Wanna play a game?

I created this piece last week for an online art project based on the game of telephone. Basically, participants are asked to create a piece in response to an inspiration that they are sent. The inspiration could be in the form of a poem, passage, painting, print, photo, sculpture or other art form. The participant is asked to reflect on the inspirational piece, react to it and create something that will be sent on to another participant as their inspiration.
To know more you can access the game at: https://artists.telephonegame.art/

The process of creating the artwork for the telephone game was fascinating. I was really inspired by the passage (left) that I received and hoped to create something just as remarkable. But, I had a difficult time translating what I saw in my head.

I spent several days thinking and a few more days procrastinating before I settled on creating a digital collage, because I thought it would help me translate better what I saw, felt, understood and assimilated from reading the text.

The collage was ready four days before the deadline, but I did not upload it until about 20 minutes before the deadline. The days in between finishing and uploading it were filled with self-doubt and attempts to make it more... or something better. I found myself tweaking the collage, over and over again, each time reverting to the original version. It never got any better, I have come to see this waffling as a combination of insecurity/self-doubt about my own ability to represent what I want other to feel and appreciate through the media I chose; an overly-literal fussy perfectionism that I sometimes suffer from, and my desire to be liked/relevant by producing something that others will think is cool, deep or insightful.

I like the piece that I created, but I am still a little uneasy with it. I feel that something fundamental was altered as I interpreted the text through the lens of my own experience. The art I created lacks the color and the movement that I originally felt while reading the passage. It moves past that experience and into a more self-reflective space, to explore the question of origin and the quiet mysterious qualities of the architect and the observer of form in creation

I showed the collage to a friend before submitting it. He said it looked like a 90s techno album cover. And, I thought... Yeah, that could work, too!