Q1 Review: Creativity

I'm a nanny, and the woman I work for said something a few years back that has really stuck with me. She's an architect, an artist, and a mother and she wears those three hats beautifully. We were talking about creativity and the call we both feel to make things and balancing that with having jobs and careers. She said "it's all work." She talked about how people equating work to only things that earn them money does a disservice to people that feel called to do labor they aren't monetizing. Invalidating arts as a hobby grossly under exaggerates its value, and sacrificing creativity in the pursuit of productivity is a cruel expectation of capitalism when the most productive thing an artist can do is create.

So this year, I decided I'm going to work. I'm going to give my creativity the respect it deserves, and treat it as very serious business, complete with time cards, spreadsheets, and quarterly reviews.

Drawing, Painting, and Print Making

I used to love drawing and painting in high school and stopped after graduation. It was a bizarre ego thing, fueled by a distaste for my senior year art class and my teacher saying, "I hope you all continue to make art for the rest of your lives." I thought I'll show her. Maybe it's the development of my prefrontal lobe, but 8 years later, it's finally occurring to me how unhelpful the grudge has been. I will not show her. She has no idea whether I'm making art or not, the only person who has suffered the consequences of me not making art, is me. All's to say, I started painting again, and I love it, it has genuinely felt like a homecoming and I'm kicking myself for ever stopping.

This quarter, I have made eight pieces in four different mediums.

I don't have any goals in particular for Q2. I will hopefully make at least nine pieces since my snail mail club requires me to make three pieces each month, but I do have a few unrelated pieces I've been dreaming up. My favorite piece in this category is the still life I did of the San Francisco Palace of Fine Arts. I love the structure and I think it turned out really well.

Music

This quarter I've been working on an EP. It's a bit behind. In theory, it was supposed to come out on February 22. When I was still living in Santa Rosa it was hard to work on it, because my co-producer is living in Portland. Now that I'm back in town, I can say with confidence that it will be done and released by the end of Q2. I'm very excited about it. It's a project comprised of two rerecorded songs and two new songs and so far, it's turning out better than I had hoped. I'm very excited to share it.

I had a show this quarter! it was a great success. I promoted it on TikTok and actually got a few strangers to come which felt like a huge when. I felt very comfortable on stage in a way I've never experience and it made me really excited to do more shows.

My goals for next quarter are to release the EP I'm currently working on and have my second project of the year well underway.

Writing

In Q1 I wrote eight songs, four blog posts, and roughly 3,000 words of my novel. I just came out of a very long writers block so I'm not gonna make any goals around how many songs I want to write in the next three months. If I write any I'll be thrilled. One goal that I do have that might be too ambitious is to finish 50,000 words on my novel. I'm excited about it right now so it feels possible, but I could easily wake up tomorrow and no longer be excited about it. Let's hope not.

Beading, Sewing, and Embroidery

When this year started, I was completely fixated on making little beaded dragons that I found on TikTok. I made over 50 and have since given most of them away to friends.

I did one sewing project. It was inspired by an ad I got on instagram a while back for a corset that looked like a bouquet of flowers. I wanted to make it to wear at a show and it has been on my list for a while. I actually think it turned out really cute. I like it more than the top I was referencing.

I also made a beaded slug brooch for a friend with a little dangly slug trail that I think turned out really precious.

beaded dragons

This quarter I started the first of a series of beading projects I'm doing for my upcoming EP. I will be beading the lyrics of each of the songs I'm releasing on various clothing pieces. I started with Hemlock St. and I think I greatly underestimated how long each project is gonna take. I'll persevere, the end products are gonna be sick and I'm excited about them.

My goal for next quarter to to complete all four beading projects for my EP, and maybe make some more slugs cause I really enjoyed that. Will I be making any more dragons next quarter? I hope not.

Graphic Design and Web Design

I did a ton of work on my website in the last few months. I updated it completely and added new features like leaking the latest, and the lyric booklets. Do I finally feel done? No, I need to add a site-wide interactive scavenger hunt. Duh.

As for graphic design I did a couple of projects, I designed the poster for my show in February and I designed a sticker that says "I went to a Mo Schulte show and all I got was head," to bribe the TikTok lesbians with free stickers. I think I'm going to make an alternate version that says "I went to a Mo Schulte show and all I got was this free sticker" for straight people because I think that'd be really funny.

Misc.

I've done some other various crafting. Shrinky dink clown pins for collared shirts, star bowls from a pottery class I did with my mom, shrinky dink Frog and Toad paper doll keychains, flower presses, pins to sell at my shows, collaging for my snail mail club.

My Q2 goal it to just keep trying new things. I want to make a tin embossed bolo tie out of a can.

Overall I'd say I had a pretty good quarter. Especially toward the end. I want to use my time better and not go on Tiktok so much, which is why for next quarter I'm gonna start clocking in to intentional creative time everyday and tracking my hours. I'll check back in June :)