ORDINARY
vol #1
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ORDINARY This first issue is dedicated to the main concept of this magazine: an ordinary day; an observation of our environment and life in terms of the shapes, textures and spaces that inspire me to work and create, to dream and make, to breathe and discover as well as rediscover points of myself through the personal and the ordinary, the beautiful and the imperfect.
FROM THE EDITOR This magazine is a self-initiated project inspired by everyday life and my personal obsession of looking for beauty in the ordinary things around me. As a person interested in living in mindfulness and attempting to apply the principles of slow living in my own life, I decided to take a step forward and create a platform where people can share and discuss their vision of and thoughts on these topics. As a graphic designer, I am interested in observing my environment, the people around me, communication, sharing ideas and talking about my inspiration, but what is even more interesting is how we create our small magical world of personal experimentations, showing the world behind the scenes, talking and showing some more personal stuff from our creative process, and encouraging and inspiring other people to find their own way to do so. I invite you to join me on this journey and to take part in.
Iva Borisova
CONTENT CITY
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WABI-SABI in the city
JOURNEY
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interview Sandra Abdulhakova and her journey back home back
home FOOD An exploration of how food can be used as an inspiration
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BODY
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interview Helena Jakoube and her adventure of self-exploration and experimentation
STUDIO talk
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A visit to Jessica Serran studio and one spontaneous talk
GEOMETRY
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Photographic exploration of the geometry of an ordinary day
CONFESSION interview Jana Krchova and how she made an ordinary day extraordinary
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TEXTURE Living in mindfulness
CITY 9
WABI-SABI IN THE CITY In Crispin Sartwell’s book Six Names of Beauty, he mentions Wabi-sabi, a concept that ‘refers to Wabi-sabi refers to an elusive and elegant beauty. Wabi suggests a beauty of elegant imperfection. Sabi means loneliness or rather aloneness. Together, they suggest the beauty of ‘the withered, weathered, tarnished, scarred, intimate, coarse, earthly, evanescent, tentative, ephemeral.’
In another book called Wabi-Sabi for Artists, Designers, Poets & Philosophers, Leonard Koren defines Wabisabi as ‘a beauty of things imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete. It is a beauty of things modest and humble. It is a beauty of things unconventional.’
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The term ‘wabi-sabi’ may have had a negative connotation in the past as wabi refers to ‘the misery of living alone in nature, away from society’ and sabi means ‘chill, lean, and withered’. However, living like a hermit is nowadays often seen as a spiritually enriching experience. It has become associated with the practice of appreciating the minor details in life, where beauty can be found in the inconspicuous and overlooked aspects of nature. It is the joy of spending some time in silence and solitude, and giving yourself space to notice and appreciate what is often overlooked in life.
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Koren also makes a parallel between Zen Buddhism and Wabi-sabi by calling Wabi-sabi the ‘Zen of things’ as it exemplifies many of Zen’s core spiritual-philosophical tenets.
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“ I still feel like a stranger in my own homeland, a stranger
carrying the heart of Europe and the heart of the Middle East nestled safely in my ribcage, a stranger with horizons that stretch beyond the high mountains of Krkonoše, the fluid waves of the Mediterranean sea, and the fiery dunes of the Arabian desert.”
JOURNEY 21
Sandra Abdulhakova - One Ticket Back Home, Please Originating from a union of Syria and the Czech Republic, Sandra presents herself as a conceptual designer and artist with an open sort of mystery and serenity. She enjoys bathing in the sunlight, growing plants and studying different cultures as well as her own. Sandra is an explorer of herself and the environment around her, and she enjoys taking inspiration from unexpected sources.
How does the ordinary day start for you? Is there something that can make your ordinary day extraordinary? My ordinary day starts with a small cat jumping onto my bed, meowing, sometimes licking my face in order to wake me. Usually, it’s around 7a.m., but sometimes Oscar — that’s the cat — sometimes, he’s generous enough to let me sleep in until 8a.m., which I suppose makes the particular days this happens extraordinary, so yes. Otherwise, it’s the weather. This year’s winter has lasted such a long time, and I’ve been missing the sun quite a lot — sunny days are so rare, so I’m always absolutely thrilled about them.
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What is your favorite time in an ordinary day? My favorite time is the time I spend in transit, either walking somewhere or taking public transport, but not the metro — I don’t take that because I like to stay above ground. I can enjoy the sun that way if it’s sunny. I usually take the same route at least twice every day, five days a week when I’m going to work. There’s always something new to see, new faces to memorize, and I enjoy recognizing patterns, like did you know that the 9:33a.m. tram from Radhošťská is either a Tatra T3SUCS or a Škoda 15T4, while the 9:40a.m. tram is a Tatra T6A5. I absolutely despise the Skoda 14T — that’s the newest tram model. I don’t think you get to see much of anything in those trams — it isn’t fun. Then there’s coming home, and it doesn’t necessarily have to be my address that I am going back to, but it’s the idea of home being where the heart is, where the people I love and care about are. It’s coming home to love and support. These days, I come back to my cat and to my work, but sometimes I bring along friends, sometimes lovers, and often times, family, both given and chosen. It warms my heart and my home to have them around.
Do you have a favorite shape or one that you prefer at least, and what part of your body do you love the most? My favorite shape is a circle, I think. I am not sure if it’s the neverending and continuous connotation around it that I find so attractive or whether it simply reminds me of pies, cake, donuts, and baking in general. I really enjoy baking. I love my eyebrows the most, which a lot of people say is strange because they require a lot of shaping to look the same. My left eyebrow is after my dad’s and my right one is after my mom’s. I like to think this is a symbol of their union, a union of cultures and worlds, something I can strive for in the future, and a reminder of where home lies.
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Have you ever experienced the feeling of not knowing who you are and what your purpose is? How do you deal with it? Always. This feeling of being lost is one that I often deal with, and it is one of the reasons I started this project. I wanted to explore the concept of ‘the Diaspora’, and the literal definition of that is the dispersion of people beyond their homeland. I lived in [the United Arab Emirates] for 17 years. I made friends and I made family there, I built the life my parents laid the foundations for when they moved there 21 years ago, and I still can’t call it home. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to call it home, even when and if I ever go back — why? Political reasons, ethical ones. After that, I lost Syria to an unjust war, and when I came to Prague, I thought I was finally coming home, but that was not the case. I still feel like a stranger in my own homeland, a stranger carrying the heart of Europe and the heart of the Middle East nestled safely in my ribcage, a stranger with horizons that stretch beyond the high mountains of Krkonoše, the fluid waves of the Mediterranean sea, and the fiery dunes of the Arabian desert. Some days, I take it as a given, and on others, I try to find a home in maps and geography, where the land’s terrain reflects that of my heart’s. I asked a friend from the other end of the word what she thought of when I said the word diaspora, and her reply came, ‘oh, is that an illness, some kind of spinal disease?’, and while I laughed at first, it quickly dawned on me that in a way, I do feel sick, homesick, formless, with a faulty foundation and disparate skeleton to match.
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Can you tell us more about your interests and hobbies, what are the things you love to do in solitude? I like solitude for the fact that it is quiet, so there isn’t much that I like to do if it disturbs the peace. I think being able to enjoy solitude is a privilege in a sense where you are not afraid to be on your own and to be your own. I like reminding myself that I am alive through taste, touch, hearing and seeing. Coffee indoors or outdoors, observing, listening, being at equilibrium. I think I mostly enjoy touch, the physicality of being, and the tactility of objects which is why I enjoy printmaking and creating with my two hands rather than building virtual pixels. I was told I have ‘salty hands’ at a very young age, which means that I’m not very good or gentle with my hands, so I think I’ve been trying to prove that wrong ever since.
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“... and on others, I try to find a home in maps and geography, where the land’s terrain reflects that of my heart’s.”
How do you dedicate time for yourself and your personal projects far from the routine on any other ordinary day? Time is a very tricky thing these days, I barely have any of it! Twentyfour hours a day is NOT enough, give me thirty hours at least! And maybe one more day of weekend, pretty please? I have to schedule most of the things I do, but I always leave some wiggle room for spontaneity. In other words, fun. My work tends to be very personal and it always takes some kind of emotional toll on me, so I really do have to push myself in order to work on it and not just spend hours thinking about working on it. Plus, everything starts with research, and a lot of times, I lose myself in it. Research can be endless, so you have to discipline yourself. I have to disciple myself. Discipline is key.
We all experience a need for a significant change in our lives at least once, how have you dealt with this need and how have you made this journey of shifting? Change can be scary, but I like to think that I always welcome it. Change is natural, remaining at a plateau is not.
Where and how do you find your inspiration and motivation to work and realize a personal project? Everywhere, but inspiration and motivation is not enough for me. Discipline is key.
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All photos documenting her personal project are taken by Sandra and soon will be publish as a series in print. For more info on this particular project follow @texturrestrial on Instagram. You can find more of Sandra’s work on her her Instagram page @hakovasa.
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Tell us more about this particular project, as you already told us the story behind, is there a specific concept? There is a concept. I don’t think I trust myself too much to pick up a medium and just experiment. It’s terrifying and my mind has never been calm enough to just do things for the sake of doing, even if it starts that way. I always come up with a concept, a reason behind why, what and how. It’s both a gift and a curse, but I did say I enjoyed patterns. It’s my way of connecting with my environment.
Do you usually start with a plan or do you prefer being spontaneous? Hmm..does it make sense to say that I like planning my spontaneity? I don’t think I am a big fan of having every minute of my day planned, but I like moving in a direction or a goal in mind, it helps me vaguely map out my movement through the day; however, I like to remain flexible because the process feels just as important, maybe even more so than the result. Living is a narrative. It takes time. What about your inspiration, can you tell us more about the media and the process you used? Initially, my inspiration came from a game we used to play during computer lessons in middle school, that was while I lived in the [United Arab Emirates]. Our school computers had extremely limited internet access and the only thing that worked was Google, and I think it was 2005, the year that Google Earth was launched, so it was a trend to find your house on the Satellite View. A lot of my classmates were expats, so we wouldn’t just find our addresses in Al Ain, the town I lived in, but we would also look for our home countries and our hometowns. We would look for our homes. I am still looking for my home. It started out with a walk along the Street View of the neighborhood I grew up in, the desert that neighbored us, the sea I had swam in for years. Then I moved onto neighboring countries. My parents told me that if I were to travel between the UAE and the Czech Republic while still stopping at Syria, it would take me a week on land. I made this journey in a few hours instead, stopping at natural landmarks, oases, forts, etc.. I stopped at my houses and my family’s houses, but I’m still looking for my home.
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What have you received from this as a personal experience, and how do you feel after this experimentation? Lost, but not afraid. I still feel displaced, but there is something so beautiful about it, that I don’t mind. There’s a lot more out there and on [Google] Earth for me to explore. I can go anywhere, you know? I’m not grounded, not unless I choose to be. I feel lighter and at the same time, connected to the world around me. How do you deal with satisfaction and when you feel disappointment from the final outcome? This project has been about healing and understanding, so while I can’t say I’ve reached a final outcome, it has been a grounding experience, and in a sense, I have found satisfaction in that. With disappointment, it’s a bit different, but I know to look at my mistakes, to learn from them and to try harder next time. What is more important to you, is it the details or the whole picture? I want to say the whole picture, but what happened in this project is that I focused on the details. Always zooming in. Always. How do you like to go out of the box, go over the rationality and do something irrational, something visibly without practicality but with more spiritual meaning for you? I don’t think I’ve ever been in a box. I don’t exactly fit the mold. I usually just do. There’s no bigger meaning behind anything unless I want it to have one. It just does.
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FOOD 39
Food As an Inspiration Sometimes it can be a struggle to find inspiration that comes from anything in order to create something artistic while doing daily chores. Not only can it be difficult to find something that inspires you, but also it can be difficult to muster the desire to be inspired. But inspiration can hit at any moment and without warning. There are moments when the beloved muse needs to be coaxed out and there are no proper tools to bring inspiration, as it can be found anywhere. So the next time that you want to create something but do not know exactly what, pick up a few raw fresh fruits or vegetables and let them lead you
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“ The common boring trip by tram in the city can be very
inspirational. Because it is not on what you look, it is how you are looking.�
BODY 47
Helena JakoubÄ› - My body feels you Self-exploration with Art Experimentation Helena is a graphic designer, a teacher and an artist, she is a supporter, an initiator and a creator, a pole dancer, a strong body lover, and you are blessed if she is your friend. She is always full of ideas and will infect you with her enthusiasm. She may seem reserved but she will surprise you with how brave she is to show her vulnerability, to talk about life and emotions and how they reflect in her self-exploration process. Helena loves strong concepts in design but also she has a very strong concept of her life and how to follow her dreams.
How does the ordinary day starts for you? Is there something that can make your ordinary day extraordinary? It starts with a thought, or a feeling. Sometimes, the character of this thought or feeling already makes my day extraordinary. As a designer I love to look at the world around with all of its small details, shapes, beauty, ugliness, lights and shadows, etc.. I actually find great inspiration in these things that I can transform into energy that I use for forming new thoughts and projects, or simply for feeling good.
What is your favorite time in an ordinary day? Usually morning. It is the start of a new day, new opportunities, new challenges, new inspirations all covered with old well-known routines that together create an interesting to observe symbiosis.
context. Sometimes it can be wild organic forms in architecture, sometimes it can be a simple triangle that someone drew on the road by chalk, or even it can be a combination of shapes assembled into patterns. It depends on the environment where the shapes appear, relevance, as well as my current mood I guess.
Do you have a favorite shape or one that you prefer at least, and what part of your body do you love the most? I work with shapes on daily basis, they are one of the basic graphic design elements. Every shape has it’s own characteristic and can carry specific meaning. So it is rather difficult for me to define a favourite shape without any
The most beloved part of my body is the top of my hands. I love the thick veins which I always admired on my mum’s hands when I was a kid and wished so much to have them too when I grow up.
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Have you ever experienced the feeling of not knowing who you are and what your purpose is? How do you deal with it? I have had this feeling couple of times in my life, including big doubts about the purpose of being here. So far, I think I already know who I am, and I don’t have concerns about the purpose that much anymore. You know, professionally I have changed my career path completely several times, and I still feel I am not at the end. And this may be the purpose. Searching, changing, finding new challenges, trying and learning new things, listening to yourself, constantly moving foreward. Because when you get stuck at one point then you may feel unhappy and you start to doubt. Can you tell us more about your interests and hobbies, what are the things you love to do in solitude? One photographer told me once that God created man to his image. But what does it mean if we don’t know what God looks like? Because it is not the word ‘image’ that is important here. It is the
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word ‘created’. God created man to his image - to make the man creative. And the photographer also told me when he creates he feels something special. — I can’t agree more that creativity has magic powers. Whenever I do something creative I am losing attention of time passing and internally I know this is the right thing to do. It can be drawing, observing the world around, photographing, thinking, planning new project, writing, reading, visiting art gallery, watching films, talking to other creative people. Sometimes an interest can grow into an obsession — like for example in 2015, I decided to one pattern per day on my Instagram under #HJpatterns. I was not only interested in visual repetition but also in other environments where repetitive actions formed for example behavioral or social patterns. I find it difficult or almost impossible to separate my job from my passion and interests which I consider as life winning situation.
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How do you dedicate time for yourself and your personal projects away from the routine in any other ordinary day? When I am very busy and I can’t find time for my personal projects that I really want to do and dedicate my time to, the best way for me is to set couple of fixed hours in a calendar regularly every week only for that exact project or activity. This way it becomes part of my routine in an ordinary day. In general I am trying to split my time
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between work and personal projects equally. Even though I love my job, it is work I mostly do for someone else not for myself. I believe the older we get the less we should work and be overworked and super busy as the contemporary trend dictates. Honestly so far I am not very successful with applying this philosophy into my every day life but I am absolutely not giving up!
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Where and how do you find your inspiration and motivation to work and realize a personal project? It depends on the personal project’s characteristic. If it relates to graphic design the motivation comes from conceptual thinking, planning, organising. If about art, it is more about current mood and feelings. For me these are two very different things. For graphic design related projects I can find inspiration anywhere, as I’ve mentioned earlier mainly from observing the world around me. Looking at things from different angles, perspectives, finding beauty in ugliness and vice versa. The common boring trip by tram in the city can be very inspirational. Because it is not what you look at, it is how you are looking. The inspiration also comes from reading, thinking, being in various
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environments… and combining all these impulses into an idea or concept. And as for the art, the motivation to create something comes from inside. There is a certain urge, a feeling that says, now you need to do this. So I go and do it. I can’t really explain very well how this is happening. I never plan any of my art experimentations up front. There is usually a rough thought at the beginning which evolves into this urge but it is rather built on the mood and / or things that bother me at certain moment that I need to express to the outer world. I never think of tools or materials I will use for my experimentation. I just grab something and let it happen.
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A Conversation on Art Experimentation Photos: Helena Jakoubě
Tell us more about this particular project. What’s the story behind it, is there a specific concept you explore in it? The art related project featured here is called My body feels you, and there was no specific pre-elaborated concept behind it. The feelings I had were going around contrast between dirtiness and beauty of a body; roughness versus softness; being exposed versus being hidden. I thought of imprints on my body, how does it feel to be stamped by your own thoughts and feelings? I took my internal feelings and put them out onto my body. The results are however abstract because I didn’t want to work with specific words or to literally name
what I felt or sensed at that moment. In such case it would become more of a conceptual thinking for me and would lost the beauty of spontaneous experimentation. I worked with unintention, placing ink and flour randomly on my body and observing what was happening through photographing details or bigger body parts. I played with various compositions, loved to zoom out and in into such details that it is hard to recognise what we are actually looking at. During the process I didn’t think of what I will do next, it all went naturally.
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What have you received from this as a personal experience, how you feel after the experimentation? I felt good even though I worked with quite heavy topics, almost as if it would have a therapeutic effect. I felt tired. I felt relief and better acceptance of myself at that moment. I liked that this art creation had kind of performance character. Except for the photographs taken during the process there is no physical outcome. This is something that attracts me a lot and that I would like to work more with in the future.
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“ The satisfaction came mainly from how I dealt with the feelings and how I was able to transform them into momentary physical activity.�
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How do you deal with satisfaction and when you feel disappointment from the final outcome? This is an interesting question because there was no physical outcome of this art creation. Since in the project I worked with my body I did care about how the photos look like and took only those shots that I simply liked for some reason. But it was honestly not the main engine of this experiment, to make the final result look good. The satisfaction came mainly from how I dealt with the feelings and how I was able to transform them into momentary physical activity. It was about the process and the action, not about the result. This is something I face during most of my art experiments. What is more important to you, is it the details or the whole picture? Both. It depends on context of course, but I like to observe both parts. The interpretation could work on more levels than only on visual part. For example there are many details on my
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mind which during my art creation I transform into something that forms the whole picture. The featured project is a good example of it. How do you like to go out of the box, go over the rationality and do something irrational, something visibly without practicality but with more spiritual meaning for you? By being myself, by living my life.
To see more from Helena and her personal experimentations, you can check her Instagram @helenajakoube
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the beauty of
being your true self and
living your purpose
“ Then I got curious, what does it mean?”
STUDIO 67
Jessica Serran a talk On an ordinary day, Jessica Serran invites us (me) to visit her studio for a spontaneous heart to heart about her and her work. It’s intuitive, it’s emotional, and it is improvised; it perfectly reflects Jessica and the essence of her art. The interview starts with a reiteration of her everyday morning: coffee, a morning workout and then painting. She explains how the process usually starts with a touch of hesitance, but once she’s got a paintbrush in hand, ”it’s like coming home.” Anyone who’s gotten the opportunity to meet Jessica knows that she is an experienced artist, an educator in her field and an art coach. She has founded the Becoming Artist Movement, and she is a regular participant in public talks, lectures, and both group and solo exhibitions. She has also contributed to many publications, and you can find out more on her work on her website jessicaserran.com
Our talk begins on a high note where Jessica tells me about her favorite moments of an ordinary day. Her first choice is painting, and she stresses how she tries to paint everyday. It’s expressive and it allows her to feel. She thinks back to her past and explains that she comes from a family of farmers and factory workers, practical people with no artistic background, so she has struggled with making art and creating, especially in the face of her loud inner critic, much like a lot of artists as well as other people. To battle this, she says she created a system for herself, and eventually, through collaborative projects, she found out that she isn’t the only one. “I had started developing online courses for artists, and then, I developed the Becoming Artist program, and it occurred to me that it was the right thing to name it. Then I was doing that and putting together a new website and just working away and all of a sudden it was like, ‘Oh! I think this is a movement!’ It was like recognizing what the thing wanted to be, and it felt like it was a movement, so I named it that. Then I got curious, what does it mean?”
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“
It was like recognizing what the thing wanted to be, and it felt like it was a movement, so I named it that. Then I got curious, what does it mean?�
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Jessica then goes on to explain the process she went through to understand her movement and why it was meant to be one. I asked if the courses she’s constructed are for people becoming artists. I relay my question by bringing up a need that people have, one that is not so easily defined. Jessica answers that it’s a process of coming to understand yourself and defining the process. She says that she likes to put a name to things and develop strategies that help us to keep creating work. Because she’s always been interested in education, she wanted to share what worked for her. Thus, she created a platform that allows artists to consistently create using her roadmap of developmental stages. Thus, the Becoming Artist Movement was founded.
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“ Let’s make a project out of this.”
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The conversation digresses but we quickly reel it back in, and Jessica is telling me about her favourite moment of an ordinary day again. This time, it’s the moments she gets to spend with her partner “talking, being silly, y’know? Cooking. That togetherness.” She loves that the most. It’s about the little bits of happiness, the small rituals, and I agree. Then I ask her how she gets rid of bad emotions, and her answer stuns me. Jessica says that she purposely tries “to feel it, like, actually feel it without creating a story around it.” The best thing to do is “to lay down, feel my heart, and drop the resistance.” She also cries, a lot, but then she turns it into inspiration. When we talk about inspiration, Jessica says she never starts work from inspiration alon. Her first step is to work, to just do something, and then she finds a wellspring to use as she takes the next steps. Another part of it is curiosity – curiosity about her own experiences and about her feelings. I share my own experience with this curiosity with her and she asks me what I do to deal with my own negative emotions. The conversation ping-pongs between small confessions of anger, vulnerability and sadness, and we both agree that in order to move forward, you can’t supress things, or else they build up and infiltrate the body.
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Jessica’s face lights up and she is reminded of a film she watched on the plane, “it’s called Call Me By Your Name. Have you seen it?” And I have. We both agree it’s beautiful before she mentions a specific scene where the father of the main character urges his son to allow himself to feel the full extent of his emotions. It’s a vulnerable scene, one of understanding and emotional bonding. It stresses the idea of putting the emotions you are going through into real words without fear of judgement or prejudice.
men and women allow themselves to experience emotions. Jessica tells me she practices a special kind of yoga called Kundalini led by Guru Jagat where the focus remains on awakening the energy through regular practice of meditation, mantra chanting and yoga. It is mostly known as the yoga of awareness, and practitioners stand by the fact that it aims to cultivate the creative spiritual potential of a human, to uphold values, speak the truth, and focus on the compassion and consciousness needed to serve and heal others.
Part of her work has always been to create a safe space, a space where people can experience things, whether it is an exhibition or a matter of life without judgement. It’s a part of mindfulness I add and we both agree that it’s essential to enjoy something without any restriction, to feel things freely, to make connections.
Jessica tells me a little bit more about Kundalini and she mentions how it incorporates the idea of women being fourteen times more of everything, so “fourteen time more sensitive, fourteen times smarter,” and so on. She points out that maybe women have this increased capacity to experience emotions while men maybe aren’t even give the opportunity or permission to feel both.
Our conversation quickly turns to the difference between the ways
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It sparks an interesting conversation between us about what it means to feel emotions and to express them. I share some instances in my life where I opted for sharing my feelings with a female friend over a male friend simply because I wanted to express things and feel their full weight rather than find a solution to the situation. In return, Jessica explains her own outlook on emotions and how she allows herself to experience them. She tells me she feels both masculine and feminine in a way where she is constantly dancing between the two, experiencing emotions just for the sake of experiencing them and using them to drive herself towards a goal. This statement leaves me with much to think about and consider,
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and I am grateful for the opportunity to not only get to know Jessica a little more but to also be vulnerable and open. Jessica is currently creating the 2nd International Becoming Artist Exhibition. Learn more at: www. becomingartist.com
text: Sandra Abdulhakova art: Jessica Serran interview and photos: Iva Borisova
GEOMETRY 79
Geometry is everywhere around us; shapes fill our everyday lives. They can be simple, clean and obvious, or a combination of intersecting objects. They can be sharp or more organic which is typical for the shapes present in nature. By observing this interaction, we can learn more about the world around us.
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Through photography, we can depict the urban geometry, the geometry around and create different stories. Through observing our environment and city geometry we can manipulate the image and the story we want to create using light, colours and reflections. Geometry is the science of shapes. Square, triangles, lines, and circles are all geometrical elements that we can use in photography. We can use hard edges and geometrical shapes to create bold imagery or more subtle “soft edged” geometry to define or aid a composition. Geometric shapes have been used in all types of art throughout the centuries and photography is no exception. The human mind perceives squares and rectangles to suggest conformity. Circles suggest completeness, triangles represent tension and lines represent movement. Geometry and symmetry do not have to be confined to the physical. Light and the lack of it can also contain geometrical shapes and can display symmetry. Symmetry is created when either the top, the bottom, the left, the right or the diagonals are mirrored images of each other. Symmetry by its very definition requires you to think outside of the “rule of thirds”. Although symmetry occurs in nature, it is much more visible in the manmade world.
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Light plays a very important factor in great geometrical compositions. Hard-edged geometrical shapes are best defined by the light falling on them and the shadows this light creates. We can easily observe urban geometry, the lines and shapes from our city environment, the colors and how they correspond to and interact with each other. The mixture of urban geometry and human figures along with their shadows create and tell us different stories with many interpretations.
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The other type of geometry is soft geometry. This often occurs in natural environments and is where we use loosely define shapes such as triangles or circles as compositional elements. Soft geometry can be hard to find at first. The reason for this is that our minds are hard-wired to look for hard, well-defined shapes. However, if you start to look carefully at scenes, you will soon start to see soft geometry.
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“ It was like running to the edge of a cliff and jumping. I just did what I needed to do, holding my breath and hoping for the best.�
CONFESSION 95
Jana Krchová - The Wishing Tree how she makes ordinary day extraordinary Meeting Jana is an adventure in itself. She studied Finance and Psychology. She’s had a successful career as an HR specialist; she’s a mother, a talented graphic designer, and she makes the most delicious pancakes. Jana will make you laugh so hard you will cry. She is strong and very optimistic; she is unpredictable and honest. She is intuitive and authentic, and she will for sure make your ordinary day extraordinary.
How does the ordinary day start for you? Is there something that can make your ordinary day extraordinary? It starts with an alarm clock in the dark. If there can be no alarm clock or no darkness, it is already extraordinary. What can make my day super nice is a very very very slow, delicious, warm breakfast. Saturday mornings are my absolute favorite time of a week.
What is your favorite time in an ordinary day? Early mornings in the summer when the rest of my family is still asleep and then the hour around 5 or 6 when dusk sets in but you know you still have an hour of light. Especially in the spring when the blackbirds start singing. Do you have a favorite shape or one that you prefer one at the least, and what part of your body do you love the most? As for shapes: a circle. By far. And I know it is not a shape, but I do appreciate a clean line. As for my body: I honestly never thought about that so thank you for asking‌I had to think for a while. I have learned to be in ease with my scars. It took me some time but now the lines that meant pain don’t make me feel as wounded as they used to. Now that I think about it I realize that I tend to hide the parts of my body I love most. A dear friend of my assigned herself a task of stopping me wearing all my oversized sweaters. A publishable answer would be probably: collar bone. A line. It made it to a poem once and we have an uncomplicated relationship.
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Have you ever experienced the feeling of not knowing who you are and what your purpose is? How do you deal with that? No, but I did experience a time when I realized I have forgotten about who I am and have taken a path that led me too far away from myself. I was living someone else’s expectations for far too long. Making that realization was painful but powerful at the same time. Can you tell us more about your interests and hobbies, what are the things you love to do in solitude? I love the forest and open air. I prefer to walk alone. No matter what time of the year or weather conditions it is like going back to the source for myself. If I can climb a hill and its windy, even better. How you dedicate time for yourself and your personal projects far from the routine in any other ordinary day? That’s really tough. I am still trying to work that out. I need to be alone for quite a long time and have no appointments or errands or deadlines in a day to enter the mental space, or flow to start working on art. And that seems almost impossible.
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“ I realized we as a society have lost the emo-
tional safety net for hard times which used to be family, community, church. We are all very modern but when it comes to hard times in life, we search for avenues to share and confess our deepest worries and highest hopes. “
We all experience a need for a significant change in our lives at least once, how have you dealt with this need and how have you made this journey of shifting? It was like running to the edge of a cliff and jumping. I just did what I needed to do, holding my breath and hoping for the best. Listening to my gut feeling has allowed for so much wonderful things entering my life. I opened the door and all started developing on its own. Sometimes it didn’t too, but I am a fatalist, I believe some things are not meant to be. We tend to believe there are only 2 options to choose from, but the reality is that there are always many more. We just need to open our minds to see them. Where and how do you find your inspiration and motivation to work and realize a personal project? Inspiration comes at unexpected times and places. I suspect there is this inspiration scanner in the back of my head running all the time but it is like watching animals in the forest – I need to be calm and present in my mind to have access to it. Usually when I am too busy with the daily run run run it seems to shy away. For a rigid non-planner like me scheduling time to work on personal things seemed super weird but I am slowly learning to do so. I need to create the space and time, give it relevance, make it into an event so it does not get eaten up by other things that seem more urgent at the time.
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... everything from “I wish I knew my calling” to “I wish for a husband and 2 children”
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Can you tell us the story behind your Wishing tree? This particular project was a part of the Behaviour class in the Graphic Design HND program at Prague College. The task was to interfere or intervene with a public environment through action that changes people’s behaviour. My close circle of friends were all going through some hard times, and I realized we as a society have lost the emotional safety net for hard times which used to be family, community, church. We are all very modern, but when it comes to hard times in life, we search for avenues to share and confess our deepest worries and highest hopes. I did research on how this was done in this geographic area long before confession was institutionalized. That is when I learnt about the Celtic wishing trees. They [would choose] a tree that was usually at a water source and hung pieces of cloth on them. The idea sparked with me — what if I would choose a tree and literally “label” it. Would people follow? Would they confess and share? And what about trust?
on the branches and waited. I would go to the tree almost every day and watch people from the bridge. It was like having a plantation combined with safari. I realized I need to “feed” the movement — soon people ran out of papers, the pen got lost… The usual situation was that people would come, read the sign and then would go through all the “wishes” that were already up. When they realized others were being sincere, they would take the courage and write and hang their own.
If it was just me, I would probably stop at this phase, but since it was a school project, I was pushed to actually try it in real life. Going out in public and mess with the environment was for a borderline extrovert like me not as easy as it seems. But I did it — I chose a beautiful tree right at the river bank, came up with a sign, cut some paper, attached strings and wrote down a very personal wish myself. Together with “wishes” from a couple of other students, I hung them
The most surprising thing for me was how much people fell free to express their longings — everything from “I wish I knew my calling” to “I wish for a husband and 2 children”. Of course there were material wishes too — for Playstation, promotion at work and the sorts, but I didn’t find a single one where people would joke or be vulgar.
When I left Prague for Xmas, there were probably something around 30 wishes which I thought was great. But then it happened — probably somewhere around New Years — when I came back in January, the tree was swamped. People really wanted to take part — there were restaurant bills, napkins, rum bottles… you name it. Some were written with pens, some with pencil, quite a few with lipstick. When strolling under the tree, the energy people projected into those small objects was almost palpable.
My tutor told me to collect them all, but I refused. In my mind it would be over the border of manipulation. I left them there, where people believed for a moment in the power of thought or maybe even that magic can happen and let them dissolve slowly in the snow. What have you received from this as a personal experience, and how you feel after this experimentation? I felt empowered, the outcome made me believe in the good in people. And also, no matter how cliché that might sound – if you are honest about what you do, the audience can somehow sense it. How you deal with satisfaction and when you feel disappointment from the final outcome? Disappointment comes when I take an easy route – cheat with not enough research and experimentation. Then I need to go back to the beginning. However in real life, there is not always time – so let me just say there are some projects I am prouder of a bit more than others. It has also taught me about choosing clients and people I work with carefully.
Always the big picture – spending time and mental space on details does not come naturally to me. The most successful projects I finished were always with a lecturer or colleague who a complementary personality traits / skill set and who pushed me to pay attention to details from the start. I suffer, I find it annoying but in the end I am grateful, because the elements fall in place like a puzzle. How do you like to go out of the box, go over the rationality and do something irrational, something visibly without practicality but with more spiritual meaning for you? I wish I could / know how to do that more… You can find more work from Jana on her Instagram @janakrchova and @neinei_dsgn
What is more important to you, is it the details or the whole picture?
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LIVING IN MINDFULNESS Mindfulness is a state of active, open attention on the present. When you’re mindful, you carefully observe your thoughts and feelings without judging them as good or bad. Instead of letting your life pass you by, mindfulness means living in the moment and awakening to your current experience, rather than dwelling on the past or anticipating the future. In our rapidly changing world, we value speed and efficiency. However, there is something to be gained by being slow if slow can make you more present, more mindful, and more aware of other people’s perspectives. One very powerful way to free yourself from physical or mental stress or just to slow down and empty your mind is by giving yourself this feeling of emptiness, stillness, peace. The best way to do that is to get closer to nature without a doubt we all know we are part of it. You just need to look, breathe and be present, enjoying the beauty of the moment.
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In Mindfulness: Living Through Challenges and Enriching Your Life In This Moment, Richard Sears writes, “mindfulness, the ability to pay attention in the present moment, is a natural human process that we are born with, but tends to diminish as we grow older and get caught up in the world of thoughts. While thinking is important, when our lives are spent anticipating the future, or living in the past, we miss the richness of the moment we are in now. Fostering mindfulness allows us to more consciously participate in our lives, breaking us out of the mindless routines we often fall into automatically�.
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... meet Iva My ordinary day living in mindfulness — usually starts with the alarm around 6 am … and coffee. I need my first coffee to be awaken and then to make one “slow” healthy breakfast for me and my family. This is what really matters for me. So I am not saying I am living in mindfulness, but I try. My favourite time in an ordinary day — the time I spend in solitude, no matter if this is just walking alone with my thoughts, or making something with my hands. These two activities help me to come back to my inner self, to talk to myself and to find my balance dealing with the emotions I am experiencing. My favorite shape and the part of my body I love the most — I love shapes, I am even obsessed with observing shapes and finding them in the world around me but maybe, my favorite shape is a triangle. To me, it looks like we have many directions — at lest three different ones, and we have the freedom to choose. About my favourite body part, though...I am in love with my collarbone. For me, this is one of the most feminine parts of a woman’s body. There is so much beauty, finesse and I even find it seductive … Did I ever experience the feeling of not knowing who I am and what my purpose is — I am kind of a person who always knew what I want from my life but yes, I got lost, but it was just because I forgot who I am, what was important to me, what I really value. I forgot how to be happy, to live in the present and to enjoy my everyday life. To dream and to pursue my dreams. Crucial was to define how and why it happened and then the answers helped me change the direction, and gave me the courage to make radical changes, to jump in the deep without lifebelt and to learn how to swim again. My interests and hobbies — they became my work and my everyday life. I do love photography and observing people. I love telling a stories trough capturing moments. I love making illustrations, paint textures, collecting old stuff, such as furniture, newspapers, photos etc. and giving them a new life and purpose. This is how the ORDINARY magazine project came to the world as well. It is one very personal project and it united my hobbies and my new profession together.
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How do I dedicate time for myself and my personal projects — I steal time for myself. I educated myself on how to put myself in the first place sometimes, and this was the most laborious work. I figured out that “me time” is a necessity! Where do I find my inspiration and motivation to work on a personal project — the inspiration is all around us. We just need to give it a chance. We need to get slower for a wile, to start breathing consciously and to observe ourselves, our experiences, our environment, noticing, and then the flow of inspiration just comes. With the personal project — for me, it is all about finding time and then to discipline, and turn it to routine. Motivation, I have, but sometimes it is not enough. I need passion, and when I have passion about something, I have my engine and it’s easy to be persistent in what I am doing. Do I have a plan or do I work spontaniously — I am a very spontaneous person by nature and this is not a secret for people who know me. Therefore, my ideas come spontaneously. In my process, I do make conscious decisions and I even overthink very often. So there is a kind of a plan when I already start with certain project. What do I receive from my experimentations as a personal experience and how do I feel after — sometimes, I feel like I got rid of something heavy that I was carrying, sometimes, I feel confused, but in most cases, I feel pleasure even if I don’t like my final outcome. In personal experimentation, the crucial things is to not stress yourself with thinking about the outcome and to just enjoy the experience itself. This is what I am doing when I experiment with paint and abstractions for example. I am expressing myself in colours, textures, forms. How I deal with satisfaction — satisfaction is coming with appreciation, with understanding that not the outcome is the significant but the process and the experience. What is more important to me, the details or the whole picture — very often I am stuck on details and I can’t really see the whole picture. I need to keep distance for a while to be able to see the overall picture. How do I like to go out of the box, go over the rationality — This was hell for me … it took me years to start getting out of the box but it’s still not what I wish it could be. But I keep working! At least, I learned how to do things which make sense for me but don’t have practicality.
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You can read more about topics in first ORDINARY issue at: Wabi-sabi in the book ‘Wabi-sabi for Artists, Designers, Poets & Philosophers’ by Leonard Koren The book ‘Six Names of Beauty ’ by Crispin Sartwell Mindfulness - ‘Mindfulness: Living Through Challenges and Enriching Your Life In This Moment’ by Richard W. Sears www.zenhabits.net www.mindful.org
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Next issue: The main topic will be transformation. We will be telling stories about different ways of transformation. From human transformation and how this influences our perception, to the transformation of our environment and how it shapes us, mental and physical transformations, and of course, the transformation of old objects and giving them new life and purpose. Addiotionally, we will touch upon food, shapes and lights, and speed in terms of how manipulate them and transform them.
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Art direction and Production | Iva borisova Graphic design, editing | Iva Borisova Photography | Iva Borisova Interviews | Iva Borisova
CONTRIBUTORS Sandra Abdulhachova | editing and proofreading / project experimentation and photos Helena Jakoubฤ | project experimentation and photos Jana Krchovรก | project experimentation and photos
T YPEFACES Soleil Regular - ORDINARY (logo) Acre Medium Acumin Pro Regular AganĂŠ Bold Basker ville SemiBold Italic PAPER Savana Matt Blanco 135g/m2 Savana Matt Blanco 200g/m2 PRINT Sprinter studio CONTACT iva.s.borisova@gmail.com SOCIAL MEDIA facebook .com/ordinar ymag/ instagram.com/ordinar y_mag/