Sometimes I buy an old book from a thrift store or junk shop simply for one image inside. In this case, this image is from a 1927 book called, Brock’s Book on Birds, which seems to be one of those advertising in book form that was fairly common in the 1920–30s especially.
This very unique etching is in the chapter “Washing Canaries”. I loved the oddity of the rather awkwardly posed hand and the softly dismayed canary. It’s the sort of image that makes me want to make something without having any idea what.
That happens to me where I see something and a bunch of things tilt in a direction to pull my attention towards an initial curiosity that branches and takes me somewhere very different.
I’m not going to suddenly make art that connects in any recognizable way to having a suitably clean canary but these points of attention are still mental landmarks for me along a creative path.