December 2009

Thank you Ann for participating in the 2010 whipup calendar. The calendar was a wonderful process and celebration of whipup for the year. I personally love all the artists whose work appears in the calendar and am so happy that these artists agreed to have images of their work published – thank you to all the artists who participated. Find out how to get a calendar here – great for gifts for crafty friends and family. There is a US version from LULU – and an Australian version from Redbubble – elsewhere – buying from redbubble has much better round the world postage options and the calendar itself is better quality (hence the slightly more expensive price).

Now for our featured artist for today and the last one in the series. I asked all our calendar artists to answer a series of questions … introducing Ann Wood…

Ann Wood lives in Brooklyn, NY and you can find her online: blog and website

Main craft of choice: sewing and paper mache
Craft hero: I love — Spore project
Fave web site: Sri threads
Fave crafty materials supplier: Cartwright’s Sequins (excellent glitter!) + Tinsel Trading

1. When did you start making/crafting, and who or what inspired that first creative burst?
In May of 2006 with the hope of generating some creative momentum and discipline for myself I started my cardboard stampede project. My plan was to make a cardboard horse everyday, Monday through Friday until I had 100. I did and exhibited the group at Tinlark in Los Angeles in 2007. It was a low pressure and relatively small daily task (monday through friday) that got my head and hands moving in a creative way whether I felt like it or not. I also started a blog and posted each horse for some accountability and a record and ended up finding more support, encouragement and inspiration in this community than I could have imagined. A couple of other unexpected benefits: I developed a much deeper understanding of the power of a small thing done daily, all sorts of new ideas emerged from the exercise of making each little horse. In terms of it’s original purpose – get personal work done regularly – It worked beautifully – it changed my life.

2. What would you say was that light-bulb moment when you discovered your ‘style’ and really hit your making stride?
I don’t think I have but there are little flickers and glimpses all the time and that’s incredibly exciting and motivating. One of the things I like about having a blog is seeing how what I make has changed over the past three years, how ideas have developed in ways I couldn’t possibly have imagined in the beginning.

3. Why do you make – what do you get out of it?
A strong sense that I am doing what I am meant to do, absolute delight in the process and the gift of spending vast amounts of time doing things I love to do.

Above images are: 1 – Iago, 2 – Cardboard castle, 3 – Paper Mache Sailboats

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