I spent yesterday (Sunday) in my new studio. It’s the smaller bedroom in my two-bedroom apartment located in Philadelphia. It has white walls, one window, poor lighting, my jeweler’s bench, and two folding tables.
I have not yet made it a space I want to be in, it feels a little sterile. My last studio I treated like my bedroom during my middle school years - a temple covered with pictures and mementos. Shelves filled with my favorite possessions specifically arranged.
I moved to Philly roughly 5 months ago and have spent most of my energy making my apartment feel like a home. I painted walls, painstakingly sought out furnishings, and familiarized myself with my new space.
I discarded possessions that I felt I no longer needed in hopes of de-cluttering my physical space and perhaps my mental as well. I decided I’d keep my studio walls blank, shelves free of clutter - a literal blank slate.
I realized today my blank walls are working against me. I changed tactics,I brought in a plant, and started organizing my materials and tools.
I opened a box, pulled out the contents and examined the small objects I had created in a workshop during my Core Fellowship at Penland School. I made them for a reason, a reason that has since been abandoned.
I feel distracted by the projects and samples I have started but never finished. I decided to find an unfinished idea and work from there.
I shuffled the parts, felt them in my hands and decided to put them to use. Made a vow to not overthink what I was trying.
I cast these resin gemstones almost two years ago. I cut them up, epoxied them in different formations, and added earring backs. The earring backs kept popping off and the epoxy wasn’t holding. I dismantled the earrings and moved on.
I have 50+ of these damn gemstones and 11 jars of unopened resin that will go to waste if unused soon. Today I sanded, set up a space to cast my resin, and wrote a blog post about how I want to work through old projects as a means towards a new body of work.
