Transitions...in other words, thanks IN ADVANCE for reading this...it's long...
Dearest
Readers,
If
you read the Book of Lael, you probably know I've been focusing on
beading, paper cutting, and other more “hands on” activities
lately.
If
you read the Book of Lael, you probably have noticed there haven't
been too many actual comics lately.
If
you read the Book of Lael, you probably know this has been building
for awhile. Perhaps you read this comic from last October 19th.
On
some level I clearly knew then, but I didn't. I didn't really know
for sure until about a month ago.
And
so it's time for a pretty heavy announcement...
This does not mean I will never do a comic again, but it does
mean it could be weeks, months, or even longer in between.
Because
the truth is I dread drawing. I dread
it.
I
used to sort of like it. Some of my Baltimore friends will remember
mid 2009 to late 2010 when I was hard to find without my sketchbook.
But, it was a constant struggle. I could never draw what I was
envisioning or even replicate the simplest of drawings. I could have
taken a drawing class so many times by now or made any real effort to
improve my drawing. I haven't.
One
of the things I've been wanting to do is to write. I've wanted to
write a narrative for over two years now. Initially, I thought it
would be a graphic novel or a narrative form web comic, but I just couldn't get it going because the idea of doing the art work kept overwhelming me.
Additionally,
for those of you who don't know, I wanted to be a novelist, a short
story writer, or a poet from the time I was around 12 until I gave
all those things up to devote myself to academic art history at 20. I
decided my fiction wasn't so great, so I should give myself to
research. I ran away from something I had been doing in my spare time
since middle school. I would put off doing homework in high school
and write 10 page single spaced short stories while my mom yelled at
me to get off the computer and go to bed. I remember those nights in
my mom's office, complete with AIM and her left-handed mouse.
(so
many gems in this photo)
Before
any of that, I whiled away many a Saturday morning with construction
paper, scissors, and tape....My more recent forays into paper art
have been exciting and promising. I've watched more tutorials and
read up more on paper art in the last few months than I have about
drawing in the last almost 6 years. I feel good about myself when I
make paper art. I truly love using my hands. I am attracted to the
simple shapes and solid color of working with paper, but, honestly, I
am finding it much easier to express myself with cut paper.
I want to create with more depth and with more meaning and not just
make jokes about eating too much, pop culture, and relationships. I
love those things, and I'm really proud of many of my comics, but I
have been itching to do more for so long. I want to say something,
not just say things.
And
somehow I see the path for that as either being with words or with
abstract forms. A dichotomy I'd love to explore more fully in my own
art.
In
certain ways, it's easy to post something weekly and not work on
something long form. It's easy to post something to be casually
consumed in a few minutes and not work on your opus or on work that
requires practice, development, editing, and depth of thought. Unlike
the work of many comics artists I greatly admire, my comics, although often time
consuming to create, did not often meet such higher bar criteria.
It
may sound strange, but drawing is preventing me from writing. Drawing
is preventing me from creating uncluttered forms imbued with so much
more than angry pencil strokes. My comic is holding me back from what
I truly want to create...whatever that may be...
I
don't know where exactly my artistic future lies—paper crafts,
fiction writing, or some combination there of, but it can't be this
anymore. It can't be straining to come up with something vaguely
funny with forced drawings because I established that I would do this
every week.
Posting
my comic every week HAS been an anchor holding me together and
keeping me creating. Posting my comic every week has been the
reversal of that moment in college when I threw away my fiction
writing career to become an art historian.
When
my professional student life fell to pieces, I clung to this new
homework I had assigned myself. I created an identity of myself as a
comics artist, but yet, I don't think I ever embraced that identity
or really filled its shoes. I was always pushing away just as hard as
I was pushing forward.
I'm
not the person I was trying to be. I'm someone else. However cliché
this may sound, I need to find out more about that someone else.
Forcing
myself to be creative every week is all well and good but to force
myself to be creative in a way I don't want to be is just preventing
me—stalling me—from working on all of the other projects I'm
interested in. How many times have I not created the art I wanted to
create because I HAD to do my comic?
I
appreciate all of your support more than you can know. I want
everyone reading this to know that, but I have to do what's right for
myself. I can't do a halfhearted job every week on something I don't
love anymore.
The
night I definitively realized I was feeling this way a few weeks ago,
I contacted a dear friend who likes my comic enough to have printed
and posted one of them in her office. She said, “If you want to
stop your comic and start doing something new, that makes me excited
for you.”
I'm
sad and scared to end such an important chapter of my life, but I'm
excited for me, too.
Sometimes
you have to admit to yourself that what was once a good relationship
is over—that you're not happy. Maybe you can still be friends, but
you have to know when to say goodbye. I'm proud of my consistency,
but perfect attendance doesn't an honor student make. Sometimes
something is at an end, and it's time to just let go.
As
I relieve myself of this burden, please stay tuned to the Book of
Lael because there will still be lots to see, just not what you've
been accustomed to seeing. I'll need your support to keep me going in
new directions to see what sticks. Change isn't always bad. Change is
okay. Change can be good. I'll thank you in advance for taking this
journey of discovery with me...
All
my love to my supporters from the very beginning, all my new
supporters along the way, my fuzz ball, the celebrity crushes and
insane strangers who lent me so much fodder, the Insular illuminators
who first inspired me, and especially to Dr. A who keeps me grounded
in a way that my art never has.
--LJE
PS.
There are so incredibly many people to thank but an especial thanks
to Dr. A, dr. ks., Isabelle, Kristen Ann, Lady J, Jesse, and my mom.
