After Louise Fletcher's courses (Find Your Joy and Find Your Voice), I found myself not doing art work. I was still doing creative things...just not in the same ways, with the same regularity, or at the same volume I had been doing. The creative things I did do included designing some books for printing, decorating our kitchen with alternating painted square canvasses as a backsplash, made some zines, and did some writing. That change led me to thoughts about wintering...and if I was in a period of creative wintering.
What better way to explore a question than through making a zine! This time it would be an exploration of how a plant prepares for and endures winter. I came up with the name before doing the research. So, seeds is really a misnomer. But I like the philosophical bent of using that word in the title. Seeds, as used in the title, mean kernels of possibility to me.
To start the zine itself, I did the cover and designs on the pages. I was experimenting with using a black Pentel Brush Pen that Austin Kleon recommends. I'm not a natural with it, and it will take some more time to get used to, but it was a good start.
Next was writing the pink words that represent the process a plant goes through for wintering. Looking at it afterwards, the negative space was overpowering. Something else was needed. I found some writing on wintering (of plants, animals, and humans) and printed it as background with a light grey Stabilo pen. It is also written in the opposite direction of the words in pink so the two wouldn't compete.
I like this zine, especially how the muted background printing is now a vital component. The piece has meaning--describing as it does, physical wintering. But beyond that, it also validates internal wintering that happens to us all like the tide--ebbing and flowing throughout our lives at different times.
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