14: Combo Move!
You look at the lime and the coconut, you draw them both up.
Instructions
Find two seemingly unrelated things.
Look closely at them.
Imagine a combination of them.
Draw the new combination!
Image: my sad little plant and our alarm clock, Eduardo.
How the huh?
Back before a reality TV show host became the President and our brains weren’t connected to a giant mecha suit of #hottakes/#coolgifs, the absurd and unexpected was usually safely tucked away in art and comedy. Putting two unexpected things together is a great way to elicit creativity and new discovery, and to bring delight. Speaking of, let’s hear from Ross Gay, from his amazing collection of essays “The Book of Delights”:
Among the qualities of delight, I’ve found, I’m finding, in my dalliance with it (T-shirt: DALLIANCE WITH DELIGHT), is the feeling of discovery. The sense that one has found something, been shown something, perhaps materially, perhaps spiritually or psychically, that was previously unknown. Perhaps delight is like a great cosmic finger pointing at something. That’s not it. Perhaps delight is like after the great cosmic finger has pointed at something, and that something (which in all likelihood was already there, which is why I’ve enlisted a cosmic finger rather than a human one) appears. A-ha! Or, Whoa! Yes!
A Cosmic Finger, and A Real One
One of the first apps I got excited about was Brushes, which finally unleashed the power of doodling on to the iPhone with your finger or clunky stylus—even if it was on a (in retrospect) tiny screen. On my packed subway commutes (remember those?) I started making little drawings, and for a long while it was random combinations. I recently unearthed a pile in my Dropbox.
Image: Some random combinations squeezed from my brain with coffee + commute
Of course, combining things has long been a favorite trick of many artists and creators. Artist Jon Burgerman (a delightful follow on Instagram) wrote a book called “It's Great to Create: 101 Fun Creative Exercises for Everyone” and offered up a free YouTube version of his combo exercise.
The artist/writer/illustrator/VIDEO-LOOP-CHAMPION Avery Monsen created a “random character generator” spreadsheet combining items and actions and shared some good combos online.
Exquisite Corpse: My Favorite Combo Exercise
The ultimate combination drawing exercise is the surrealist game “Exquisite Corpse”. Surrealism is commonly attributed to beginning in 1917 and gaining traction beginning in 1924, pulling together absurdity and juxtaposition to capture the reverberations of the horrors of WWI, the Spanish Flu, and the unsettling pace of modernity. Sound familiar?
My wife and I even participated in a couple group art shows called Suckers & Biters (mildly NSFW website here) that had couples creating them. This image is us in the middle of wedding planning.
And Finally: Unrelated Items as a Way to Sleep Better?
A few weeks ago The Internet was achatter with a “new way” to fall asleep faster: coming up with a list of unrelated items. I’ve tried it, and it … sorta works, but not as much as getting darker curtains?
Image: Meme based on a comic by Hanna Hillam
Sidenote: the James Acaster specials on Netflix are weird and tremendous, and include a joke about going to sleep with the kicker “no more jobs!” and this has become canon in our household as we go to sleep.
So have some fun combining stuff together, and I wish you a “No More Jobs!” nightly.
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