Playing with Ink

I’ve finally been playing around with dipped ink. It’s a lot of fun to explore, but it’s frustrating. I definitely need to get some more appropriate paper if I’m going to do enough to get better.

Clothes and Character

Part 1: Books

In books that bother to describe their characters’ clothing, readers are generally assumed to be learning from the fact of the fine silk, smooth and deep red, or from the well cut suit that has been worn heavily, or from the pink crop top. Words ostensibly can’t be wasted on such details as the color of the ribbon on the sun hat or the cashmere blend of the baby’s hand-knitted blanket in shades of forest green. No, if we know that the elderly gentleman in the front row has just divested himself of an ill-fitting black raincoat in the cloakroom, it’s either a plot point or a judgment on his character or his finances. When we’re learning that the young woman is, say, dressed appropriately for the weather, it is something far more significant than dressing for the weather is in typical life conditions. If she is, that is probably a good sign. Your character is paying attention to the right things or is perhaps meant to be read as prudent, practical, smart. Or just lucky, though in my unscientific observation, this is not likely.

Perhaps your character is a beautiful young woman, which is unfortunate for her because beauty is as beauty does. Perhaps, your character is like the most beautiful but rather boring oldest Bennet sister Jane in Pride and Prejudice. Jane Austen lets her be beautiful because she is not as interesting, not as clever, and not as central to the story as Elizabeth.

One of my favorite literary characters in terms of clothing as a means of characterization is Helga Crane in Nella Larsen’s Quicksand (or a free PDF). “In vivid green and gold negligee and glistening brocaded mules,” Helga is beautiful and loves beauty. She is more interested in aesthetics than those around her in the earnest yet vicious and prescriptive Naxos and it damns her, first simply to banishment from that particular place and movement. Eventually, as the aptly named and therefore inevitably downward and smothering tale progresses, of course, that aesthetic sense is lost. As the bitter end of the novel approaches, “Herself, Helga had come to look upon as a finicky, showy thing of unnecessary prejudices and fripperies.” So which is it? Is Helga damned because she cares too much about beauty or damned when she abandons this essential part of her being?

Of course, in Quicksand, it’s both: Helga is the quintessential damned if you do and damned if you don’t character. That’s because this is a book that is most obviously about race and class and gender. And beauty is as beauty does, or something not quite like that. Beauty at least means way too much, whether the character’s beauty or that of her negligee.

In part two, I’ll consider what quarantine clothes say about us. If you’re not seeing anyone, or rather no one is going to see you, what do you wear and how does it matter?

A Prompt and a Catalogue

Sometimes you need a prompt, right? As I know from teaching, a good prompt sets the stage and evokes something’s making it easier to find a creative path. I recently received a collage card from a friend. Her creativity was a delightful prompt for my own. I would not have thought to make a collage at all, and I opted to reply in kind: she made a stylized flower garden and I replied in kind.

I went my own way, too. I developed the prompt for myself by limiting my materials to orange construction paper and a catalogue called Cuddledown: Devoted to your luxurious comfort and style. I am not kidding.

This catalogue is filled with pastel sheets with high thread counts, cozy robes, richly patterned bedspreads. The blue rosettes with cream, the modernized paisley in magenta, chartreuse and ecru (it’s not as outrageous as it sounds!), the watercoloresque impressionistic meadows made the project almost too easy. Sometimes that is the point.

It made for a fun card collage, and now suddenly my white on white sheets and comforter (in my gray bedroom no less!) seems unspeakably boring.

Collaboration and Creative Freedom

Collaboration can be a great way to jolt your creative process. Sharing control can be frustrating, but knowing that you have to let go is freeing.

Also, for the purposes of creative exploration, I’m not focusing here on collaboration where one person follows another’s directions.

I recently have been inveigled into a number of this sort of collaboration by my kids. One of them will start a drawing, and then firmly request my assistance. Sometimes my job is to “add ten caterpillars,” each with a red head like the quintessential very hungry caterpillar. Sometimes my job is to “add a touch of blue to the brown soil so it’s wet.”

I’ve tried to assert myself a bit here. Collaboration is a back and forth, a conversation: I made a floral pattern and let one of my young artistic partners have at it. The result is whimsical and better than you’d think possible under the circumstances, and the process was a pleasure. Collaboration is letting yourself communicate creatively, letting yourself go, and letting yourself get inspired.

Multiples

Make multiples. It’s calming and promotes creativity. I made 27 butterflies today, with help.

Once you select what you’re making and give yourself a goal, you’re set. You have a specific task. You can pursue mastery of this task; you can explore widely within the confines of the task. It’s much easier to explore within the confines of that task. And your goal will be motivating.

If you happen to be trying to keep kids busy with a craft for more than long enough to pour yourself a coffee. multiples might help do that too. That depends on the kid , though. I make no promises.

Today, our house began a 100 butterflies project. We chose butterflies because we have a butterfly hole-punch, and it’s fun to punch them out, and then everyone can color them. It’s great because we have the confining butterfly shape and then anything goes. It is an almost all-ages collaboration. We are making a kaleidoscope of butterflies. Some are semi-realistic. Some are patterned—polka dots, chevrons, stripes, rainbows. Some have flowers and succulents . Some have scribbles.

One of the kids has already asked if we have to stop when we complete our 100.

What You See out Your Window Is a Sculpture

We have a sculpture out each window--not just a privacy fence, a wall, a cityscape, a landscape. The topography of a major city is, like mountains and trees and rocks, not just what it is made up of, but is a massive sculpture, forming the space. 

One of my favorite sculptors, Barbara Hepworth (1903-1975) said: "All my sculpture comes out of landscape,” and, "I'm sick of sculptures in galleries & photos with flat backgrounds... no sculpture really lives until it goes back to the landscape, the trees, air & clouds." She shaped space, carved out, created mass and stillness and significant spaces within the mass of a piece. 

If you’re looking out your window, again (and again and again), look again. If you’re looking at a neighborhood, a building, a roof, a wall, your neighbor’s trashcans, a tremendous cityscape, a suburb, empty fields, wooded forests, water...Look again. Look at the empty spaces, the spaces that appear empty because of distance, the spaces between and the spaces carved out. 

Enjoy the view.