On Series

In creative activities, working in series is more productive than conducting experiments. Ultimately, whatever usable results are derived from experiments get incorporated into existing series.

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Culture is a progressive series of appropriations.

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There are two basic ways to add cohesion to creativity: 1) create the work, then serialize; and, 2) create similar pieces in an existing series. This also works in music where you can compose first, then add to a collection (album) or define the framework for the album and fill it in accordingly.

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All creative people should keep lists (and work in series). If creative work is in the flow of your life, why not begin the serial process and follow it through? A natural branching occurs the longer you do it. But the objective is not only to gather and glean, but to also cultivate and prune the list, and give it power to be generative.

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If a piece doesn't fit in a series, put it in another one until it does. Styles have the flexibility to be co-adaptive, e.g. photographing unfinished paintings as a series.

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If you are an 'idea person', ideas are in the flow of your life, and you need to learn how to deal with that as a force pushing against you. Every new idea pushes all the other ones away, or sometimes obscures them. The first thing you need to do is tether it to something else: a series, collection, category etc. such that it doesn't disappear. Ideally, an idea should take on some type of shape within a short period of time.

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The album format in music is still useful in terms of providing a focus for the activity. Series work the same way in visual art.