ICAD- Another Daily Challenge
The 100 Day Project was, in hindsight, really challenging. When I posted my first Index Card a Day post (ICAD) my husband asked, “Are you doing another daily challenge? Why? The last one was so draining.” Yeah, it really was, but there is a method to my madness.
I enjoy posting something on Instagram everyday, or almost every day. Great conversations and connections happen there that I truly enjoy. Coming up with daily content is a struggle. I know that there is no reason why I have to post as often as I do. Okay, well there is if I’m truthful. The IG algorithm likes when you post at least once a day and are skillful with your hashtags. I notice that I get way more engagement from accounts that don’t follow me when I am posting at least once a day. The 100 Day Project brought me a lot of followers. The bigger the audience, the more likely that someone might make the jump over to this blog or to my online store.
My 100 Day Project wasn’t just art, there was also a reading and research element. I was reading books on creativity and the creative practice and adding a quote to my collage post every day. What I came across again and again was that the best way to improve your art is to have a DAILY PRACTICE. To show up and make something every day, even if it’s just five minutes of work or some time spent organizing materials. Another part of the practice needs to be showing your work and putting yourself out into the world as an artist. This is why IG is so good for artists; you have a platform that lets you put your work out into the world and get feedback. Our brains like those likes and comments and that keeps us chasing the attention. That fuels the daily practice and gets us to keep showing up.
“ ICAD seems like a perfect low-stakes opportunity to keep the momentum of my daily practice. ”
All this is exhausting, as much as it might be rewarding. These daily challenges take some of the pressure off that constant desire to produce by providing a structure and a goal. ICAD seems like a perfect low-stakes opportunity to keep the momentum of my daily practice. A 3x5 or even a 4 x 6 index card is so small. I can create an interesting composition with just a few small pieces of paper. This is a perfect opportunity if I want to experiment with mark making, gelli printing or stamping. Or maybe I’ll try a bit of abstract painting on a substrate so small that I don’t feel like I’m wasting paint. I’ll be able to use some of my tiny scraps in the bottom of my bins of materials that I thought were too good to throw out but too tiny to use.
The sixty-one little collages I will create don’t have to happen over sixty-one consecutive days (that’s the official length of the ICAD challenge). I can batch them together and post three on the same day. I can even be really sneaky and make a bunch at once and post them on separate days. There are no rules but the ones I make for myself. I could use the daily prompts, but that is too much pressure and I’m trying to escape demands, not create more for myself.
In the middle of the night, I woke up and my thoughts went to this project. What was I going to post for the text for each card? That is demand that often seems like too much. Then I thought, “I Capture A Delight- ICAD.” What if I used each collage as a moment to pause and reflect on something lovely that I saw or experienced during the day? Problem solved.
Join me; create an index card sized piece of art and have a moment of grateful reflection for sixty-one days. #ICaptureADelight