Most days I spend a few hours taking photos for articles and typing up posts to share on Hive. Sharing nearly instantaneously is very fun and gives me a little rush when I see how my post have resonated with the world.
We are all well versed in the positives of writing online as a side hustle. The nearly instant reward of receiving votes, comments, and attention from strangers can really help in my creative processes. But instead of focusing on making art to share online I want to talk about the reverse, how blogging feeds into my zine making.
I must admit, I do feel like most of my attention gets turned into digital work. Digital work is what society seems to value most these days. It is certainly faster and more monetarily interesting that creating physical art.
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Is it more satisfying though? **
Now I want to look at writing online as a filter in the many layers of artistic distillation instead of the final product.
Sharing online is like casting my work into the world and seeing what resonates with the people. From there I get an idea of what information, images, and bits of prose readers enjoyed and that spins off into ideas for creating physical reading material.
My favorite images originally captured for Hive posts can be printed, collage(d), and made into something (mostly new). The most thought provoking sentences can be printed and re-arranged onto paper.
And sometimes I do away with the words altogether creating a new story in my own handwriting. Creating nearly entirely by hand or with minimal help from a computer can lead to surprising evolution in the thoughts I want to convey.
After cutting, pasting, erasing, and re-writing the zine eventually feels ready to be shared with the world.
With a handful of completed titles in hand I took a stroll though some random neighborhood the other day. Every few blocks or so I came across a Little Free Library where neighbors exchange books anonymously. There are mostly books on pop fiction and even a section for children's tales too.
I added a few of my own to the collection and went on my way. Blog posts are only available when internet and electricity art. Books and zines can be read anytime and anywhere. And hope that whoever finds them feels inspired to share their own stories in such a DIY way as well.