I tend to have a pretty intense lack of confidence in my work. Part of the reason I wanted to focus on monoprinting and mixed-media collage for my 100 Day Project is that I want to get more confidence with both. Previously I had a tendency to hide my monoprints in a background layer and work over them, rather than making them the focus. And though I love collage, I had never made one that I didn’t hate.
I’m trying to be kind to myself and all that stuff. But that said, this this thing is a hot mess. The page stubbornly refused to look anything like what I meant it to, and it feels scattered and lacking in focus. The two pages look somewhat disconnected from one another. I wanted to leave some white space, but the scrap of fabric to the left of the white area is too smooth, making it look as though I forgot to add something. And that leftover scrap of lotus-printed tyvek is just sort of hanging out there looking disconnected from everything around it.
I do like pieces of it, and I’m trying to focus on the parts that worked rather than on the Jerk Voice in my head telling me I’m exceptionally bad at this and unlikely to improve any.
I like the way the white ink created motion and left those areas looking a bit battered and windblown. I may yet go back and work over the fabric scrap with more white ink. (But not just now. I’m done torturing it for now and ready to move on to something else.)
This area is the part I like best, though I can’t seem to put my finger on why exactly. Maybe it’s something to do with all the dark of the branching print and the black paint juxtaposed with the sort of window effect of the white ink surrounding the cut-out circle.
And now I’m going to clear the rubble off my desk and pull some prints — yay!
