naming

Just before the holidays, I finished printing the third piece in a group of three large prints that I had been working on during the fall. I’m very excited and pleased with them. As usual they had ‘working titles’ while under development. However, I have delayed signing and documenting these for I’m struggling to come up with just the right titles. Because they may become part of a larger series, and I do tend to work in series, just the right naming is all the more important to me. I’ve considered including them in my ARKEO series for they are related, yet they are also different in look and mood and future pieces may be using new materials and presentation.

Last week I spent many hours over several days preparing digital files of my work and the work of an artist friend (who asked for help) for a group submission to a gallery. Of course the naming of those three pieces came up again but remained frustratingly elusive. Ultimately I had to title them temporarily “To Be Titled #1 to #3” just for this purpose. Not “Untitled”, because that sounded permanent. Even the artist statement was made even more of a challenge!

As I was about to nod off to sleep last night, my thoughts returned to those pieces once again. Bad timing to start thinking challenging thoughts at bedtime! Like a computer hard drive that doesn’t completely go to sleep, my brain kept working all night even while I slept. Sometimes answers are revealed to me that way, in fact a couple of titles did emerge from the night fog, but I’m not entirely convinced by them. Those prints may stay unsigned for a while, sigh, and I know this happens to other artists too. Pardon me if I don’t even post the images here just yet.

This is even harder than coming up with names for our human babies!

January 14, 2011 in Being an Artist by Marja-Leena