, c. 1629-1630
Digital Image Courtesy of the Getty Open Content Program

Hello friends,

I've mentioned my always-has-ideas-friend Kim before.  One of Kim's many great, creative ideas is a D.C. area program called Little Academy.  Little Academy offers affordable, one-session classes for adults curious about various creative, intellectual and socially conscious topics - art history, poetry, music, film, women's studies, you name it.  The classes I've taken so far included a class on how to film an entire, high-quality movie using your smart phone and a class on the history of protest music in America.  The classes are meant to be easygoing and social, so if you're in the D.C. area and like cocktails (after all, they're taught at a bar) you should absolutely check it out before this Summer's session is over.

Kim also knows that I'm a Jewish music nerd, and so one thing led to another and I am now going to be teaching a class titled "Challah Back: A History of Jewish Music in the U.S. and Beyond" on August 8.

All credit goes to Kim for the clever title and the enticing course description on Little Academy's website; if I had had my way the title would have been something like, "Jewish Immigration Patterns and Ethnic Diversity and their Lasting Influence on Modern Popular Music."

The difference between the two titles really highlights one of the biggest challenges for me as I plan my class: Figuring out the line between what is universally interesting and what is just interesting to me as someone who is already super into this topic.  It's particularly hard given that this class is entirely voluntary and something people are doing for fun, so they're not the usual trapped audience there because they need to be there.

I have plenty of teaching, training and public speaking experience.  My big girl job requires me to present trainings and speak at conferences in regard to really dry, technical topics on the regular.  I mean, I'm not a total Ben Stein about it.  I try to pepper in some humorous anecdotes or human impact stories and throw an occasional interesting graphic into my PowerPoints.  But the real difference here is that when you're teaching a technical topic that people need to understand to do their job, the goal is to clearly convey only those the facts and information your audience absolutely needs to know.

But what about teaching something you absolutely love and are passionate about and do for fun?  You would think this would be easier but I'm actually finding it extremely difficult!  I'm not complaining. I looooove the fact that I'm being presented with an opportunity to spend two hours externalizing my internal geek monologue and showing people cool music videos that I'm really into.  The problem, however, is that if I include everything I was originally hoping to say, packing my PowerPoint with with images, article links and embedded videos, the session will last nine hours.

(A little teaser: This video is by an artist named Riff Cohen, a Jewish Israeli of North African descent I just discovered and am OBSESSED with - I'll be discussing another one of her videos during my class that has significantly more Jewish imagery in it, but I love this one, too, and personally am thrilled she sings in French because I don't understand Hebrew or Arabic - look at how her ethnically diverse perspective on Paris differs from the stereotypical one)

How do I decide what to cut?  How can I not embark on the only tangentially relevant but absolutely fascinating discussion of Jewish contributions to the bourbon industry and the fact that anti-Semitism was a driving force behind the prohibition movement, given that the class is taking place in a bar that specializes in bourbon cocktails?  How can I not talk about how, even today, popular culture uses cribbed motifs from recognizably Jewish music to trigger imagery about greed and money, and compare that to similar uses of musical tropes from Black, Chinese and Native American cultures that are used to immediately evoke stereotypes about those groups in settings where members of those cultures are not actually present?  (Here's my favorite overall example of this phenomenon, and here's my favorite example involving stereotypical Jewish musical tropes - nice stock tickers, ladies.)

How do I gauge what parts of my presentation will be interesting to my audience, when I'm mired in this stuff and therefore interested in all of it and they're only just starting to dive into the topic?  How do I make this topic interesting to Jewish people and non-Jews alike?  How do I balance people's expectations that this class is going to be all about Bob Dylan, Leonard Cohen and Paul Simon with all the really other important and very cool stuff that I find super interesting but that isn't as well known and probably isn't what my audience is expecting to learn about?  How do I deal with the fact that most Americans' exposure to Jewish culture involves white-looking dudes from New York or New York-like places, leaving out about 90% of the rest of Jewish culture, which involves Jews of many different races and ethnic backgrounds and geographic locations and a wide diversity of languages and traditions?

As someone whose major claim to be able to teach on this topic is simply the fact that I love it, have spent a lot of time with it, and have compiled a lot of cool information and facts about it, and who doesn't have any professional or educational credentials in musicology, Jewish studies or like fields, how do I deal with a challenge from someone who claims to know more about the topic than I do or who adamantly disagrees with my interpretation of my topic?  What happens if someone in my class expresses a bias or stereotype about Jews that just isn't cool, without even knowing that they're doing it?  Am I qualified to take that person on?

And what do I do about managing people's questions, facilitating organic discussion, and making things interactive but still making sure we cover everything I want to cover during the session?  At presentations for work I always build in question time, but work topics aren't endless and aren't areas of passion for me where I could talk for ages and always have another video to show.

I guess the good news, however, is that most of the people in my audience will probably be a little tipsy :)


What about you?  Have you ever had the opportunity to teach something just for fun, or to teach in a more serious setting on something that's a topic of passion for you?  How do you manage to deal with the challenges of gauging what other people will actually be interested in, keeping yourself from going off on tangents, or cutting out things that you care about because you simply don't have enough time?  How does this type of teaching or presenting differ from other types of presentations you've had to perform, like school presentations, talks at conferences, or briefings at work?  If you could teach on anything, what topic would you want to teach and what would your class look like?  What do you think would be your biggest concern?  Discuss in the comments.

Bring the Fairy Tale In

"The Knight and the Lady," Master E.S. c. 1460/1465
Courtesy of the National Gallery of Art Open Access Program

Hello friends,

People who know me will tell you I'm a practical person.  I don't get caught up in fantasy or delusion or daydreams.  I think about the practical realities of the here and now, sometimes to an extreme.  My favorite story that illustrates this is from several years ago when my best friend told me about a visualization exercise in which you're supposed to imagine you're walking through the woods, and different things you encounter along your journey represent facets of your real life.  At one point in the exercise you come to a container, and you have to describe the container.  My friend, on her first run through, had encountered a beautiful, ornate porcelain vase. Me?  I came to an old dirty used Tupperware container somebody had left in the woods.

Apparently the container is meant to represent our attitudes toward love and romance.  Whoops.

I wasn't having any trouble with my imagination or ability to visualize.  Everything I encountered on my mental journey through the woods appeared in vivid detail.  It was a veritable Bob Ross painting. It was just incredibly realistic.

Living in Washington D.C., I feel, is a lot like the world in my incredibly realistic walk through the mental woods.  Everything is practical, structured, purposeful, no nonsense.  The people are like that, too.  So I guess maybe I'm in the right place. But clearly, clearly I'm missing something. And it seems likely that all the other buttoned up, 9 to 5 business professionals roaming around this painfully sterile city are missing that something, too.

That thing we're missing is a sense of fantasy. Of whimsy. Of fairy tale magic.

Before continuing, reader, if you need an immediate fix, take a moment to stop and appreciate David Bowie right here:

(If you're unfamiliar with the movie The Labyrinth, it's about a baby who could have spent his whole life in a magic fairy tale world with David Bowie and a bunch of Muppets but then his sister went and ruined it).


I've been contemplating about how to add a little bit more magic into my very gray, very corporate DC life.  And, being me, my attention immediately turned to aesthetics.  Not too long ago I had the delight of spending time in a backyard garden in Georgetown that feels like being transported away into a fairytale:

#fairygarden #outdoors #evening #georgetown #gardeninspiration

A post shared by Emily S (@bostoniensis) on Oct 23, 2016 at 5:20pm PDT

#fairygarden #outdoors #evening #georgetown #gardeninspiration #homeinspiration

A post shared by Emily S (@bostoniensis) on Oct 23, 2016 at 5:23pm PDT

The owner of this home also has a knack for pulling the elements of her garden into the house itself so that it's unclear where the house ends and the garden begins.  I felt like I had been transported, and it was a feeling I decided I would like to recreate in my own home, one day, when I have the time and the resources to actually buy a house and spend serious time perfecting it.

After all, isn't home supposed to be a secluded, magical safe haven away from the rest of the world where we can shut off and just be content and alone for a while?  For the longest time, as I fantasize about home ownership, I have bounced back and forth between decor styles I like such as Southwestern, art deco, Hollywood regency, beach chic, mid-century modern, etc., and how to combine them without seeming like a crazy person.  I've realized now that I haven't been thinking crazy enough.  When I move into the next apartment or condo or house - you know, the one, my for-real-this-time big girl home, I want it to look like something out of a freakin' fairytale.  I want to be completely transported, with flowers growing out of the ceiling and a four-poster bed in the middle of the room and a hall of mirrors and chairs that look like thrones.

Naturally, I've been compiling Pinterest boards.  Here's my Pinterest board of fairytale home ideas, which seems to be heavily dominated by pixie lights:




I also have a Pinterest board that's more for inspiration and aesthetic appreciation, where I have compiled (and continue to compile) all my favorite fairy tale Instagram posts:




And, finally, my board "Zen Time" may not be fairy tale themed, per se, but it certanily embodies the ethos of escape, surrealism and being somewhere out of time.




I've also been trying to incorporate just a tad more whimsy and fun into my dressing.  Whereas I used to consider myself a chic, professional, edgy, contemporary dresser, with lots of black and gray and clean lines and angular, streamlined silhouettes, over the past year or so I find my wardrobe transformed, replete with botanical prints, soft flowy fabrics, feminine details and many shades of hunter, emerald and jade green (green!  Two years ago I would have told you I don't wear green).

The necessary Pinterest board for this, obviously, is "Flower Queen."




Other ways to incorporate fairy tale whimsy?  That's simple: by putting yourself out there.  I've been attending monthly salons in strangers' houses!  No joke.  And going to crafting classes.  Learning to make flower crowns and paper flowers.  Instagramming everything.  And I want more!


How about you, readers?  Do you have a place or a niche or a facet of your life in which you incorporate the whimsical and fairy-sparkled?  Where do you go to escape the gray, humdrum angles of the city?  Would you ever consider going full throttle with a weird (fairy tale inspired or otherwise) decor theme in your home or do you feel like that would just be way too much?  Do you ever escape by looking at pretty, otherworldly things in books or online, and is that enough for you? Is there somewhere you go in your head with your eyes closed?  Have you ever thought about bringing it to life?  Do you incorporate fairy tale inspiration into your crafts or other artistic pursuits? Discuss in the comments.

The Corporate Homogenization of Retail

"Street Scene," Jacobus Vrel, about 1654 - 1662
Digital Image Courtesy of the Getty Open Content Program

Hello friends,

I recently stumbled across this Washington City Paper article discussing how independent retail businesses can barely make it in D.C.   It explores in greater depth a phenomenon that I have long noted.  In fact, the sterile, corporate feeling of D.C. immediately struck me the minute I moved here. It's one of my biggest criticisms of the District and surrounding area and a big part of why I think it's so important to really invest in building a creative niche for myself.

Unfortunately, though, this is a trend that's happening in cities across the U.S. as more and more people decide they want to live downtown and rent prices skyrocket. It's just happening in D.C. faster than most cities because D.C. rents already started high, and its role as the seat of national government tends to insulate it from economic downturns that would normally drive prices down in other places. Cities, which have traditionally been centers of artistic innovation flowing from communities that operate outside the suburban mainstream, are now becoming homogenized playgrounds for the wealthy.

It's palpable.  We can feel it across our entire culture.  The movie and music industries are just reproducing the same rehashes of old, already-been-done hits.  Lunch hour is dominated by the same ten chains that let you order at the counter.  Women across the country get all their work clothes at Ann Taylor, J. Crew and Banana Republic.  It's only due to the death of big box book retail (i.e. Borders) and nostalgic Millenial coffee yearnings that the independent book shop (with cafe) is enjoying an urban renaissance right now.  Yet half of online sales occurred through Amazon last year, for books and for everything else, so how long will that last?  The only businesses capable of competing with online shopping while also paying anywhere-near-a-city rent are corporate chains, and that's usually because their online sales bolster their brick-and-mortar presence.

To an extent I blame Washington D.C. government.  The article goes into the city's policies somewhat, and the city's lackluster attempts to encourage the growth of independent business.  I personally think that, instead of developing new programs the District should work to improve existing services and to refine and/or clarify regulations that place large burdens on small and independent businesses.  One D.C. agency stands out to me in particular: the Office of Tax and Revenue.  OTR is so notoriously difficult to deal with that I'm surprised any small business in the District knows how to comply with D.C. sales and business tax requirements.  I have some stories of my own regarding OTR, but they're not that entertaining and would require a series of six blog posts to tell fully, so I'll spare you.  But it's safe to say that I gave up on even trying to start a side business in the District because OTR was so miserable to deal with.  I am not alone in this sentiment.

The death of independent retail also seems to have killed off another honored pastime: the shopping trip.  Only a few years ago I used to love the idea of taking myself out shopping and spending a day seeing, smelling, touching, trying things on, falling in love with an item I would never have known to shop for had I not spotted it.  But I can't actually remember the last time I took a stroll down M St. in Georgetown or went to the mall (the shopping mall, not the Mall) just for fun and without a specific errand in mind.  Because all the stores are the same chains I can find online, and if that's the case I may as well just enjoy the convenience of buying through their websites.  So I have become accustomed to shopping online, consequently skip the physical trip, and then the few independent stores that are out there never get my business.  It doesn't help that the independents are scattered throughout the city rather than being focused in one small shopping district so that it isn't a giant ordeal to shop independent.

I think it's a chicken-and-egg scenario.  The notion seems to be that small businesses can't maintain the kind of online presence that corporations do and thus can't compete, but I would argue that it's the other way around, and that the lack of independent stores is what drives online shopping in the first place, by diminishing the joy and fulfillment of the physical shopping experience.  So consumers shop online, and never even discover the little independent guys.

I enjoy the hunt.  I enjoy getting out of the house.  I enjoy getting to actually touch things and make a day of it.  Peapod is a thing, and yet urbanites still love to go to the farmer's market.  So, too, with retail.  It is nice to be able to put in the exact search terms for what I'm looking for and have it immediately pop up on my screen when I'm shopping online, but what about the lack of discovery and curation and uniqueness that would occur in an independent retail shop where the items before me are not predetermined by a set of search terms or an algorithm?  The homogeneity of corporate retail begets even more homogeneity.  And as corporations die off, what independent stores will even exist anymore in order to grow into corporations that take their place?  Will we one day live in a world where the same three companies are responsible for everything we buy (kind of like how Clearchannel owns all the radio stations and completely dictates what music we hear)?

So the next question I ask is, what does this trend mean for the future of handmade, independent and artisan products?  In some ways it appears to be having a renaissance, in no small thanks to Etsy.  But even Etsy has gone corporate and, post-IPO, it now allows its sellers to work with production partners and outsource their labor.  Gone is the handmade requirement.  So, while Etsy may be an incubator for small and independent businesses, the emphasis on diy is gone.  Nor is Etsy a local phenomenon. Etsy's website connects buyers to sellers all over the world (thus requiring US based sellers to compete with sellers in countries with lower valued currency and cheap labor).  It does nothing to foster the development of independent brick-and-mortar retail that can give a city its soul back.

I want to believe in a city where small, independent artisans can rejuvenate brick-and-mortar retail by offering items that you simply wouldn't be able to get at a corporate chain or online.  Or, that you could theoretically get on Etsy but would never actually be able to find in its highly saturated market of millions of sellers and by slogging through hundreds of search results per keyword.  I want to believe in a city where local shop owners play the role of curator and tastemaker, cultivating a unique and uniquely local style.  The city should have a signature look, a signature vibe, in everything it makes and sells, rather than the same rapidly homogenizing wave of corporate soullessness that makes people in LA dress and style their homes the same as people in Austin and in New York.

I was just in Austin, having heard tales of its weirdness and unconventional combination of Southwestern style with modern liberalism.  So you can imagine my dismay when everyone was dressed like they are everywhere else, all the restaurants had the same small plate nouveau nonsense I've become accustomed to here, and the gift shops carried all the same brands as my favorite gift shop in DC.  I found the same suede clutch that I had bought in DC a few months earlier, no joke. The same Rifle Paper Co. greeting cards.  I've discovered this is happening in Boston, too, from my recent visits.

Is this what we're doomed to, readers?  The same indigo dyed woven wall hangings and cutesy mermaid greeting cards and edgy jacket earrings in every store?  Everything is taking on a veneer of artfulness and whimsical woodland botanical global hipsteresque streamlined Millenial chic, inspired by the Etsy aesthetic, but even Etsy is corporate now.  That artfulness is superficial, set by an algorithms and bots that crawl Google for search terms.  Owls, arrows and chevrons are out.  Now it's monstera leaves, cacti, succulents and moon phase calendars, nationwide.  Next year it will be something different, but it will all still be the same.

What are your thoughts?  Do you feel that the convenience of corporate brands and online shopping at large retailers outweighs the curation and uniqueness of independent however pricier and less convenient retail?  Is there room for both, and if so, how do you balance?  Do you also find that even independent retailers are starting to carry all the same brands?  Has Etsy let you down, or do you still feel that it is relevant and helpful in locating new, interesting, artisan, handmade products? Have you found a replacement for Etsy that is truer to Etsy's roots, whether online or elsewhere?  As retail has become more homogeneous do you find yourself turning more toward your own handmade stuff, swaps, vintage, friends who make stuff, local popups or other alternatives?  Discuss in the comments.

On Instant Gratification

"Arctic Hare." John James Audubon. c. 1841
Courtesy of the National Gallery of Art Open access Program

Hello friends,

I want to share with you a new guiding principle I have stumbled upon for creating balance in my creative life.  That principle is to make sure that I have a healthy sampling of both long-term and instant gratification projects going on.  I think this is what I was missing up until now.

I'm one of those people who has to work on some type of creative or artistic project every day to feel sane.  In the past I've relied a lot on longer term creative projects that I worked on a little bit every day.  Long knitted lace shawls, for instance, where I'd knit a few inches each night for weeks or even months.  A layered acrylic painting that requires lots of steps, with time to dry inbetween, to get the texture I want.  Handmade perfumes that required lots of trial and error and letting scent sit for long periods of time to see how they age.

But then a few months ago, when I discovered dying with indigo, something changed.  This new skill let me watch a project go from absolutely nothing to completely finished in only a few hours.  At the time I didn't quite identify it as instant gratification; I just knew that there was something really rewarding about it and that I wanted to keep dying scarf after scarf after scarf to see how they'd each turn out.

Fast forward to this past weekend.  I'm signed up to sell a bunch of my handmade items at a Mother's Day Pop-up Market in the Shaw neighborhood of Washington D.C. on May 13 (stop by and say hi if you live in the area!)  Knowing this, I decided it would be a good idea to use some blank cards I had laying around anyway to make mother's day cards.  Needing a quick and dirty way to produce some cards fast, so that I wouldn't take too much time away from building up my stock of my more standard merchandise for the show, I turned to the block printing skills I learned at a workshop I took several months back.  I sat down, carved out a "Mom" print in about an hour, and set forth quickly block printing about 20 cards. The printing process itself was super speedy, taking maybe 15 minutes.

Something about that process was super satisfying.  I was having so much fun, in fact, that I found other experimental blocks I had carved out after my class but never worked with and started just printing on printer paper, for fun, to see how they turned out.  I ended up producing tons of prints!  I won't picture them here because they are political in nature and contain some colorful language about a particularly controversial figure who is in power at the moment and whom I shall not name.  The point is, unlike the meditative and calm feeling of slowly contributing little by little to my knitted projects, it was exciting.  It was exciting to be able to quickly produce several different finished items in a short period of time.

As it happens I showed my prints to a few friends and it seemed like everybody wanted one, so being able to just hand them over to anyone who wanted one because they were so fast and easy to make, and have everyone enjoy them certainly added to the satisfaction.  Compare to a beautiful knitted piece that takes me 3 months to make and can only go to one friend.

Same thing with the indigo scarves.  Once you have your dye vat prepped, you can dunk many different scarves either simultaneously or one after the other, making finished pieces in great big batches.  Block printing evoked the experience of doing my first indigo dyes: wanting to do more and more and getting excited to see how each one turned out.

So then I realized, that's what made both these experiences different: instant gratification.

Even compared to jewelry-making, which might only require an hour or two to do a completed project if it's small and simple, these were fast and addictive.  Jewelry is methodical.  You're slowly building the piece at a constant rate.  With printmaking and dying, boom, there's one.  Boom, another. And a third, a fourth.  You get to instantly enjoy pieces and compare them to one another, and experiment quickly and with ease.  It's a totally different pace.

And so I've realized that I need to incorporate more instant-gratification arts into my repertoire on a more regular basis.  I love knitting and painting and jewelry-making, and I consider them skills I have finely honed over time.  The pieces I create are beautiful and intricate, and the amount of time and meticulous effort that goes into them is evident and a large part of what makes them beautiful.  But the flip side is that the time it takes to make a single project can make them seem daunting, lead to burnout and even feel more like a chore than a hobby.  They're satisfying, but not necessarily fun.

On occasion I think it's worth it to spend a day, or even just a few hours, enjoying the feeling of having produced lots of new pieces in a short period of time.

How about you, readers?  Do you find that you tend to gravitate more toward longer-term or instant-gratification projects or a balance of both?  Do you find that the speed and frequency at which you're able to produced finished items has an impact on your overall creative satisfaction one way or the other or is it more about the journey for you?  What are your favorite types of hobby for a fast creative fix or last minute gift?  Discuss in the comments.

Emily

Creating in a Series

"Kitty Series. Hoosac." John P. Soule.  1871.
Digital image courtesy of the Getty Open Content Program

Hello Friends,

When I was in high school my creative writing teacher gave the class a strange assignment: We were to designate a special journal, go outside for 28 nights straight and write about the moon.  Being high school students, we immediately balked at the seemingly cumbersome scope of the assignment, and at having it dictated to us what our subject would be, and such a trite one at that.

But after a couple of weeks our tune changed.  By that time, we'd all written everything that we had expected to write about the moon.  Having to write on it over and over again was forcing us to go deeper, to get stranger and more creative, to make connections we hadn't made.  It forced us to revisit similar concepts from a new perspective.  Also, themes started emerging over the four weeks. We were all too young to have really developed themes or styles over the course of our short writing careers, so this was really our first time to discover these things in our own writing.  By the end of the assignment we were hooked, and many of us opted to continue writing about the moon just to see how far we could get.

I've got a Full Moon themed box on the horizon, what would you like to see in it? photo@emma.mildon

A post shared by Anna & Jun (@astralbox.oceania) on Apr 17, 2017 at 6:43pm PDT

This reminds me somewhat of another experience I had in high school, when my mother dragged me to go see a Warhol exhibit that was in town.  It was a massive exhibit with room after room of his works, including both his famous pop art prints but also photographs and sketches.  At the time I was convinced I hated Warhol.  What was so special about Marilyn Monroe's head in different colors and a can of soup, anyway?  But then I saw the exhibit, and I saw everything as part of an entire series or collection.  Again, my tune changed.  I started to see themes emerging, themes that I could only appreciate after looking at multiple pieces side by side.  I got a sense of what it was he was trying to say.

There is a certain subtlety, nuance and flexibility to working themes across an entire series or collection.  It allows for development, dialog, different perspectives within one whole.  To pack all of that into one piece would make that piece completely over the top, hitting viewers in the head with blatant preaching and overused symbolism.  The art of the series enables a picture of a can of soup to really just be a picture of a can of soup, but also to say a million other things.

Sidewalk Warhol Viewing

A post shared by Snapshots Around The Big 🍎 (@illtakeamanhattan) on Apr 17, 2017 at 8:59pm PDT

These are lessons I have taken with me as an adult.  For instance, they really enhanced my ability to appreciate recent exhibits on Jacob Lawrence's Migration Series and a collection of Toulouse Lautrec prints and proofs at my favorite D.C. art museum, The Phillips Collection.  Each individual piece of the Migration Series looks childish and mundane, but in the context of the greater series these pieces tell an incredible story of a major historical migration in the U.S.  So too do Lautrec's prints tell a story about turn of the century Paris and the development of printing technology, whereas each of his pieces individually is really just an advertisement for low-brow entertainments.  Needless to say, I bought catalogs of both collections for my coffee table.  One print will never do.

The notion of the single-artist series naturally gives way, then, to the curated collection.  Choosing different pieces from different artists so that they can be juxtaposed, compared and contrasted, show varied approaches to the same subject matter or the same technique.  Curating itself is an art.  My first real experience as a curator probably came when I was editing my college's literary magazine and discovered, completely to my own surprise, that all of the pieces my colleagues and I had selected for admission had some kind of MidEastern or ancient biblical theme.  We ran with it, selecting a cover image that had been taken in Morocco by a student studying abroad and calling that semester's issue Scribe.  When we realized that this was happening, we then consciously rearranged the pieces to give them a flow, to really capitalize on the waxing and waning of different themes, ideas and images as the reader moved from piece to piece.

#moonphases

A post shared by Federica. (@federica_ricafede) on Apr 17, 2017 at 6:05pm PDT

I realize that these concepts continue to pop up everywhere.  Today, I am a hobbyist tarot reader.  I have always loved the idea of creating my own deck, which makes sense given that it would merge my appreciation for tarot with my creative hobbies.  Tarot decks are made up of 78 cards, each with a distinct title and symbolism.  I decided to create one using still life and portrait photography, all of which would incorporate flowers that I felt embodied the ethos of the particular card.  And as I go about this project (as I write I'm a little under half done) I notice other themes popping up.  Lighting and angles, certain color combinations, even how close I zoom in on my subjects, the types of photo editing I perform.  And when themes can be seen across multiple pieces in a series, the absence of those themes can also be telling as well.  Whereas most of my cards are bright and vibrant, meant to embody life and spring, the death card is clearly devoid of these concepts.

Perhaps the most obvious encounter, however, that we all have with the concept of things created in a series, and of curated collections, is fashion shows.  Each season designers are challenged to embody the zeitgeist through a collection of several pieces of clothing, utilizing similar fabrics, colors, cuts, ideas.  All different but all the same, as part of a cohesive overall statement.  Shows featuring multiple designers demonstrate the notion of curation.  And the fact that certain trends pop up in shows by different designers across the industry demonstrates a kind of collaborative (or competitive) dialog.

I recently attended a fashion show featuring several designers in the Washington, D.C. area.  The event, Underneath It All, took place in the Dupont Underground and was co-sponsored by a number of area stakeholders.  Dupont Underground is an art space that is literally found underground in the old trolley terminal under Dupont Circle, not to be mistaken with the Dupont Circle Metro Station.

If you have never been to a live fashion show, it's something you should go try at least once.  Even if you're not a fashion person per se, you do have to wear clothes, and a fashion show brings clothing to life in a way that we just don't get to see otherwise.  In this case, I got to see collections by several different designers local to me.  So, one, I got to appreciate a series of linked but different pieces by each designer and, two, I enjoyed the way in which the show's curation enabled me to watch the different collections in dialog with one another, comparing and contrasting.  Even so, there were common themes throughout, because D.C. is a distinct environment with distinct tastes and needs that will naturally influence all of its designers.

Bellow is my own curated selection of what I thought were among the most striking pieces (that also photographed well, a few favorites had to be left out because I just didn't get good photos).  I've purposely taken them out of the order in which they appeared and instead put them in a new order that I feel really exemplifies how the same themes appeared across collections and designers.  Enjoy the compare-and-contrastability!  (Designers/brands: Fordam Rowe, Ema Dona, Espion Atelier, Jarmal Harris, BTF Clothiers)

                        
                        
                        
                        
                        

What about you?  Have you ever had the opportunity to create or curate a series before?  How did that experience compare to working on a single piece independent of anything else?  Did you find your decision making consciously change because you knew you were working on each piece in relation to the greater whole, or did you find yourself surprised at the end by the ways in which your collection came together?  Discuss in the comments.

Emily