Postcards From a World That Never Happened

I went into last weekend with big ambitions. I had a list of blog posts to work on, lines of poetry that needed honing, expanding, art that needed making. And as it often happens when I’ve got multiple projects to work on, I spent two days bouncing back and forth between them all and completing none. Late yesterday afternoon, after I’d abandoned all hopes of writing anything substantive, I turned my eye to collage work. And found I couldn’t make a single one. I sat for hours cutting, gluing, rearranging, waiting for inspiration to strike. All to no avail. Then, finally, at around 5 p.m., I said to myself, Just put something together. You don’t even have to show it to anyone. But for God’s sake, make something.

That something was this:

Sundays in the Park

I looked at it and thought, This looks like a postcard.

And the proverbial floodgates opened. That’s it! I’ll make a series of small collages that look like postcards. Postcards from another world–from a world that never happened.

I began working at a frenetic pace. Suddenly, the images I’d been toiling over all weekend (and then some) came together effortlessly. And I ended the night (or, rather, the wee hours of this morning) with nine postcards to start the series. I hope you enjoy them. (You can click on the images to make them larger.)

From top, left:

  1. The Girl and the Moth (my personal favorite)
  2. Just Married
  3. Midnight Cruiser
  4. Big Dreams
  5. Illumination
  6. The Hunt
  7. Shipwrecked
  8. Bubbles

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20 responses to “Postcards From a World That Never Happened”

  3. I loved midnight cruiser, just married and Sunday’s in the park. Your artwork is stunning. My friend often tells me that I romanticise writing and wait on inspiration too much. He says writing is a job. I’ve started taking his advice. It’s sometimes better to simply write something…anything than to wait for creativity. I guess this post reinforces that view even though it’s about another form of art.

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    • Thanks so much, Nitin. I agree with your friend that sometimes it’s best to create something–anything–when you’re feeling stuck. It’s my experience that really good inspiration only comes after I’ve worked for it. Spent hours writing and rewriting, arranging and rearranging images and getting nowhere. I’ve come to view those moments of toiling without reward as a kind of prerequisite for success.

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  4. An admirable and beautiful work, L. With this proposal (so unexpected for me) you renew the old conceptualist idea that every object can be art if the artist considers it so. At the same time, you recreate the concepts of utilitarianism, functionality and desacralization of collage to offer, based on them, a utilitarian, sensitive and functional work. Secures a new vision that allows the viewer to revitalize their conception of spirituality through the aesthetic enjoyment of these delicious ‘postcards’.

    Congratulations! 🙂

    Liked by 1 person

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  5. It appears you just needed some time to get settled into the creative process. Fortunately you stuck with it! The first piece (title and content) remind me of a play I saw a few years ago, “Sunday in the Park with George,” based on a piece by French painter, Georges-Pierre Seurat.

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  7. What a fantastic series! Yes just produce something is usually a good mantra.

    Based on the headline I thought you might be sharing a pre or post or non COVID world! Yes to all of the above!

    Liked by 1 person

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