365 Sticky Notes

Michelle Genders in Blue Mountains, New South Wales, Australia is creating 365 sticky notes...

Why did you decide to do this project? I just completed the April CreativeSprint. During the sprint, I decided to continue making something every day and got hold of your book 365: A daily creative journal. I’ve decided to begin with a Post-it note a day. I just wanted to keep up the momentum. It may change in time.

When I started the sprint I was going to only use ink and paper but soon I was making with other things. So I’m open to evolution. Having said that, Post-it notes made sense because I wanted to keep it simple, fun and not too daunting while I’m putting a lot of hard work into my other art work.

I know from studying jewelry at art school that small is not always easier, but being bound to a relatively small scale means less labour and being someone who tends to make ridiculously labour intensive art I definitely need a labour limit. Other advantages: I can carry a Post-it note anywhere, they are relatively cheap and I already have lots of materials to use with them. I’m interested to explore the possibilities within this small scale.

I've completed two "creative challenges" in the past: Academy of Emergency an art exercise where you create two things per day for two weeks in response to the newspaper. And The Artist's Way a twelve week programme to support your creativity. You journal daily and complete other exercises on a weekly basis.

Both of these experiences:

• evolved my art practice to another level 
• developed confidence in my ability to create 
• where the generation of a few seeds that grew into other projects 

How has doing a daily project changed your life? During the April creative sprint, I found that lots of ideas that had been floating around vaguely in the back of my mind for ages had a chance to come into being. This either:

• allowed me to get it out of my system and move on 
• see the potential in this idea to go further 

and this was very useful! I want to see what else will show itself if I continue with this discipline.   

See all of Michelle's sticky notes HERE.

(My) Artplay at 60 ~ Using the Daily News as Inspiration

Rebecca Grace Jones in Shepherdstown, West Virginia has returned with a new month long daily project (My) Artplay at 60 ~ Using the Daily News as Inspiration

She explains the project as, "Using the cover photo and story of the Washington Post newspaper for inspiration to create a piece of artwork, in image and word, every day in the month of December 2013 and present the results as a show in January 2014"

Why did I decide to do this project and how has doing a daily project affected my life?

As an artist I have two needs ~ 1) the challenge of creating something and
2) someone to show it to.

This means that in the sixty years I’ve been walking around on this earth I’ve not evolved much from the child who would bound out of bed in the morning eager to see what I could scribble together with my crayons and then run to show it to my mother.

As a small child I was able to come up with my own inspiration for crayon scribbles. When I started attending school I learned that it was possible to make things from the suggestions of others. It was also quite satisfying, because then they would acknowledge my accomplishment in the form of a rating system called a “grade”.  This was different from my mother’s reaction in that it might not always be favorable, but the recognition fed me nonetheless.

The challenge of creating something from a presented idea became a puzzle to solve, an activity upon which I thrived. This made me a good art student through graduate school and a decent free-lance illustrator early in my career.

The audience has changed over the years from mother, to teacher, to art director, and now to you, the public. It’s been necessary to evolve, at least to a degree, in order to accept the levels of acknowledgement I receive and continue to produce my art regardless. As a child it’s possible that, if my mother hadn’t gushed over everything I showed her, I might not have pursued the life of an artist. Now, I find I’m able to, well, actually, I need to create things whether you, my audience, like them or not, though, of course, it’s nice when you do. I don’t think I could continue if what I created was being completely ignored, but I am able to find the motivation I need to keep working in even a limited amount of attention.

Having spent 2012 completing the 365 projects from Noah Scalin’s book, 365: A Daily Creativity Journal, where I was given ideas, I find now, that in order to keep up the daily practice of creating, I am in a position of having to make up my own assignments. That’s where this latest project comes in ~ Using the cover photo and story from the Washington Post for inspiration, I find something to draw or collage and write about, either as a synopsis of the story or a poem in haiku form. I enjoy writing, particularly constructing the haiku in its 5-7-5 syllable structure, because of the puzzle-solving element involved.

This project, the working title of which is (My) Artplay at 60 ~ Using the Daily News as Inspiration, gives me the structure of being there every day and presenting me with a challenge of finding something inspiring enough to be creative. When I post the artwork (or artplay) and word-thing on my blog, www.wordkeepers.blogspot.com, I get to see if it has any effect on anyone.

The incentive for this project was an invitation to have a show at the Fire House Gallery in Charles Town, WV for the month of January 2014, during which I will turn 60. It made me want to do something fresh and interesting.

How has this changed my life? It is the difference between getting up in the morning and being presented with a blur of things to do, and bounding out of bed to get the newspaper to see what today’s assignment is, and then to my computer to see if you got, or didn’t get, what I did yesterday. It’s what I need to do.

See all of Rebecca's project HERE.

Bicoastal

Kizz Robinson in NYC & Chris Deitner in LA are doing a collaborative 30 day food photo project called Bicoastal...

Why did you decide to do this project? I had done a 365 project and, while I enjoyed it and found it helped me learn a lot about my camera and my creative brain I didn't have it in me to do another one so long. My archiving skills aren't that good.

I decided that I wanted to learn more about my smartphone's photographic capabilities and I kept coming across projects where people on opposite coasts or in different countries were taking photos at the same time and putting them together. I love those projects! I started to think about people I knew who would think this kind of project was fun and I immediately thought of Chris.

We batted around some ideas about how long we should work, what our theme should be, and how we'd archive it and finally decided on 30 Days of Food on Flickr so here we are.

How has doing this daily project affected your life? I happened to start this project at the same time that I partnered with a different friend to try to lose a little weight (I'm far too cheap to buy new pants). Now much of my day is spent focusing, literally, on food. For a day or so I was afraid that having the photo project would make the healthy eating harder, make me more resentful of some of the harder choices. Happily that hasn't been the case. Taking photos and concentrating as much on how I want to look at the food as on what I want to eat has been really fun. A couple of days I've even said, "Wait, I have to eat something so I can take a picture!"

Also, I took a lot of pictures of my hands in relation to food for my 365 Days Project and would sometimes feel like I was getting in a rut. The project was pictures of my hands but wasn't limited in any other way. It's counterintuitively freeing to have a narrower focus. I'm getting a lot of joy out of that.

See all of Kizz & Chris's photos HERE.

Sprint To The End

I can't believe the year is almost over, congratulations to all of the folks who've taken on and shared their projects so far – it's been a real blast reading about your experiences!

For those of you who haven't started a project yet, I want to share a suggestion from Kevin King: Sprint To The End.

Basically just make a commitment to do one thing a day for the 31 days of December. It's a great way to get the benefit of some daily practice without committing to an entire year. Plus you'll cap 2011 with some great experiences and start 2012 with some new ideas and inspiration.

And of course if you decide to take this on I hope you'll share about your experiences with me!

Happy Sprinting,
Noah

Bella Diva's 30 Days of Jewelry

Idabelle Fosse in Seattle, Washington is making a new piece of jewelry every day for 30 days...

Why did you decide to do this project? I decided to challenge myself to do one new piece of jewelry a day for 30 days because I was inspired by Noah Scalin's presentation at the Schoolhouse Craft conference. I wanted to see if I could push myself to create on demand, as well as to see what new ideas I could get from the things around me. I also wanted to jump start my work for the holiday season and hoped to create some buzz for my new jewelry line.

How has doing a yearlong/daily project affected your life?  I have learned to find joy in my "mistakes" as well as the pieces I find to be good. I have learned to appreciate the need for flexibility, and i have learned that though it is a daunting endeavor, that I always get something out of it. most of all, I love the fact that my imagination flows more now than it did. as I was making one piece that was working out well, I got the idea for two others that I wanted to try. it's been a wonderful experience.

Read more about Idabelle's challenge HERE.

One Coffee Cup a Day

Bernat Cuni of  Cunicode design studio in Barcelona, Spain decided to create One Coffee Cup a Day for a month...

Bernat explains, "One Cup a Day project is an experiment on creativity and rapid manufacturing, by ideating, designing, modeling and making available for production and purchase a espresso coffee cup within 24 hours, during one month. By the end of each day, a new espresso coffee cup was made available for sale here. The cups are 3D-printed in Glazed Ceramics by Shapeways.com."...

Why did you decide to do this project? I wanted to prove the amazing capabilities of additive manufacturing, Designing and making available for purchase an end product within 24 hours.
I choose to design a coffee cup because due to the costs of  3D-printing in ceramics with a glaze finnish, I wanted to make something relatively small and useful at the same time. Besides that, I'm a regular espresso drinker and I really like tiny ceramic cups, smaller the better.

How has doing a yearlong/daily project affected your life? I did this for 30 days nonstop and it was challenging, engaging and fun. A perfect combination for enjoying what you are doing. I found that having ideas was the easiest part of the project; in fact, from day 25th I realized that I still had many ideas but only 5 days to come, so I had to choose. The project didn't affected my life because I tend to be quite busy, no matter what I'm doing, so I experienced the same good work/life balance as always.

See all of Cunicodes's coffee cups HERE.