The Thing About Tools

on what the real secret to our best work might be

I have this thing about tools. Not the hardware store kind, but the kind I use to work on my creative projects: art supplies, knitting supplies, a myriad of paper samples, fountain pens, notebooks, those kinds of things. I love them. I might even say I collect them (hoard feels too brassy a word for such a pleasurable pastime), and I am starting to wonder why, when most of them they just sit there, unused.

If you’re a quilter you might collect fabric. A gardener may have a bunch of heirloom seeds carefully catalogued. A chef might stock a pantry full of exotic spices and unique pasta shapes, fifteen different types of sauté pans, a collection of unique knives. I’m sure I’m not the only person with this problem, but I’m starting to notice that 95% of my “tools” go unused. Or maybe it’s that I’ve explored and toiled at it enough that I’m finally learning what works for me and I’ve whittled it down to the daily dependables.

I actually spend time reading blogs about pens, about what nib works best with what ink, about the subtle differences between the hardness of graphite leads. I scour the websites of artists I admire, hoping that they’ll reveal the magic brush they use, what colours they choose for their palettes. I continue to spend abnormal amounts of time researching the palettes of the artists from the past. Sometimes I even buy these things. I try them out, you know, little experiments. But what happens when I finally sit down to my own work? I grab the same old things I’ve been using forever. The new stuff barely gets used and all of the magic it contained in the hands of the other guy remains in the hands of the other guy. My own work continues to puddle along in its own way, regardless of what tools lie at my fingertips’ ready.

My favourite art mediums are, without a doubt, graphite and black ink. In other words, the plain old pencil and the ancient sooty black called sumi. These are not easy mediums to master, believe it or not, especially if your inspiration comes from the masters of both, like Andrew Wyeth with his pencil, and Rembrandt and Sesshū Tōyō with their ink pots. I’ve got a long way to go even at my more advanced skill level after my ten thousand hours (at least) of practice. There are so many artists who use these mediums with skill that I can’t even imagine possessing. I read about them. I study their work—and I find out what pencils, brushes and inks they use. If I had that pencil maybe it would be the missing ingredient.  Ha ha. If only.

There are entire websites devoted to this, friends. They belong to the people, my people, searching for the perfect pencil, the most saturated and lively black ink, the most danciest dancing of brushes.  But what is a pencil? What is sumi? What could possibly make one better than another? Well, there is certainly a difference in quality to be found, but none of that matters a damn bit unless the person using it has the skill to make even the cheapest No. 2 scratched on a piece of copy paper look like they used it and meant it. A pencil is a pencil is a pencil. It’s not the sword being wielded, it’s the knight wielding it.

And what about paint colours? Have you ever looked at an art supply catalogue, at the infinite kaleidoscope of watercolour paints there are to choose from? How can a colour-frenzied girl even begin to try to select a few? If you take to me an art supply store you may as well leave me there (with your wallet) while you get your oil changed, meet the cable guy back at your house, grocery shop and take a five mile hike. Don’t worry, I’ll still be there, standing slack-jawed in front of the watercolours trying to decide which grey looks more like a November sky after brief rain. Anyone who knows anything about colour theory can tell you that it only takes three colours to make a million colours. Three. I know this, and yet I continue to gather the rainbow, trying them out and often ending up with something resembling the silty mud leftover from the salted snow piles of winter. But hey, we need those colours, too, don’t we? We do. Indeed.

I think I have an art-supply disease. Maybe a syndrome. I’m not sure. Maybe you have one, too?

I do work at things in a very disciplined manner, I don’t give up, and have my own way about it, and that includes experimenting with the unfamiliar or new and sometimes stumbling upon the ticket that just might work. An important part of that is studying the work of others that I admire, but knowing what kind of pencil they use is not going to make one bit of difference.You have to put the time in. You have to be able to deeply know what to do with the bare bones before you know what to do with a tube of Indathrone Blue from Sennelier in Paris on a piece of handmade Twinrocker paper.

There is no magic tool, my friends. 

Damn it.

Guess what the number one message I get from my followers is? Something about what supplies I was using. And I always respond with the answer, because I understand the malady.

My son and I used to attend a music camp in Tennessee when he was younger. It was hosted by Victor Wooten, a very famous bass player who makes it seem like he has eight hands whenever he plays his instrument. During this camp Vic would have his personal, expensive and very well-known 4-string ying-yang bass available for the students to play now and then. I can imagine, for a bass player, being able to play that bass must have been like an artist getting to use the brush that Michelangelo wielded to paint the Sistine Chapel. When the students did play Vic's bass, they played it with reverence, but did it magically turn them into Victor? Of course not. The most interesting thing was the time when Vic asked one of the students if he could play their bass, after the student made a comment such as, “If I had a better bass, then maybe I could.”  It was just a simple, inexpensive piece of equipment, probably worth less than two-hundred bucks, nothing special at all. Well, what we witnessed and heard was nothing short of magic. When Vic played that bass it sounded just as good as his own. And then he would play it upside down and backwards, and it may have sounded even better. There was no magic in Vic’s bass; the magic was in his well-seasoned hands, years of practice, and skilful ear. It’s not the sword folks, it’s the knight.

I suppose my problem is not unlike the basketball player trying the Air Jordans, or the cyclist spending a wad on Lance Armstrong’s pedals. And how many cooks buy into that expensive kitchen stuff that Jamie Oliver uses on his TV show? I have only used cast iron skillets for years; I bought them at Vidler’s 5 & 10 on Main Street for ten bucks, and they make a roux just as good as any fancy, French copper pan. I’m sure of it, because I know how to make a roux, because I’ve made them a thousand times. I’m a pretty good cook all around when I want to be, and you won't find much of anything as far as tools go in my kitchen. Good luck even finding a knife that slices a tomato. I know what the deal is. The deal is that there is no substitution for just getting your hands to work. Grab a pencil, any pencil and DRAW.

So, I’m thinking about getting rid of some of my clutter. Maybe having an art and knitting supply garage sale. If I think of what I use most it’s my Uni Kurutoga drafting pencil with a 2B lead (a wee bit softer than a No. 2), because it has a great eraser in the lid and lasts a zillion times longer than a regular pencil; the trusty Winsor & Newton watercolours that are always in my palette, my treasured little tins filled with the soulful, handmade, DeepDeepLight watercolour paints from my friends Agnese and Daina in Latvia, my Isabey travel brush that is falling apart it’s so old, and my little pot of dried sumi ink that is not the best sumi I have (oh boy do I have some special sumi), but it’s the most convenient and portable and always at the ready. These are my tools and I know them well; they have helped me create what I consider my very best work. Maybe if I settle in with them more often and stop searching for the pot of the gold, the rainbow right in front of me will be the real treasure, and I’ll find I’ve had everything I’ve ever needed has been in my hands all along.

Tell me about your tools. I would love to read about them.