Emphasizing Impermanence

Well it's over.

The first year of college just concluded and I'm headed into summer. Time remains infinitely weird.

Back in August 2024 when I was starting the school year, I was a triple major with Human Communications, Studio Arts, and Honors Humanities. Fast forward a couple weeks and I had two majors and a minor: Human Com, Honors, and Business Administration. Then, before Christmas I was down to the Com and Honors majors. Where did the art go? 

Well actually, the art didn't go anywhere. I created almost as much as I would've in any art class. 

After that runway show in December I was given an incredible opportunity with Wonderspace, leading a series of 6 Cardboard Club workshops in February and March, helping with two of their large Saturday PLAYdates. It was amazing, and I learned so much. But time moves on.

So, instead of dwelling on the past, I want to encourage moving on, particularly with art.

For the April PLAYdate I spent ten hours building a cardboard boat that got played with hard for 4 and quickly destroyed. For context, after only an hour the mast had depleted to only one sail; at one point I looked up and a kid had grabbed the mast with two hands and was violently rocking it back and forth, and at another point a kid straight up stood on the nose that was only glued on.

So at the end of the afternoon, I took the mast and beat the sides in to flatten what was left of it. 

The whole thing was constructed and deconstructed in less than a week, and I loved it.

This is one of the reasons I love cardboard.

I've never been one to hold onto my artwork. I'd always rather build something to give away, or that has a practical instead of decorational use. Even though I had a few years where I made over a hundred detailed, highly decorative cereal box figurines, I haven't kept a single one this long. I hung on to a couple, but even those made their way into the recycle eventually.

Cardboard is almost an artist's memento mori. Nothing really lasts–especially not cardboard. It successfully reminds me that the joy of art is in the process, either alone or collaboratively, and then sharing the results. 

An old teacher of one of the art faculty was visiting the other week, and while I didn't get a long conversation with him, Mark Potter heard a bit about Cardboard Club. His one question was along the lines of, "What skills do they learn?" to which I rambled, "well, we focus on four tools: rulers, scissors, knives, and glue guns, but the benefit of repeated meetings is that they can work on teamwork and more life lessons besides how to make cool stuff." He was interested to hear if they took their completed works home, proud of something they made in the hour and a half. I let him know that "nope. They don't really make anything that's able to be taken home. We often work collaboratively, so there isn't really any one thing for a member to take." 

It turns out that Mark had been talking to another student about why they had so many "menial tasks" assigned to them in their art classes. The point he tried to make to them was that these activities are skill builders– not finalized projects. Instead of being the biggest and best, these activities are perhaps only practice to refine skills for later use. Who knows when they will be necessary, but they likely will, and only after completing project after project will the skills be refined enough to be reliable. 

Cardboard is almost purely a skill-building material because of its impermanence. 

Try to make something last in the hands of a child that is only made of cardboard. From what happened to the boat I made… I doubt yours would fare much better. Kids simply have no spacial awareness when it comes to fragility, and they have no regard for artistic efforts. They really don't care how much time and effort you put into something–they just care if it looks cool.

When I was younger I drew a cover on a notebook that said "living the simpler life." Even in elementary school I was a fan of tiny homes and minimalistic living. But then I started hoarding art supplies. Piling and piling it up until it took two full van trips to transport it to school. 

Only recently did I reduce and refine my collection. Now I know what is my preferred marker, preferred knife, and preferred pencil. I've thoroughly reduced the clutter by removing the excess supplies and upgrading my storage, and now I'm proud to say it all fits in a single van trip. 

What I didn't remove, and that were far less impermanent, are the "tools". This includes anything from a jigsaw to a cricut to a pair of scissors. They are the larger ticket items that you can't just go out and repurchase willy-nilly. They are things you share with others when they don't have one. They are not things you just get rid of. 

My paint, I decided, was not something I wanted to hold on to. I don't like painting, and I prefer the look of the shades of brown cardboard in my sculptures. Just because I used them a lot before, doesn't mean I have to use them a lot in the future, and I absolutely don't have to hold onto every color of Walmart's Apple Barrel paints anymore. The painting era can be over. Happily. But the experience stays with me. The tool of painting knowledge remains.

The other night Wonderspace had their volunteer sendoff and brought paint-by-numbers. I surprised at least one of my peers with a more than half-decent painting (of course ignoring the numbers and mixing some colors) proving the impermanence of a paint collection hardly changes its equipping of my metaphorical tool belt.

If I can use cardboard to prioritize improving skills like problem-solving over building just visually cool stuff, then teaching workshops to more kids will be a breeze. I won't have to worry about the product, only about the intentionality they have. Besides, their projects will end up in the recycling soon. 

It's the experience that won't.