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Is it just me?
I subscribe to many bead, wire and art publications. I am also adding a year to my age, yearly.
In the last year I have not renewed my subscription to several. Reason? I find the styles to be either juvenile or garish. I can no longer find the understated elegance I enjoy. Ornament has stayed true. My other magazines feature designs that are ‘familiar’. I have seen them before. Either in total or in elements and the bits are reworked.
The proliferation of books, magazines, ezines, websites, blogs dvd’s (have I missed anything) have made every technique available to everyone. For that I am in awe and quite happy. This mass explosion in print and visual media seems to have exhausted the ‘acceptable’ designs for publication. I am ‘jaded’. And many times hesitate to share the work I complete. I am not mainstream by any means and do not have the grace to respond to comments well.
With the constant intrusion of the outside into our studios it becomes difficult to allow our voice to sing alone and true. We tend to look to trends and want to meet what others ‘want’.
Who decides trends and the season’s colors? Is it not the designers of an industry? What would happen if I closed my computer, closed the door to my studio (myself inside) and sat for a week or month? Designed what I wanted, in the colors I want? No magazines to ‘encourage’ a certain element. Just my own creativity?
I wish!
I often find myself spending hours just looking at and reading other’s art. Enjoyable, not very productive. If I find a design I like, I make it a point not to go in that direction. Why? Fear of copying and non-originality. Better not to have spent the time surfing and just work!
Currently in process
A knitted coat in a polar weight roving for me. The scepter I mentioned earlier. It is just about finished!
A surprise package from Artbeads.com with champagne cz’s!!
knitted socks for a friend’s son (he won’t wear socks so I’m knitting some fun green ones in a beautiful wool!)
hooded cardigan for my son.
Let’s get back to the beginning. I am getting a year older, yearly. I started knitting this summer. Designs are becoming juvenile.
I think I am in trouble…
Valerie
9 comments:
Hi,
I understand your thoughts completely. I've dropped four subscriptions that I used to love because now they seem stale to me. I've just subscribed to a new one, and it's from another country.
I'd rather be a creator than a consumer. Surfing is consuming.
But... looking at media online, even media different from my own, seems to help get creative neurons firing in my brain. I may look at an image online and it may set off an entirely new idea that has nothing to do with the image!
I guess it all comes back to moderation.
Diane
Hi Diane,
Amazing 'from another country'. In the middle of reading this my doorbell rang and the post arrived with a package from the Ukraine. I had ordered some fiber magazines. Oh my word!! the designs are utterly stunning. Fresh, and ideas I have never seen on this continent. They have taken elements I've seen in other context where the appearance was cheap and common. Those same elements are given new life and status in high end designs.
Truely Amazing.
Valerie
I agree with all of your comments. I have dropped most of my subscriptions as well. As you stated, it seems they contain the same things or are too elemental(juvenile) and provide little inspiration particularly for those of us that have been "at this" for a while as we keep "adding years".
Hi all. I write for a jewelry magazine, and I'm always very interested to hear what works for you and what doesn't. I understand what you're talking about (I'm a consumer too) but would love to hear more specifics if you're able to capture them. I know it's hard -- I love it when I see stuff that makes me gasp, get annoyed when it's trite and boring, but how to articulate what works for me? Hard! And of course what appeals to each of us is quite varied. Valerie, now you've got my curiosity piqued about the fiber magazines!
As a newcomer to the beading and jewelry making world, I can already see what you are talking about. So far, I haven't even subsribed to any magazine as most of the magazines seem to have the same types of things in them. So, I only tend to buy individual issues. I remember reading that the singer-songwriter Tori Amos finds inspiration for her piano playing from watching and listening to guitarists. I have started to look at painters and sculptors. Although I have not quite yet figured out how to incorporate the ideas, my excitement is newly invigorated, at the very least.
Glad to know that I am not the only one that feels this way. Maybe it is that we are being bombarded with too much information. I know in the past year I have found little that inspires me, and have stopped looking so much at others' works also. I don't want to be swayed in my work or designs. Like you, I want to be true to myself. I have tried to find more inspiration from Mother Nature and from my own thoughts. Time to get off this wagon and lock ourselves away and be true to our own hearts.
Jan, Brenda and Joy,
Looking to other paths seems to work for me also. Every year I close my studio for 2 months in the summer. This year seems I have little interest in my beads or clay. I have completed a couple of large pieces with an end goal. Not general experiments and play.
My newly learned skill of knitting has taken over all my time.
Ronna I am going to take a big leap and post my likes/dislikes publicly.
Valerie
I am interested in what you have to say and look forward to the posts. -Martha
Hi Martha,
I took the leap and put it out there in public. Now I'm wondering whether to run and hide or just dig a hole.
Valerie
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