Eric Timothy Carlson’s abstract tape painting reminds us a) how great ordinary tape is for making stuff, including a la minute artworks b) you don’t need to get crazy about it. It can be a fun, chill few moments of exploration that you rip off the wall when you’re tired of it. Perfect for the weekend.
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This sign on Holton Rower’s studio door instantly shifts our perspective: about being more mindful of the potential to hurt someone’s feelings……including our own
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A tasting spoon is an essential kitchen tool, allowing you to add flavor experiments directly to the “taste” to see if you like them. Over the years I’ve collected —and given — quite a few tasting spoons. They make great, unexpected gifts. Here’s a roundup:
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At Kleidersachen, a German tumblr whose name name literally translates dresses things, sublime examples of out-there clothing and textiles had us transfixed, culling ideas right and left on a variety of themes, in awe, inspired. To start, we’re thinking about neutral apparel that can be drawn, painted, written on.
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This wondrous gif is a poem in itself. And we found some other illuminating fragments…
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On my office wall, I tape images that inspire, motivate, and hearten me. Recently, I taped up a greeting card that said PROCEED AS IF SUCCESS IS INEVITABLE. Although the words make great sense, they curiously had little impact…UNTIL something compelled me to pair it with a photo I’d clipped from a magazine: Big lesson in what a MOTIVATOR can be.
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Holton Rower sent us this astonishing image of scaffolding festooned with flowers, an utterly magical arbor to walk under. We wonder who made this ephemeral artwork, and where it was? We found two haiku to go with our imagined walk through it:
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In the final paragraph of Camus’ last published essay, Create Dangerously, we found this radical idea: One may long, as I do, for a gentler flame, a respite, a pause for musing. But perhaps there is no other peace for the artist than what he finds in the heat of combat. ‘Every wall is a door,’ Emerson correctly said.…
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Among Improvised Life’s many categories and themes is “Materials for Making“. We love finding surprising uses for materials and showing you how you can use them. The other day as we were mulling our Friends with Benefits subscription program, we realized that money is a Material for Making as well.
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In a recent ramble around New York, we came upon this classical iron fence, transformed by grapevine. The fence acts like a loom or structure through which someone wove grapevine in and out to make for much greater privacy and a warmer, more organic feel. And of course, that got us looking up grapevine (which…
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Our friend Holton Rower has been learning about cooking salmon on a cedar plank on his Weber grill through trial-and-error, a method we totally endorse. His first go wasn’t completely successful but it was clear that the cedary smoke is a perfect marriage with salmon. If you don’t have wood coals to cook over, cedar…
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One of the many unexpected materials artist Holton Rower uses to make his art is money —physical paper money— rolled, folded and fashioned into all manner of unexpected scuptures. His concrete block filled with tightly-rolled bills resonates strongly with us. Like Rower’s illuminating art works, money + energy + creativity = something unique and tangible.
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Holton Rower sent us his latest off-the-cuff improvisation, done while making dinner: an inspired fake fingernail made of celery. Hmmm. Wondering about that exact moment when Holton SAW the possibilities in an ordinary stalk of celery.
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(Video link HERE.) Our friend Holton Rower wanted music to listen to while he fried his morning eggs. He couldn’t think of one band. Then he remembered a kind of Indian fusion music he liked from a dj with a name like Baad-something. So he typed B-a-a-d into Youtube and struck gold. He and his wife…
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We recently came across this tweet from God, with a new set of refreshing and useful commandments. Equally compelling, were tweets sent in response with suggestions for additional commandments. Here are some favorites:
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Artist Holton Rower taped this sign in his studio years ago: a simple, powerful practice to constantly clear misunderstandings or hurts. Recently, we read literary critic D.G. Myers description of a practice he’s taken up since hearing of his diagnosis terminal prostate cancer:
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Lately, we’ve been seeing some cool dresses with the distinct texture of Nature…from moon landscapes to birtch bark.
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The Wishbone Project is Improvised Life’s campaign to crowdsource hundreds of thousands of wishbones for a monumental artwork Holton Rower plans to make out of this unusual art material. Reader BCE just sent him the first batch.
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Holton Rower designed a iron-clad magnetic wall painted to look like the adjacent walls. It allows Holton and his family to easily display and remove artwork, photographs, notes —anything that can be held up with magnets — as they wish. Here’s how he did it.
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Our friend Holton Rower sent us some screenshots of very imaginative snow creations that remind us just what a splendid, ephemeral FREE material snow is for spontaneous making, fashion inspiration, exercise equipment.
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