pick and mix

slow, quiet note no. 81

It has been a week of creative snacking and grazing. A bit of this and a bit of that. A bit of here and a bit of there.

It has felt like the creative equivalent of a picnic, a pick and mix, a picky tea - all very appealing, tasty and nutritious but, in hindsight, not quite as satisfying as a proper meal.

I’ve been:

• workshopping

• collaborating and planning this year’s art trail project

• reducing the fabric pile

• adding to the fabric pile

• art-tripping

• teaching myself how to bead (ie making it up as I go along)

• yo-yoing (again)

• twisting lengths of cordage with fabric strips and scraps

• coiling and circling with above mentioned cordage

• quilt-top constructing

This sounds a LOT but, as usual, I’ve been picking things up, putting things down, doing a bit here and a bit there. Most of this was made whilst watching the Netflix remake of ‘Little House on the Prairie’ (one of my favourite seventies TV series) and binge watching the brilliant Ann Droid.

Not that I’m complaining. This list is evidence of sufficient time, resources and space to do what I love to do best. What I have now, though, is a growing pile of unfinished projects, samples, ideas, lists and possibilities.

I can feel myself tipping into making for making’s sake, keeping my hands busy but for no particular purpose or project in mind.

It’s all good analoguing, it’s pretty impossible to scroll while I’m stitching but the yo-yo/fuxico/suffolk puffery addiction is a point in case.

There must be hundreds of them now. They even have their own travel kit - a needle, thread, scissors, the plastic gizmo I make them with and twenty or so pre-cut circles. Neither use nor ornament, they are a pile, an accumulation, an idea waiting to happen. They are starting to feel like something I do out of habit rather than intention. Like nibbling cheese from the fridge instead of making a more substantial lunch.

I usually rationalise these periods of meandering making by treating them as the textile version of sketching - I tell myself that this way of working gives me time to think and plan. This relaxed, open-ended acceptance of what other people might perceive as faffing usually works well for me. Sometimes I think of them as a stitched equivalent of morning pages, thirty minutes or so of activity to work the creative muscles.

However, all of this is very well but I feel the need to do things a little differently. I feel as if I’m on a kind of creative static bike, like I’m pedalling but not getting very far and now I’ve started going round in circles, it’s time to have a rethink.

yet another work in progress

This may, in part, have been prompted by Wednesday’s re-visit to the Royal Academy’s Summer Exhibition, this time with friends and neighbours from our weekly village make and mending group. Our annual outing is always a grand day out and this year was no exception. As well as the Royal Academy, we secured tickets to see the David Hockney show at The Serpentine Gallery.

a timely post-card reminder from the late, great David Hockney

It was great to revisit the Royal Academy. I saw things I hadn’t picked up on the first visit and marked the catalogue with the names of artists to look up online when I got home. It was much busier than my first visit and I took even worse photographs. If you’re interested, the entire catalogue can be found online and is searchable by genre and subject.

‘A Year in Normandie’ was, as expected, beyond uplifting, full of colour and appreciation of landscape and the seasons. I also enjoyed the paintings in the central rooms, surrounded by the illuminated iPad drawings.

Detail: Abstraction Resting on a Blue and White Checkered Tablecloth, Hockney, 2025

Perhaps I’ve just seen too much of other peoples’ work recently? Perhaps I’ve reached peak-art?

From memory, one of Julia Cameron’s many recommendations in the ‘Artists’ Way’ is to have a kind of creative rest - to avoid reading, watching, looking at other artists/writers/makers work, at least for a specific period of time.

I must find the book and look it up properly but it sounds a bit like a pre-digital creative detox. I recognise that I have a tendency to look outwards, I can find it easier to think about other peoples’ work than my own. As ever, I probably need to take a bit more of my own advice - to shift my gaze and attention to my own work, to think about what I want to develop further and what to leave alone for a while.

People who come to my workshops often share that they do not feel as if their work is as good or as accomplished as a particular artist or maker. I make a point of reassuring them and remind them that what we see most of (particularly online) are the final products and objects created after hours and hours of making, painting, drawing or writing. We see finished objects, edited highlights and the successes far more than we see the messy beginnings and frustrating in-betweens. We don’t see many drafts or samples or failures along the way.

Now feels like a good time to take some of my own advice. After tomorrow’s double workshopping, I’m looking forward to a few days by the seaside. I have a couple of in-person workshops coming up over the next few weeks but I’m taking a break from weekly teaching until September. I’m looking forward to putting my phone down and looking with both eyes (perhaps with a sketchbook in hand).

I leave you this week with two different views of this magnificent tree:

I’ll write more about Friday’s visit to Compton Verney another time.

Thank you, as ever, for taking the time to read this week’s slow, quiet note.

My Sunday posts are free but you could buy me a coffee if you’ve enjoyed reading today

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Have a great week.

Janice x