I decided to take part of last week off because even though there was a tonne of work I needed to do I was feeling far too depleted and brain dead to accomplish anything. I needed to brainstorm new ideas for an upcoming project but since nothing was coming I realized I needed a break. The PNE show took up a lot of my time in a way I hadn’t expected and it was a drain on creative energy after awhile. Towards the end of last week I could tell I made the right decision about taking a step back because the creativity and ideas started to flow again. Phew.

I need to create new work in time for the Culture Crawl in November, but first I need to put something together and write a proposal to submit at the end of next week. I won’t say much about what this one is all about because it’s in early stages. It’s an open-ended opportunity and I’m using it as an excuse to work collaboratively with friends and to create a large installation piece. The paper tree pictured here is a prototype for part of what I’m hoping to do on a much larger scale.

I’ve had the idea rolling around in my head for awhile about making a tree, and there are many different ways I could do it (and still can). I wanted to tie it into the altered book work I create and even contemplated making a tree out of books. Making the prototype helped to formalize my ideas and now I have a clear idea how to proceed with the larger version.

It’s a bit rough around the edges but I didn’t want to be too precious with it because it’s meant to be a first draft. My biggest frustration while working on this were my limited drawing skills, but they’re good enough to make the outline of a tree.

I’m hoping the final version will be magical enough to fill the view with wonder and awe. That’s not a lot to ask of my work, is it…?