Those of us who work in creative professions hope that our work will always continue to improve over time as we achieve new levels of skill, taste and practice. In general this is true, but like the stock market, improvement over time doesn’t happen in a steady, straight line — it appears through the average of successive peaks and valleys. Though I understand this rationally, when I slide into one of those dips I can’t help but feel like I’ve just gone backwards — like I’ve failed.

Let me pause for a moment to define what failure is to me: failure is the inability to submit work of which I am unequivocally proud. Did I complete the assignment to spec?* Yes. Did it solve the problem in a clever and aesthetically pleasing way? I think so. Did I immediately want to run out and show it to everyone I know? No. And that’s what feels like failure.

Somewhat ironically, the harder I’ve worked on a project, the worse I feel when it doesn’t work out. I take no comfort in knowing I tried my best. If that was my best, then what good am I? Being able to blame a lack of time or effort is much more comforting than having to admit a project fell short due to bad decisions, a lack of good ideas, or poor craftsmanship.

My feelings of failure are also directly proportional to the stakes of the assignment itself. In this particular case, the piece in question was created for inclusion in an illustration annual, where it will serve as the sole representation of my entire body of work to over 1,000 industry professionals. This one piece will introduce me and my work to all of the editors and art directors I have been hoping to reach for years. So pardon the hyperbole (“I didn’t make something spectacular! I don’t deserve to work in this town again!”) but you see, the stakes could not be higher.

I was seriously considering pulling the whole project this morning, $500 investment be damned. How could I have my not-amazing work to appear alongside the obviously-amazing work of dozens of other artists? Allowing such an unfavorable comparison would surely be more detrimental to my reputation than not appearing at all, right?

Luckily I asked that question out loud, to people I trust to give me honest answers, and they wholeheartedly disagreed. My husband insisted it would be a mistake to not participate in the book. As one of the only artists in the book working in three dimensions, my piece will introduce me as someone to consider for editorial props. Other friends agreed that even if it isn’t the piece de resistance of my entire career, my submission is still strong enough to encourage people to check out what else I’ve done.

Fortunately, as with all failures, there is always something to be learned, and the sting eventually fades over time. With this project I learned that complicated assemblages (especially using unfamiliar materials) are better served by a “lean manufacturing” approach (finishing a small section of the project in its entirety before starting on the rest) than by an industrial approach (making all the pieces first and then assembling them all at the end). Never again will I waste time and materials because I discovered too late that a good idea didn’t come together in execution, and that is extremely valuable — even necessary. In fact, I might argue that on the stock market graph of creative development, you can’t have the peaks at all without the valleys. After all, without the failures, what new knowledge is there to propel you to greater heights?

All that’s left to do now is to try to channel my inner zen master and let this project go, while also hopefully maintaining a little optimism. Who knows? Maybe my little sculpture is right up Tim Burton’s/Brad Bird’s alley, and they’ll insist I contribute my talents to their next film. Stranger things have happened.

*For those of you who are curious, the assignment was to create an assemblage using only supplies from a hardware store, a la Project Runway’s “unconventional materials” challenges. I can’t show you the actual piece until the book is published, so the tiny detail up top will have to do for now. This was also my monthly project for April.

So, upon the suggestion of my very smart husband, I collected all of the project ideas that have been relegated to the back burner and wrote them on slips of paper. On the first day of the month I will draw one from a hat, and that is the project I will work on for the next 30 days, ideally completing it by the end of the month. My April project has already been assigned by Uppercase (for Work/Life 3), but May through August will be ruled by fate. After that it will be time to take a break and assess how well this is all going.

Weekly progress will be posted right here on the blog in order to keep me somewhat accountable, but I’d also love to hear feedback from other folks during this time. Are you working on something similar? How do you motivate yourself to keep doing creative work at the end of a long and tiring day? Please share your experiences and thoughts below.

Wish me luck!

Everything was done from scratch, including the photographs of the quarters. To see other chart formats/materials that didn’t make the cut, click here.

 Here is the full graphic as seen on the blog. I did the graphic design for the lower portion as well, in partnership with Eleanor, and created several original icons for it.

A timeline for a post about the history of the Kala Institute in Berkeley, CA, using all original vector drawings in the background.  The timeline and decades had their positions and colors switched by the author prior to posting.

I think that much of the conventional wisdom about social media is complete and total crap.  It turns out that I do NOT need keep up with it every day. I do not need to tailor or time tweets/posts in order to get the most likes, followers or re-tweets. I don’t need to avoid sharing my work more than 10% of the time and I don’t need to build a large social media community or following for my work to be commercially successful.  Know why? Because a person who follows me on social media due to some strategic piece of shared information most likely doesn’t care about me as human or as an artist, they’re just mildly interested in said piece of information — which is fine as a social media side effect, but makes no sense as something to chase after/spend time on.

The people who do care about me as a human and an artist on social media are the people who also care about me in real life. They’re the community who will support and share my work because they’re the ones who will actually take the time to look at it and think about it. They’re also the people whose lives and work I care about in return, and the people with whom I have the most satisfying conversations, on- or offline.

Knowing all this, here’s what I’ve done: unfollowed all the people I envy or am inspired by — I have enough inspiration and project ideas to last the next three years without needing more sprayed at me like a fire hose. I also unfollowed every social media/marketing expert and inspirational life coach, and every celebrity — they also have nothing that I need right now. That leaves me with just people I love and people/publications who make me laugh. Pretty great, right? I don’t get stressed out anymore when I visit Facebook, Twitter or Instagram. I don’t open my e-mail every morning hoping to see a re-tweet, like, or new follower notification. Best of all, I’m getting so much more work done — creative, exciting work that I feel great doing.

At the same time, I’m connecting more meaningfully with people online, one at a time.  I’ll reach out to someone who’s admired my work, or someone whose work has inspired me to be a better artist. Sometimes we’ll have things in common and exchange a few e-mails. Maybe we’ll even meet in person some time if we’re in the same area. Sometimes it goes nowhere at all. Either way I’m finding life much more satisfying now that I’ve stopped caring about fans and followers and have started making friends.

Created for the 2012 American Folk Art Museum “Glitter Gala,” which had both a sparkly and choose-your-own-adventure theme.

Some close-ups of the “fillings”:

And here he is around town in San Francisco (photos courtesy and ©2012 The Bold Italic):

Hey, Lauren.

Hi. Who are you?

I’m you, in twenty years.

Weird.  That’s what I look like?

Yes, your hair gets curlier.

You look like Mom.

Uh-huh. Anyway, I wanted to have a little conversation with you, find out how much has really changed.  What’s going on with you?

Um, I just won the class science fair with my suspended animation machine, but I’m terrified to take it to the school science fair because I already know it doesn’t work.  Everyone thinks I’m super into Looney Tunes, but I’m not actually, I just think they’re better than Disney. None of my friends are in my class this year.  I think I want to be a toy designer when I grow up or a marine biologist.  What am I like in twenty years?

Well, you do become a freelance toy designer, but you don’t make much money at it, so you also have a part-time day job doing design work for a division of Warner Brothers.

Cool! Like I draw cartoons or something? I take back what I said about Looney Tunes.

No, you design Powerpoints and internet ads.

What’s a Powerpoint?

Erm, a Powerpoint is sort of like your science fair board, but displayed across pages on a screen.

That seems dumb.

I’m not going to disagree with you there.

And what’s an internet?

Oh man, I forgot you didn’t have this until high school.  The internet connects everybody’s computers together so that you can share information. You type in the address of someone else’s computer file and then you can use that file to look at pictures, read the news, buy stuff…it’s amazing. You can make video phone calls like in the movies!  Oh, and the computers are basically just flat screens and have no wires.  Most people carry a tiny computer in their pocket that’s also a phone.

Wow!  So are you rich?  Are you sharing all of your songs and stories and artwork and selling jewelry and tiny Fimo animals to the whole world? You must be so famous by now!

No, I’m not rich or famous. Day job making Powerpoints, remember?

Oh.  Right.  Are you not making songs or stories or art anymore?

I am, but there are literally billions of people out there sharing their songs and stories and art and products, which is awesome, but it means that even though you don’t technically need a publisher, or a record label, or even a store for people to find your work, there’s so much to sift through that it’s not much easier to get famous. Or rich.

So what are you going to do now? Are you married? Do you have kids? Where do you live?

One question at a time, please!  I’d still like to be by own boss someday, making a comfortable living and creating beautiful things.  I guess that’s always been the dream, it’s just taking a lot longer than I originally thought. I am married, to a truly wonderful man. You get really lucky with that one.  No kids. We live in San Francisco now, which we like much better than New York, though I know you won’t think that’s possible, and we have lots of amazing friends out here who are like a second family.

Huh. I really thought I’d have kids before I turned 30.  

Yes, yes you did.  You also thought there’d be flying cars by then.

No flying cars? Rats. Well that still seems like a pretty good life. It’d be even better if you were rich and famous, though.

I’m working on it.

Any advice for me?

Be brave. Care less about what other people think of you and just do what you love. Be kind and empathetic to others, and own up to your mistakes (you’ll learn lots about this in the summer of ‘94).  Keep playing the piano, and never let guilt motivate your decisions about relationships. Let down your guard sometimes, even though it will be hard to do until you leave New York. And care less about becoming rich and famous. You can be happy without being the center of the attention.

That all sounds hard.

It is.

Well, see you in 20 years, I guess.

See you in 20.  You have a couple of rough years coming up, but don’t worry, everything turns out okay.

Promise?

Promise.

Fleece, acrylic felt, polyfill stuffing, silver lame, 100% merino wool felt, cotton/poly thread, acid-free fabric glue. 38” L x 14” dia.

photo by Nicole Grant