100 Day Project: 100 Days of Art Parts: Days 21-41

My 2023 100 Day Project topic is 100 Days of Art Parts.  I haven’t been publicly posting every day.  And I only count it as a day if I’ve posted my work online.  So I’m a bit behind where I ought to be, but I’ve made my peace with it.  After all, the point of The 100 Day Project is to challenge yourself, develop your expertise, explore a new area, etc.  It’s not “keep on track.” 

Here’s what I’ve been up to:

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A Few Things I Learned Along the Way

Looking back at these twenty-one days of making, I can see a few ideas that came up again and again:

• Art grows through experimentation. Test the stencil. Try the color. Make the print. See what happens.
• Letting go of expectations is an essential art skill. The result may not match the picture in your head, but that does not mean it is unsuccessful.
• Repetition leads to refinement. Making the same kind of pattern, redesigning a stencil, or revisiting an idea helps you understand what works for you.
• Making bad art is part of making good art. Unsuccessful work is practice. It teaches you, builds your skills, and can often be cut up, layered over, or transformed into something useful.
• One idea can produce many possibilities. The same stencil, tool, or pattern can create very different results depending on the color, surface, application, and context.
• Simple tools are often enough. A homemade paint comb, inexpensive brushes, paper, and ink can produce rich and interesting results.
• A useful collage stash needs variety. Bold and quiet, clean and grungy, colorful and black-and-white papers all serve different purposes.
• Layers can improve or rescue existing work. You can always add, alter, cut, rearrange, or build on what is already there.
• Art takes time. A fifty-second video does not show the hours spent designing, printing, drying, evaluating, arranging, and revising.
• Enjoyment matters. Getting lost in the process, following your curiosity, and loving the physical act of making are all part of sustaining an art practice.

The biggest lesson may be that a sustained art practice is built through making, noticing, adjusting, and making again. Creativity is not a straight path toward a pile of successful finished work. It is a cycle of trying things, accepting surprises, revising what is not working, reusing what seems unsuccessful, and gradually discovering your own preferences. I ended these twenty-one days with a larger collection of Art Parts, but I also ended them with something more useful: greater confidence in my ability to respond to the work as it develops.

If you’re doing a 100 Day Project, I hope it’s going well and you’re enjoying it and learning something too!

Thanks for stopping by!