What’s In A Word?

Of late, I’ve been mulling over a little project, with a little bit of conspiracy thrown in for good measure. Hm, that sounds a little negative, doesn’t it? Well, there’s certainly nothing bad about it, it’s all good.

Shortly after the conclusion of the big gocco extravaganza swap of February Aught Eight, Erin sent me a sly little email proposal. Something we both really liked about the gocco swap was having an exercise, a predetermined jumping off point from which we could get the creative process going and stretch ourselves. Being a designer, this process is integral to the way I work on alot of projects, but it is also really nice to have this for a personal project. So often when I do a project for myself, the idea comes from within, and I don’t get the opportunity for that outside jumping off point, which sometimes causes preconceived ideas and prevents me from stretching it as far as I might otherwise. So, she wanted a bit of outside inspiration to jump from, a word, a phrase, or an image from me, to give her something to think about, which she would translate into another gocco experimentation.

I loved it. So I asked for the same in return. I gave her one word, “tea”, and she challenged me with “piece.”

Along the way, her project morphed into a sewing project, and I am still working on an edition of gocco prints. I am so excited about this collaboration, to see where it leads both of us, and the process of how we get there. More on tea and piece next week.

Also, I nailed my deadline, and updated my little shop this evening with February Meditate cards, small journals, and a few gocco prints of “Winter Snow” on charcoal gray paper.