Think Big Think Small
As an artist, I usually think B•I•G.
If my sex-trafficking exhibit requires a forty-foot storage container, I figured out how to rent one or borrow one.
If my mental health exhibit requires 5,000 golf pencils, so that 70,000 people can write notes, I figure out how to buy 5,000 pencils (for only $200!).
But while thinking B•I•G, every once in a while I’m surprised with a new challenge. Like during this past year’s work when I didn’t supply any pens at my Broken Wings exhibit. My artistic goal was to simplify and encourage visitors to attach a wristband to the mesh walls, without any writing, as a commitment to start a Butterfly Effect of kindness.
But visitors’ desire to write messages on the wristbands couldn’t be altered; they were determined. So, at the last minute, I had to scramble to come up with pens. Thankfully, one of my volunteers kindly brought a box of 50 used pens. After a decade of experience with large crowds at my interactive exhibits, I was pretty sure that 50 pens would only last two or three days.
Amazingly, however, the pens lasted nineteen days—the duration of ArtPrize—and 65,000 individuals happily wrote kindness messages with only 50 used pens. Somehow, we even had leftover pens at the conclusion of ArtPrize.
In conclusion, this grateful artist learned that to think B•I•G sometimes requires one to think S•M•A•L•L.
