Back in 2018, in our pre-COVID world, I was struggling with finding time to stay connected to my art practice in between demanding work, and family responsibilities with young children. Right before the year had started, I was reflecting on "time" being a common "enemy" for everyone, and had an idea of starting a daily art journaling practice.
The idea was to create a simple framework where I removed barriers to entry and committed to a daily "yes" to engage for a full year. Small, consistent, daily steps adding up to something greater at the end—some type of connected display of them in sequential order in a modular format that would allow me to bring the pieces together as a puzzle.
At the time I was experimenting with making wooden jewelry and fell in love with using micron ink pens on the wooden surface. I found the tension between the intricate pen mark and the organic grain of the wood interesting. The 3" size was intended for easy portability so I could have them along anywhere I traveled. The hard surface of the wood provided the added flexibility of drawing on them standing up when sitting was not an option (A lot of these were done or partially done in the metro commuting to and from work). There was no subject, the intent was to have this process be a practice of presence, complete stream of consciousness where I translate energy, not inviting thought and or any literal representational references. It could be a scribble of a line and or as intricate of an abstraction as I felt like on a given day. In other words, there was no room to use "time" as an excuse to not engage.
So stuck with it and at the end of the year I had 365 squares.
