Yesterday was my last post for my Collage365 project. Wow, I made it through a whole year! Was it worth doing? If you’re thinking of starting (or quitting) a daily art project, here are some thoughts to keep in mind.

Accomplishment

This is your carrot. While you can achieve some of the other points here without finishing, this is the one that can keep you going. It’s a simple task, right? Do something creative each day for a year.

There are many ways to get to the end, but it will require some flexibility. The biggest trick was managing being away from home, but even life at home can get in the way of a daily goal. Here are some options for flexibility:

• Buffer several creations for delayed posting. This got me through weekend travel.
• Have an on-the-road, bare-minimum kit. For collage, that’s a glue stick! For photography, your camera; for drawing, just a pencil or marker.
• You don’t need a masterpiece every day. Give it a good shot, but try for intuition, not overthinking or spending too much time. Learn from what you don’t like.
• Post 365 items eventually, maybe not every day.

Community

Find some people to do this with! The folks on Twitter using the #collage365 hashtag were wonderfully supportive, as well as delightful artists. Find your team through a common hashtag, Facebook group, or local artists’ gathering. Check in, give feedback, and cheer others on.

The Importance of Play

With the span of a year ahead of you, there’s plenty of time to try out ideas. In our collage group, one person was using a splatter technique, which we all admired, and had a go at ourselves. This is a great way to explore a new medium, technique, or genre, and quiet the critic in your head. No worries about today’s creation; there’s always tomorrow!

Composition

By reviewing your submissions, as well as others in the group, you learn what works for you compositionally. This was my primary goal for the project, and I’m now much clearer on what I prefer, what might be missing from a piece that’s not quite gelling, and what appeals to me in others’ work. It’s like a mini-critique group, every day!

Technique

With all that daily practice, not only will you improve your technique, you’ve gained a valuable unsticking device. Now that the daily yoke is off, I know I can always pull out the paper scraps & glue stick and get my creative mojo working. Writers journal, artists sketch, photographers post to Instagram or Tumblr for similar effect.

Body of Work

You’ll have a lot of work collected by the year’s end. Will you love each and every piece? Certainly not. I do have many that I quite like, and many that have taught me what I don’t like. I have a better sense of my style, and a direction I want to continue. Despite the carrot of accomplishment, and the strengthening of my composition, this is my most valuable gain.

Well? Does that sound worth it to you? When the full year is ahead of you, it’s intimidating, sure. But using the good old “day at a time” mantra, you’ll be at the end of it with all these gains. Let me know where to follow your progress!