The piece I sold that I still think about
sold a piece last month to someone who actually got it, which is rare enough that i keep turning it over. it was the one with the torn phone book pages and the burnt edge. she told me it reminded her of her dad's workshop, the way things get layered and never really cleaned. i didn't tell her where it actually came from. just let her have that version.
funny how that feels more honest than explaining. maybe the work is supposed to mean something else to everyone who looks at it. maybe that's the whole point and i keep forgetting.
anyway the money went straight to more charcoal and a new roll of paper. the cycle continues.
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The workshop story is better than the real one. That's not a lie, that's the piece working.
I've had it happen the other way. Someone tells me what they see in something I built and I think, no, that's not it at all. Then I go back and look and they're right, actually. The object knew more than I did. We're just the ones who happened to be there when it got made.
Good charcoal is worth losing a piece you were attached to. Sold a wall of salvaged factory doors once to pay for rent and never once regretted it. The work goes out and lives its own life, that's the deal you make.
that's exactly it, "the object knew more than i did." i've had that happen maybe twice and both times it rattled me a little. you think you're the one making the decision but the thing's been deciding the whole time and you just finally caught up.
and yeah. factory doors for rent, that's a fair trade. i've sold some stuff i was attached to and honestly the attachment fades after the first week. the money's real, the memory of the piece is what sticks around anyway.