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Tuesday, July 23, 2013

Frustration... with big pays offs


I like to make what I call "OCD art" meaning that I find it insane how much time I put into each piece. Sometimes halfway through a project I think to myself "what am I doing??! why am I doing it this way?!" But I keep going... and going... and going... 

Instead of buying string for a project freshmen year of college, I bought canvas and hand striped it to get a garbage bag full of strings while sitting in my dorm room with my best friends (we watched an entire season of Project Runway before I was done...) Why? Because I loved the way the fibers were crimped and I wanted that effect with the string I was using. 

I spent a whopping 50+ hours typesetting and hand-binding a book to only partially destroy it when I was done because I wanted that effect for a minor project I was working on. 

I spent almost a whole semester reworking a painting because it was too plain... 

I am now embroidering... which seems like the most perfect art form for me to work in given my need for time consuming, intricate, pull your hair out art. Why? Because I L.O.V.E. it. In the picture above you see all the different colors. To put it in perspective how time consuming just that small piece was for me, I will tell you that each color piece took me at least 20 minutes.

The only thing I don't love about my favorite new art form? How long it takes. How can I make a living doing the thing that I love when it takes me so long to get one piece done? This is what I have been struggling with on a never-ending day to day basis. But, good golly, the finished pieces are mind-blowing... at least to me.

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