Stalling

Okay, so I’m not so much keeping up with this blog o’ creativity. It’s okay, I’ll just walk it off, pretend it never happened.

Robert once told me a story about a friend who bought a Moleskine* notebook to record all his creative thoughts when they came to him, but ended up throwing it out because he couldn’t fill it fast enough and felt like it was becoming a constant reminder of his lack of creativity.

I feel like that now with this blog. Only, I can’t get rid of it because now I have an audience to satisfy. So much pressure!

The only thing I can do, I suppose, is step up the pace. So I will try to post every little bit of creative thought I can muster, no matter how tepid or downright boring it is. Watch out.

*For those of you who don’t know, a Moleskine is a brand of notebooks and sketchbooks marketed to those of us who have decided that we want to tell the world, “hey, I’m artsy!” It also has a tendency to go along with pencil lead on the fingertips, little bits of your artistic medium on your (possibly handmade) clothing, and a generally unwashed appearance. If you are that kind of person–or at least want to appear that way–you will (if you haven’t already) eventually buy a Moleskine and stick it in your back pocket. Trust me.

The Return of Clyde

I found my camera.

Your Daily Serving of Fruit

So I lost my camera. Boooo. It’s only pertinent here, because one of my intentions for this blog was to share my creative pursuits–via photographs. Oh well. The time has come for me to improve my descriptive imagery writing skills.

One of my first metals projects this semester (which you will not be able to see until further notice) was to make a hollow form out of metal, the shape of which would be inspired by a form found in nature. When I received this assignment, immediately a vague, pear-shaped image flashed into my head. When I explored that thought more, I realized that it wasn’t a pear necessarily that I was thinking of. This shape applies to many, many things in nature–fruits, first and foremost. When you think about it, the shape we call the “pear” shape is also the shape of an eggplant, squash, papaya, figs… many fruits. Many vessels for seeds–the beginning of plant life.

When I thought about that, I almost immediately got excited as I realized, when inverted, it is also the shape of a uterus–the vessel for the seed of humans! As someone who grew up Catholic, the idea of the womb-fruit metaphor is very familiar to me, such as in the Hail Mary prayer:

“…and blessed be the fruit of your womb…”

And finally, we are all familiar with referring to curvaceous women as “pear-shaped.” In this day and age, that is usually a negative comparison, but in reality, a woman in her natural form bears more resemblance to a pear than an hourglass. This is appropriate, since in a larger sense women ARE the vessels that nurture the seed of new life. What a meaningful form that turned out to be! It is a life-shape.

Right now, the form is completed, and only needs to be cleaned up, filed and sanded before I turn it in tomorrow. I wish I could show my sketches and the completed form, especially since the next step in the assignment is to swap our hollow forms with a partner and alter the construction. I think that a before-and-after could be interesting: will my partner choose to give the new form the same meaning that I chose for it, or will they abandon it in pursuing their own vision? I can’t wait.

By the way, I feel I owe an explanation here–much of my work and thoughts this semester will probably have a heavy feminist slant, as it is something that is important to me and I am exploring more lately. So be prepared for more womb talk in the future…