A Stitch in Time.

A few weeks ago I got to hear an artist talk by the talented performance artist, Coco Loupe that was everything you want an artist talk to be; interesting, inspiring, humbling and reassuring all in one. In it, she mentioned her ‘daily practice’ which really struck a chord with me- Most of my current projects are either long-term, collaborative, wrapped up in about 12 layers of CONCEPT or some combination of the three. While it’s all work I’m really excited about, I’ve been having a hard time the past couple of weeks maintaining momentum. I think my own lack of ‘daily practice for the sake of daily practice’ is the culprit.* It’s like playing an instrument or running- warm-ups take more than zero minutes and they certainly aren’t interesting, but they do make a world of difference, especially, in the case or running, in longevity.

All of which is to say that the night before I succeeded in living for a quarter of a century found me with a 1987 planner passed on to me by another talented woman I admire, and a longing to just make something pretty. Or, not even pretty- just to make something barely beyond the realm of doodlery for no other reason other than “it feels good.”

‘a stitch in time’ Cat Lynch, mixed media/

Why a timezone map? Because the lines made by the zones were interesting and the colors pretty. Why cut them out? Because Sunday I wanted to cut something up. Why weaving, why sewing? Because the rest of the week I felt like putting something back together. And I wanted to make art while watching ParaNorman.

Of course, because I’m still me, this is merely the beginning of a series, and of course there are Rules;

-They will be small
-They will be arbitrary
-I will only work on them during the week/evenings and save weekends for working on bigger and better things
-I will not be upset at how they look in the end.

Another idea came up during Coco’s amazing artist talk- the idea that one must make lots of crap to make things that aren’t crap. I believe one artist present mentioned a “10% rule”? (Meaning that for every 10 things she makes, maybe one will be good). By that logic, there’s a chance that, should I continue to stick with this, by this time next year I’ll have 5 good drawings.
That ain’t bad.

 

 

*well, that and the fact that it’s Christmas time and I have a mental age of 10.