Got your attention, huh?
The past few months I've been working on my
artist book skills...and they haven't come easily. I've wanted
to make books about a lot of things lately: living in morocco, infertility,
changing family dynamics, good books I've read, pictures I've taken, dogs and
husbands I love, Moroccan rug prints, the list goes on and on. But
whenever I sit down to tell a story that is personal I'm completely bereft of
ideas and enthusiasm. I don't know if I'm afraid my technical skills
won't live up to my emotional attachment to these ideas or what, but It took me
8 months to get halfway through a book about our trip to Portugal last year but
then I hated it and dismantled it for parts.
So, Max and I have been pulling prompts from a
grocery sack the last few weeks. He has to write about them and I have to
create a book around the prompt. The first one we drew said "A Golf
Caddy Learns a Dark Secret". Since my reading and thinking habits
trend non-fiction I immediately hit the google to research golf scandals and
the like - thinking I'd take my inspiration from real life. (Max wrote a
delightful piece of fiction. Our brains work very differently.)
I came across this crazy story about a caddy who claimed he was
seduced by his golfer solely for the purpose of getting pregnant. He
later sued her saying he was an "unwitting sperm donor". Close
enough for me. I know it's a super weird thing to make a book about, but
for some reason it worked for me and I was able to try a few new techniques I'd
been wanting to experiment with.
The design and construction are really simple -
mostly I wanted to see if I could finish a task and stick to a theme.
Telling a story I had no personal attachment to was a really great
exercise. It let me step back and see what worked and what didn't and how
to construct an idea using mostly images. I think after a few more goes
I'll be ready to tell my own stories.
"Sperm Donor"
Accordion Fold
Paper: Arches Cold Press, Ingres
Matte Medium Image
Transfers
Text taken verbatim from
newspaper clippings
