A few years ago I was growing increasingly uneasy with how much time I was spending looking at screens: at work, at home, while commuting on the subway, everywhere. I wanted to do something with my hands again, return to creating art with pencils, paint, and paper, enjoy the smell and feel of tangible materials again.
Just for fun I purchased a scale model airplane kit. Like many adults my age I’d built models as a kid but grew out of it as a teenager. So I rounded up a few tools, glues and paint and got down to work. Honestly, I expected I would likely spend a few hours noodling around with the thing and then set it aside having enjoyed a little nostalgic adventure. That’s not what happened. I actually loved it. What began as a lark quickly grew into a serious hobby.
The scale models I’ve completed in the past few years have won national awards and been published in magazines. Recognition is wonderful but it’s the simple joy of creating beautiful objects with traditional tools and techniques that I find so rewarding and life affirming, relaxing and fun. I learn a lot along the way researching these airplanes, their place in aviation history and their pilots. Rather than emulating the pristine aircraft found in museums I build and paint them to represent how they actually appeared when in use years ago. Every scratch, stain, smudge and oil leak tells the story of the aircraft, its design, its purpose and it’s era.
The intensely manual process of creating these scale models is an interesting compliment to my digital work. Each enriches the other. And I’ve come to appreciate how personal evolution and ongoing exploration in our creative endeavors can be a life long, wonderfully enriching process.