Last Monday, Lynda Barry came to town to spread the gospel of the creative process as is writ in her new book, What it is. Get a sense of it here in her Tin House graphic essay which is wrapped into the book. I got a chance to spend the morning in her writing workshop, the afternoon sitting in the sun drawing strangers, and the evening listening to her talk. She's an authentically gifted writer/artist, and very very very funny.

I was exhausted by the end (but she wasn't!) so I skipped the book signing but apparently she spent hours talking to everyone who wanted to talk to her. The messages she shared sounded to me like true truths. She is enormously productive as a creative being and the stuff she makes has a real power. The idea that anyone can write, sing, dance, and paint is one I'm already signed on to (by the nature of my work, my mission, and my daily mantras) but man did it feel good to listen to her sing it.


And then after trying to 'splain it to everyone last week, the New York Times published a page on the book, the workshops, the magic potion and I was able to clip it out and show it around.

I am still writing in my notebook. Still thinking about the ways I can keep incorporating these elements (the extra page to doodle as I write, the "don't read it for a week" rule, telling myself it's good, good, good at least at first) and I think I can.
Alright then, I'm gonna go draw and write and otherwise keep the stuff spilling out. Daily, freshly, honestly, and vividly. At least daily.

Rachael

thank you Lynda!

All the famous people keep parading around my neighborhood but they are not rubbing it in. They are sharing their ideas. It's cool.

Yesterday I had to work (it's OK I like to work on Saturdays, that's when the kids come and get creative) but Alison Saar was going to give a lecture in the afternoon and so magic Amy held down the fort and I spent an hour listening to the sculptor talk and show slides. It was really dark in the auditorium, so I didn't get the drawings and notes I usually get because I couldn't see the page. I still noted a number of things and drew a couple others. Her bio is well-known enough (and on her gallery's website here) but what was strongly felt from my corner of the room, was a consistent interest in hanging figures, making surfaces richly marked with roof tins, and considering dualities. There's a show at ROCO right now, she is not a hard artist to find with the frequency she shows in bigger cities but it is good that a small army of supporters have brought her work to town. She sometimes told us the dimensions, sometimes shared the backstory, often referred to her own family as a source for the sculptures (I thought her brief emotional moment as she talked about her daughter growing up was particularly poignant).
And now, there's Maryls' mama coming around...
I'm about as geeked out excited as a girl can be to go to the Writing the Unthinkable or (thinking the unwritable?)workshop tomorrow with Lynda Barry and then to see her talk. I promise to try to share the take-a-way from that.

And then, after that, I tell ya, I'm done with the big names and back to taking more walks around my very humble block and enjoying my generally anonymous life. There is some mulching to be done and more story-telling to spill out and I have been a very poor correspondant. Plus, I used to paint pictures.
See ya,
Rachael

Thursday night I had a chance to see a wonderful talk by here in Rochester, moderated by Joanna Scott and with very talented interpreters. While my notes are traditionally messy and scattered, I captured some ideas that continue to reverberate in my head.












A little inspiration goes a long way...
Rachael

see also Chad Post's blog on it here

I looked at my calendar and realized that in the next few weeks, Alison Saar, Umberto Eco, and Lynda Barry are coming to my town. I looked in my yard and realized my tulips had big heads of yellow. Nice.

Even though, I skipped a couple of lectures I was planning on attending this week because I couldn't stand to sit in the dark listening to strangers when it was sunny outside, I am looking forward to absorbing and sorting through Saar and Rushdie and Eco and Barry and the tulips and the weeds and the bugs and the people on my bus.

My sketchbook is filling and I'll share some pictures soon, but I'm racing to finish the last of my three short stories (sure it doesn't sound like much) for the fiction seminar I've been taking this semester. I've been impressed with the ideas shared around this workshop table and I think it's made me a better writer (if a less frequent blogger)...oh well.

Take care, troublemakers...
Rachael