A tiny Free Little Art Gallery inside my Little Free Library

 

I first heard of a free little art gallery as a place to exchange art locally when an artist in my area (South Minneapolis) installed a box on a post — the sort of thing that would usually be used as a Little Free Library — and called it a free little art gallery. She announced its arrival to our artist network, the League of Longfellow Artists (LoLa), and I remember paying it a visit and contributing some tiny art of my own. I don't remember if I took anything or, if so, what it was. This was nearly 10 years ago and I am relating this strictly from memory, which, as I'm sure you know, is never reliable. 

I have seen more things written about Free Little Art Galleries in the last couple of years; they seem to have become rather a big deal after the pandemic shut-downs began. It appears that the credit for starting the whole movement goes to Doug Millison and a group of artists in the San Francisco Bay area in 2013, to foster community and connections through the exchange of art. "By making and sharing free art, we seek to liberate our thinking and open more fully to the world and to each other," they write in the mission statement on their blog (linked above).

I have had this idea in the back of my mind ever since we installed our Little Free Library last year, but I didn't want to give up on the book exchange that is its original purpose, so I envisioned it as a subsection integrated amongst the books. Finally, a few weeks ago, I took some measurements and designed a kind of display box that wouldn't displace too many books but could still hold very small artworks for exchange, such as ATCs (artist trading cards). 

My art exchange display box in progress; it measures 7 inches long by 4.5 inches wide and deep.

The finished tiny gallery box installed in my Little Free Library

The box can be taken out to examine the contents.

I wanted to get it in place in time for the LoLa Art Crawl, which happens this weekend, Sept. 17–18 (2022), and I managed to do that just this morning (Sept. 15). It will remain in place hereafter, of course, and I look forward to seeing what happens with it. I even made a tiny zine about it — to give away, of course, and which you will find in my tiny Free Little Art Gallery. 

Tiny original art in the form of drawings, collages, paint-by-numbers, misc. paper crafting, etc., as well as literary art like short poems and stories are all welcome as long as they are no bigger than 3x5 inches and appropriate for all ages. Art by kids especially welcome and encouraged. 

You can find it, and me this weekend, at site no. 4 of the LoLa Art Crawl. I will have notecards featuring my artwork and several zines besides this free one (although some are this tiny), plus a few handmade journals and lidded boxes. 

To find a Free Little Art Gallery near you, try Find a Free Little Art Gallery.

Finishing up the Tiger Zine

It's not so much that I procrastinate. It's more like I get distracted and side-tracked, like a cat that hears a faint rustle in the bushes and must go investigate, forgetting about its intended destination. 

So although I started gathering information and writing articles many months ago for what I have chosen to call my annual zine, meant to be a compendium of informative tidbits I have collected in the process of researching and making the Useful Calendar each year; and even though by April I had completed a few longish articles about research-heavy topics like worldwide efforts to save wild tigers from extinction — because 2022 is the year of the tiger — sometime in May, it just stalled. 

This happens in part because I often sabotage my own efforts by gathering too much information and then feeling overwhelmed by it all. A case of TLDR only for the one doing the writing — too long, didn't finish! When mid-August came around, I was seriously considering abandoning the project, but then I thought about how much time and effort I had already put into it, including creating new artwork just for this zine, and I asked myself, What will it take for me to finish this? 

Well, I decided that I would not write those few articles that I had originally intended to include but had not yet written, even though I had gathered the information and found the subjects worthy and fascinating. I told myself there will always be another zine, I can always find a place for that topic if it's really important to me to write it. 

Then I looked at the draft document and realized that it was exactly 24 pages with just a few small gaps that needed filling either with new artwork or a short snippet of text. Well, any multiple of 4 pages can be made into a booklet, so suddenly the completion of my tiger zine was within reach. I was finally energized to finish it. I did two illustrations for the section on the evolution of cats (above) and a third of catnip (which I have growing in my yard), wrote a very short piece about tigers and catnip (yes, they like it), and selected a poetry excerpt for the last page, which goes nicely with an illustration I already had. Done, and done! 

I'll debut it during the LoLa Art Crawl, September 17–18, and then make it available in my Etsy shop and possibly at the Minnesota Center for Book Arts, if they want it (they usually do want my zines, but last year's annual zine didn't sell very well, so I have no expectations regarding this one). 

It's kind of funny, too, how I can't seem to motivate myself to adopt a daily drawing practice, but when I need an illustration (or two or three) in order to finish a zine, I can sit down and really focus on getting them done without being led astray by distractions. I do enjoy it when I'm in the midst of creating the illustration, and I often say to myself, I should do this more often. 

I guess I just need to make more zines.