Unexpected Finds

Thrifted books and being open to creative inspiration however it arrives.

New washi tape in the shop! Do you need some that says "made with artist intelligence?” Yes you do.

Hello friends,

Last week at my local thrift store I found a true gem: a book titled 1001 Questions Answered About the Seashore. Published in 1957, not only are the questions great, but so is the typography and the illustrations.

I mean, just look at this octopus:

First question of the book, “why should you be interested in the life of a seashore?”

“In the first place, if you already have this book in your hand you are probably on or near a seashore, or have prospects of going to one, so why waste such an opportunity? If you are on vacation you may even now be a little bit bored with sitting around getting a sun tan and a variety of beach views. In any case the nonhuman life of the shore and the shallow sea beyond it is fantastic, of truly great interest and of almost unbelievable antiquity. It is time you became acquainted, for here, right on the shore at our feet, is as wild a jungle in its own way as any tropical forest and of a kind that may well outlast mankind itself.”

Yes, yes, yes, sign me up.

It’s thanks to the book that I learned one of the crabs I had spotted on my low tide swim last week was in fact a kelp crab.

I could have gone online to look the crab up of course, but in a dearth of digital information, I always find it more satisfying to learn something by way of a book, a person, or a serendipitous signpost.

The new fact settles in a more concrete way, doesn’t just float past you as you quickly move on to the next thing.

The simple yet graphic black and white illustrations reminded me of another book that I picked up earlier this spring, when I was perusing the shelves of a used bookstore in Long Beach, WA.

Imagine my delight when I found Shore Bird Patterns, a collection of patterns for carving shore bird statues. I have no plans to start carving birds, but the illustrations are excellent.

This one for example.

Every time I find a snippet of inspiration like this, I feel a little thrill.

Sure, it’s nice to be able to order a used book online when you’re after something specific, but nothing beats the frisson of discovery when you come across something that you weren’t expecting and yet entirely meant to be. It certainly beats having something served to you by an algorithm.

Beach findings are a bit like these books. You wander without a plan and revel at whatever you discover. Shells get stuffed in pockets, hands are run over barnacles. You may be after a piece of beach glass or a rock, but usually it’s less about being on the hunt for a specific thing and instead being open to whatever is offered.

We’re so used to accessing exactly what we want, whenever we want, that opening ourselves up to whatever the moment offers—whether it’s an animal, a book, a conversation—begins to feel more and more radical. It’s the unplanned, the unexpected.

I took the cue from the book find and later in the week sat down in the studio to do a block carving of an oyster shell. Seashore on the mind and all that.

As I worked, I listened to an interview with Terry Tempest Williams. I just got a copy of her latest book The Glorians: Visitations from the Holy Ordinary. I am only a few pages in, so not far enough to make any sweeping overviews about the book, but I do love the idea captured in the subtitle.

The “holy ordinary” appears in “moments of extraordinary significance that we don’t pay attention to,” she says. In the interview she notes that, “It’s everywhere. It’s all around us. It’s birdsong in the morning, the robins. It’s being in New York City and seeing the leaves coming out and drawing the warblers in on migration. Everywhere we look, there is beauty.”

But we have to look, don’t we?

As always, the more I look, the more I find. The more the world reveals itself.

A bumblebee in the dried laundry pulled fresh from the line, a low flying eagle so close I can see its yellow beak, a school of fish viewed through goggles, a free box of early ripened apples, the first blackberry tasted after a swim.

All of it a gift.

-Anna

I’m leading a block printing workshop this weekend, so I was playing around with some things in the studio, and I am here to report that printing on thrifted t-shirts is very fun.

I just used a stamp pad (this one) for these so we will see how the designs hold, but I’ve always been inspired by artists who print on thrifted clothing, like Alison McKeen and Lydia Vadopalas (one of her chanterelle shirts lives in our house). I figured since I had all the supplies on hand there was no reason not to.

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