I cleaned up my art cupboards this morning, something that’s always a reflective time. I found several lino plates and a whack of sketches that I forgot about, and I uncovered a mountain of unused lino.

A decade ago I bought a roll of flooring linoleum at a work auction. Flooring lino is a lot like art lino, except that the surface has a bit more texture, it’s a bit thinner, and it’s not mounted. But being the cheap bastard that I am, I saw the roll as a great opportunity, as practicing on the $20-a-sheet art-grade stuff is daunting. And in the end the floor-grade lino stands up better and produces similar results.

I left the roll sitting in various closets over the years, mostly unused. Art is one of those things that only works in the right state of mind, approached with a healthy amount of obsession. Getting motivated to work on art projects requires more habit than inspiration; I need everything ready before my muse is ready go, or my muse gets bored and buggers off. Leaving my linoleum in a roll in the back of a closet kept me at arm’s length from one of my passions for many years.

Just before I got married a good friend gave me a set of art-grade linoleum plates. It took me years before I was ready to use these supplies, mosly because I didn’t want to mess up the expensive material. These supplies became my motivation to use the cheap-bastard lino, though, as it was a way to prepare for the real thing. Over the years my wife added to my inventory of art stuff until I was eventually fully stocked. Even after having all of the right equipment it still took me years before I was carving regularly.

There are many reasons that I wandered away from inspiration and expression, but more interesing is that the journey back was mostly a matter of intent. Over the last few years I’ve started to make room for my art stuff, in places where I’ll actually use it. I make time for it now and consider it a way to recover from life and work. I also spend a lot of time looking for inspiration, reflecting, and relaxing. I have to do these things–all of them–or I find reasons not to bother expressing myself.

A few years ago before we moved from the island I took my roll of lino and split it all into smaller, more managable pieces. The roll, after having been stuffed in a closet for most of a decade, had warped badly and I assumed that most of it was ruined. I cut it and left the pieces in a pile in a cupboard for a few years, and their collective weight returned the lino to a usable state. Today I found that pile, and a few piles of never-warped pre-sized plates.

There are hundreds of plates worth of the stuff waiting to be carved up, and even a large piece of the art-grade stuff waiting for a special inspiration. Knowing that I won’t run out for a while is motivating, as it defeats the cheap-bastard-reasons for not starting another art project. It’s also cool to see that something I bought on a whim 10 years ago for a few bucks has been so much fun.