What I Made in August

or fragments rescued from the bin

All August I felt like a punk kid with a Xerox machine and ransom-note letters. I worked mostly in my underwear, which gave me an undeserved sense of freedom: liberation is not transcendence, it is simply the absence of pants. Meditation apps were supposed to help too, and sometimes they did. Stretching helped. Even the sun helped. And then there was the expensive watercolor paper.

Between pants-free work sessions and excessive water drinking, my mind wandered to Kurt Schwitters and his strange affairs with bus tickets and candy wrappers, to Ray Johnson’s mail art envelopes, and of course to Jockum Nordström.

I also hoarded scraps without knowing why. A piece is forming. Maybe it will, maybe it won’t. Maybe it will resist me entirely, leaving me with another half-born/damn picture book. I’m starting to accept that resistance is part of making (?) And through it all, there was the bird. This bird:

I named the bird Bird

When I bought the expensive watercolor paper for the bird, I touched each sheet like I were in a silk shop. The clerk watched me too long, and I’m sure she thought I was unstable, or worse, pretentious. She was probably right. But then again, that’s part of the transaction. You can’t buy real paper without also buying the story of yourself as an artist.

Pattern Studies for Mélanie Johnsson Pattern Challenge

My obsession with collage hasn’t gone away. It’s embarrassing, really, how much time I spend crouched over scraps like a raccoon with a secret stash. Old manuals and magazines. Margins torn from library discards. The backs of things. The torn-away part. Where the glue used to be.

I keep arranging everything on the floor, then storming away like I’ve just had a fight with myself, needing space, needing distance. Sometimes, when I return, the composition has mysteriously solved itself in my absence, like bread rising in the dark. Other times I return and it looks worse. Both states are terrifying, but also, maybe, the point. Because there is always that inevitable middle stage, when you’ve disrupted the original chaos and haven’t yet arrived at the new order. It is a brutal, unflattering stage, but it insists on itself, and you either face it or you quit.

Anyway, collage. What have you been making this month?

Today’s Artist to Know is Magali Franov. An amazing illustrator whose work you can find here. Enjoy the interview.

From Magalis’ Instagram