So i am still working on that altered book. I was hoping to have it all done and posted up before i leave for my Thanksgiving trip home but that is just not happening. so much for thinking it will be a quick touch-up.
I spent one week laying down some fresh paint and drawings; the next week, removing, tearing up almost everything i did the week before, and then trying to reconstruct some new pages. And this week, repeating the same whole process again but finally feeling i am getting somewhere...
I had been trying to copy how i drew before and what i already have down, trying to capture the essence of what was done 4 years ago. But only to find that my lines are no longer the same; the pressure is heavier, the lines are awkward, anxious and the paint is too thick, too clunky. I am not the same person anymore. Regretted coming back to rework this book. The original mood of the book felt totally ruined, displaced...
But somehow with all that tearing and reconstructing of the pages, it is helping to reconnect and find the flow and focus of things. Slowly, i am not as afraid to make changes to what is already there, and let what is present with me show through. Either i am finding a way to bridge the gap between then and now, or coming to terms with the fact that the book is evolving and it is its own at this or any point in time, however it will become.
This here is a happy clutter.
i know about happy clutter
ReplyDelete(c u in a coupla daysss!)
3 cheers for happy clutter! Mine is growing around the bed and getting deeper each day.
ReplyDeleteI've tagged you on my blog, 5 weird or random things, if you want to join in.
Making changes – so scary! It’s so difficult to decide whether going back and reworking something is a good thing or not. I’m asking that myself just now as I’m grappling with a dress that will either have to be unravelled completely or made into something just right. These are the questions I ask myself: Do you (and that is a rhetorical you, not YOU) want to improve on what you’ve made then because you don’t like what you did then? Because it’s unbearable to leave loose ends? Because you want to change the past? Resolve something? Obliterate something? Find out if you’ve changed? Moved on? Improved? Can’t face what’s going on now? Are these questions too big?
ReplyDeleteYou’ve found out that you’ve changed, and that is something to be marvelled at. You’re a work in progress, as am I and everybody else who dares know it. Even when we’re stuck we’re moving somehow, inexorably, and then one day, looking back, we realise we have changed. That pulsating heart, that rhythmic breath, the quivering soul, that constant flux until...
I just realise I had to tell myself that, thanks for giving me that nudge.
Hope your thanksgiving with your family was warm and loving and full of joy.
such lovely clutter. I want clutter in my studio. Clutter means progress, or in my case, the attempt at progress.
ReplyDeleteMarjojo you asked...and gave yourself the answer that I would have given to myself....this constant question and query. But so often I feel, as if this would be a nice theory because I stick to a small part of me always reechoing the same stupid affirmations...;)
ReplyDeleteMien, you always deal with yourself so manually...I love this "activity" in you!
I really admire that you are able to have the courage to tear it up and get back to it. I think that is a very valuable process; one that I cannot seem to get myself to do. You inspire me to consider having the courage...
ReplyDeleteI had to mention you here on blueprint ;)
ReplyDeletehttp://blogs1.marthastewart.com/blueprint/2007/11/pushing-paper.html#comments
glad the clutter has become a happy clutter and not a frustrating one. It's cool to see how the book can have so many layers of meaning, and tell a story that changes with time along with you, adding more layers and figuring out what to accept to cover up and what ends up taking on new importance.
ReplyDeleteMien I LOVE that you collected wings for Marjojo!
ReplyDeleteYou are such a beautiful soul :))