it’s hard when you’re *in it* to appreciate everything you’ve done (or really to appreciate it at all, especially if you are in critical-eye-review-revise-repeat mode) but taking a second to just *enjoy* your work will allow you to reconnect with why you’re pursuing creative work in the first place. what do you see in your projects you don’t see anywhere else? what does your previous work inspire you to pursue when you see it as an achievement in its own right instead of a stepping stone?
(also the artist way im going to shill this book until i die)
May 30, 2025
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this quote really helped shift my perspective about creative work and helps me push through a lot of moments of self doubt to persevere in this process. few things have stuck with me like this has and i think anyone creating anything should read it
Jan 26, 2024
100TH REC HOMIES
Recently watched a documentary about one of my favourite artists, Coulter Jacobs, and there's a shot in the film that briefly lingers on a quote he had painted onto a block of wood:
Learn what is to be taken seriously and laugh at the rest*
My take on it:
The quote isn't anything revolutionary, but within the context of the doc, which focuses on Jacobs' artistic pursuits/struggles and influence within the LA tattoo artist + abstract art community, it perfectly sums up the importance of being forgiving & allowing yourself room to breathe when you're working on your craft.
As someone who has a tendency to overthink & give my all with even the smallest of tasks, finding that delineation between seriousness and levity can get very blurry at times, but perhaps that's exactly why that short sentence stood out to me and it may be of use to you too.
Whether you consider yourself an artist or not, it's just as good a reminder to not take everything in this life with too much severity. It's a heavy existence already, no need to make it harder on yourself by treating everything like it will utterly make or break your life and/or career.
*The quote originally comes from Hermann Hesse, a German-Swiss novelist, poet, painter & Nobel laureate whose works focused a lot on the pursuit of personal authenticity and self-understanding.
Apr 11, 2024
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It can feel as alienating and heartbreaking to make anything right now. The attempt is what matters. I’ve been trying to make art for a while and feel gratification in doing it but I think that’s the problem isn’t it? We force it and when it doesn’t come out in the way we want it to it feels like we shouldn’t even try. By the nature of you making it ’s important, and your art is needed rlight now-
even though it doesn’t feel like its being witnessed. You are a witness to it
Mar 15, 2025
Top Recs from @alaiyo
Mar 23, 2024
a treatise on the attention economy - checked it out on libby and got through it over the course of a work day, a lot of really interesting social and cultural explorations about how time itself is the final frontier of hypercapitalism and what decommodification of our attention and time should look like
the book starts with a story about the oldest redwood tree in oakland and how the only reason it’s still standing is bc it’s unmillable, and how being uncommercializable is essential to our survival. it ends with an exploration of alt social media platforms (mostly p2p ones) and what keeping the good parts of the social internet and rejecting the bad ones should look like
all in all a super valuable read; my only nitpick with the book is that odell isn’t just charting the attention economy but also attempting to “solve” it and relate it back to broader concepts about labor and social organizing, but her background is in the arts which leads to some really wonderful references to drive the points home while also missing some critical racial + socioeconomic analyses that one would expect (or at least really appreciate) from the book she promises to deliver in the introduction. but this does also make the book easier to read which is good because everyone should definitely engage with what she has to say
will definitely be revisiting
Mar 25, 2024
