Wednesday, Feb. 16, 2011 - 11:05 a.m.

I finished the first piece. It's fuzzy, colorful, and bounces. I'm now working on 2 more, simultaneously. Texture! I'm being a bit lazy-- I envision huge things, but have to work on my patience. It's because I am exploring potential, I tell myself. Once I have some examples to help me visualize larger things, then I will do larger things. Maybe.

Right now they look like fun mobiles for a kid's room. But you know what? They take a REALLY long time (especially that one yesterday, where I was making little spacers with a hole punch and used overhead transparencies). So I need to shoot higher.

The first one had torn mulberry paper (hence the fuzziness). The second one is just torn printmaking paper (some dyed, some plain). Uneven, but not fuzzy. The third uses some of my handmade paper. See, I want this to work so I have an excuse to make handmade paper. That was the original scheme: become wildly successful making things with handmade paper, then travel every summer to some part of the US where I will hole up and use local plants to make more handmade paper. Good scheme, eh? If only it weren't predicated on wild success. Or even a modicum of success.

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