The Art of Tinkering by Karen Wilkinson and Mike Petrich ($23.80 at Amazon)
(photos clockwise: Cover, Grace Kim's Sessile Handbag, Ken Murphy's tools used to capture the History of the Sky, Moxie's felted billiard balls and pickax, and Jie Qi's Electronic Popables.)
San Francisco's Exploratorium was a place I loved going to as a kid because it was a wondrous place where I could learn about science while touching everything in sight. Just last year, the Exploratorium moved from the Palace of Fine Arts to it's new Pier 15 location along the Embarcadero. It's now a favorite place my husband and I take our 5 year old daughter. The Tinkering Studio is a recent feature inside the Exploratorium where anyone can sit down and learn how to make something from circuit boards to finger puppets. Launching today is new book, The Art of Tinkering written by The Tinkering Studio's co-directors, Karen Wilkinson and Mike Petrich. The book showcases 150+ makers working at the intersection of art, science and technology and captures that infectious maker spirit I so deeply love. Inside you'll not only find profiles of important makers but also how you can start tinkering around and explore making things from soft circuits, wire art, puppets, mark-making machines, fused fashion and more.
Featured as one of the makers inside The Art of Tinkering is Moxie Liberman, a fiber artist who's latest art piece Control 2.0 (pictured above) finds itself integrated along with the pipes and plugs along a wall inside the Exploratorium. Moxie can make wool bend and shape itself into any 3D object with a poke of a needle, known as needle felting. Moxie and I go way, way back. We became friends during the second Maker Faire in San Mateo back in 2007 when I worked on the MAKE/CRAFT team. She's been a good friend ever since and I am constantly in awe of how her talent grows each year and how patient and caring she is while teaching others how to tinker with her craft.
Here's my Q&A with Moxie where we talk about her fiber art and what she's making these days:
How did you start your collaboration with the Exploratorium in San Francisco?
Moxie: The Exploratorium may not have known it, but we've been collaborating since I was 8 years old. I grew up in the Bay Area and some of my most vivid childhood memories are of my time spent at The Exploratorium. I used to have dreams that I lived there. Even when I became extremely ill, (in my early 20s) I would conjure memories of the red, cushiony room in the old Tactile Dome as my meditative happy-place. Anyway, cut to 2012, Karen Wilkinson had seen me at Maker Faire and invited me to participate in a talk that turned into a mini-residency. I can't describe how inspiring and supportive the Tinkering Studio crew has been ever since. (I secretly still wish I could live in there, don't tell anyone!)
What was the inspiration behind your art piece Control 2.0 and how long did it take you to complete it?
Moxie: I'm attracted to shiny garbage and complicated machines, and using wool to recreate metal and plastic is a compelling process for me. I tried to create a kind of overwhelming, confusing, familiar-unfamiliar system, or is it a testing ground for the human guinea pig? I want people to imagine that the push of a button could trigger the end of things, or candy for everyone, or nothing at all. It took me a full year to create all the components, and 4 days to install, first at the Bellevue Arts Museum and now, in a different configuration, at The Exploratorium.
How do you feel about being included in The Art of Tinkering? Are there any makers in the book that inspire you?
Moxie: The Art of Tinkering is such a beautiful book, of course I'm completely honored to be a part of it. Every single page is an inspiration. I love Grace Kim's approach to e-textiles. Asia Ward's work touches me and her advice to new tinkerers is dead-on. Ranjit Bhatnagar and Walter Kitundu do astounding things, making me see, and hear, the world around me in a new way. And of course, Tim Hunkin – I want to run away and join his circus. I could go on, and on, and on. It's a great book.
You are a tinkerer, but I know you are also a great needle felting teacher. What kinds of simple projects do you recommend for a newbie needle felted? Also how young should kids be to try this art form?
Moxie: One of the core principles of tinkering is allowing yourself to play openly, which is also my approach to teaching. The minute you try to make something specific before you know how a method works, it's easy to become shut-down with fear and expectations. I recommend not worrying about the outcome of any first project, just pick up a needle and some wool, and see what happens. Make a ball, make a blob, make a mess, just let yourself feel how the materials change in your hands, and let your intuition guide you. Having said that, learning style is also important to consider. Some people have an easier time with instructions first, and that works too. (I have some free step-by-step tutorials online and there's a link to supplies there, too.)
I've taught children as young as 5, but it depends on the situation. As long as kids under 12 have the ACTIVE supervision of an adult, and the ability to poke slowly while always watching their own hands, it works well.
Have there been any projects made by your students that just blew you away?
Moxie: I absolutely love to see student work of all kinds, I find it truly inspiring. I always get excited when students connect with me online and send me photos. One of my favorites lately was a zombified-doll, with guts and stuff. I have a Felted With Moxie Flickr group for students and people who have read my book to post photos.
What are some of the current projects you are working on? Do you also have any upcoming events at the Exploratorium?
Moxie: I keep in touch with the folks at The Exploratorium. We don't have anything on the books at the moment but they'll never be rid of me. We'll play together again, I'm sure.
Coincidentally, I'm in a tinkering period, so I have a bunch of things smoldering right now. I'm experimenting with mixing some plastic tubing with fiber, I'm doing research for a piece I want to do dealing with family history and trans-generational trauma, and I'm daydreaming about doing some larger collaborations for art in unexpected venues. It's a fun time, but hard to describe. That's the beauty of tinkering, of course. You start in one place and find yourself somewhere else entirely.
The Exploratorium asked some of their makers "hack" the book cover. Here's what Moxie did:
The Art of Tinkering - hacked from moxie on Vimeo.
The Art of Tinkering by Karen Wilkinson and Mike Petrich ($23.80 at Amazon)
