MEET KP AND MICHELLE P, AND OUR NEW ARTIST INTERVIEW QUESTIONS
Time to reveal the freaky fairies behind this little project.
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Welcome to Season Two of our SPACIES artist interviews.
In Season One, we gave 14 different creative creatures the same 29 questions to answer on process, personal style, and artistic influence. The results? Stunnin’.
Our first class of interviewees ranged from culture writers (
, ) to astrologers (, , ) to ceramicists ( ) and so many more creative people, and you loved seeing the variety of answers come in:
Truthfully, these interviews were an experiment for us, too. We weren’t quite sure what we’d find at the end of this, or even what we were looking for.
A secret formula for ultimate creativity?
Permission to follow your own artistic impulses?
Inspiration for the perfect desk set up?
As
and I worked through these answers every week, we realized we had… more questions. (Surprise surprise.) And honestly, 29 questions is already a LOT to ask people to answer. Bless the previous interviewees for their time and patience in getting these to us!We went back to the drawing board (shared Notion document) and started spitballing:
What are the follow up questions we wish we could ask? What do we keep tripping over as individuals in our own creative practice? What are we trying to learn more about with SPACIES? What’s the perfect number of questions to ask?
The nature of time and space in the creative process kept floating to the surface, begging to be plucked from the water and held up to the light for closer examination.
Season Two of our SPACIES artist interviews asks ten questions on the concept of action and inaction.
Not to toot our own horn, but 98% of the time when we send out interview questions our subject sends their answers back and says something like, “Wow, that was so illuminating for me to work through.” *toot toot*
Naturally, to test these questions we make ourselves answer them (this is v important, because sometimes we go to answer and realize the question is dumb dumb stoop, or kinda boring, or too hard to answer in text, or leads the witness a bit). KP and I haven’t properly introduced ourselves here, so we figured we’d publish our answers to the q’s as our Season Two kickoff.
I’d love to invite YOU to answer these questions for yourself. Maybe drop your favorite answer in the comments — it’s such a thrill to get to know you all here.
What’s your metaphorical Adderall — something that slingshots you into an inspired creative tornado of action?
What idea or concept are you chewing on? Has it shown up in your work yet?
How particular are you about your notebooks? Pens? What do you write in and with?
What was going through your mind when you first decided to share your work?
What’s your media diet, at present?
To be creative and to make things in 2024 is objectively difficult. You have to square off with distractions, global anarchy, and perpetual haunting of the existential question: “why bother?” What keeps you coming back to the ring?
John Cage was inspired to develop his practice of composing via random chance and chaos after reading a book about the Chinese divining practice, The I-Ching. What influences or inspiration from outside of your field or profession have made the biggest impact on your work or process?
What do you “wrong” that makes your work successful?
You’ve been working on something and it just isn’t coming through the way you’d like — do you kill your darlings and scrap the whole thing? Do you compost the idea? Do you file it away in cabinet of misfit concepts to review later?
What’s a weird superstition you subscribe to?
And while we’ve got a cute little lineup of creative interviews this season, we’d love to hear from you: Who should we feature next?
KP PILLEY
What’s your metaphorical Adderall — something that slingshots you into an inspired creative tornado of action?
A large iced coffee from Dunkin Donuts with cream and butter pecan. Compared to literal adderall, that shit gets me going. I used to live in Boston so I developed a Dunkin’ tolerance but now that I’m in Virginia, Dunkies iced coffee is basically medicinal.
What idea or concept are you chewing on? Has it shown up in your work yet?
The following story from Jemima Kirke:
She is right!! Sometimes I check myself to be like “wait I am thinking about myself too much.”
I’m also thinking a lot about mommy bloggers x mormonism x white supremacy x choice feminism. I’ll report back when I can write a full sentence on it, instead of listing ~concepts~.
How particular are you about your notebooks? Pens? What do you write in and with?
Extremely particular! I used to want to throw a notebook out if I wrote my name messily on it and luckily I’ve grown away from that level of notebook perfection, but I still care deeply about the tools I use.
In my rotation right now: Leuchtturm in A5, my planner from Reesa Bo Beesa, Pilot Precise v5 Ball pens, and Stabilo Boss highlighters.
What was going through your mind when you first decided to share your work?
Similar to how when you make a really tasty dinner, it’s even better when you have someone to share it with. My work feels better when shared. For better (making something I am truly proud of and showing a loved one) or worse (getting really into spoken word poetry in college), I love the connection that comes when allowing someone to truly see you.
What’s your media diet, at present?
I am kinda all over the place with media consumption.
TV shows: Traitors (obviously), ALIAS (I can have a little copaganda as a treat), Columbo (dear god they don’t make em like this any more)
Podcasts: Binchtopia, Twelfth House (duh), The Bald & The Beautiful, and Good Children
The last movie I saw was J.Lo’s This is Me…Now, which might be one of the top ten whackiest things I’ve seen of all time. Take a big ole edible before you get into that one.
For books, I’ve been tearing through everything I can get my hands on in the Romantasy genre. It is deeply heteronormative and not usually my cup of tea but something about it feels very reading fanfiction at 3am in 2008. We do need to a Sarah J. Maas for queer people tho.
To be creative and to make things in 2024 is objectively difficult. You have to square off with distractions, global anarchy, and perpetual haunting of the existential question: “why bother?” What keeps you coming back to the ring?
It’s almost like I cannot help myself? Like as much as I wanted to be a corporate shill or a LinkedIn Boss Babe, something in me was so revolted by the thought that I had to run in the opposite direction.
Also, if we are being completely honest, spite! The systems in play right now want you to just be a measly little worker without power. I hate that notion and I hate them.
John Cage was inspired to develop his practice of composing via random chance and chaos after reading a book about the Chinese divining practice, The I-Ching. What influences or inspiration from outside of your field or profession have made the biggest impact on your work or process?
I hate to continue with the spite thing but I realized a lot of the limitations I placed on myself came from systems of capitalism, patriarchy, and white supremacy. I very much hate those things so to realize that the pressure I was putting on myself was society’s expectations vs my own, I was set free. Productivity & being “good” is for puritans. I’m just chillin.
What do you “wrong” that makes your work successful?
My work is in social media and I fully think the internet could go away at any moment in time. Like I am emotionally prepared for them to get rid of any platform at any moment (hello TikTok hearing). If that happens, like yes it will suck but also life will go on! I think I am able to show up online in more fun and less stressful ways because of it. Posting online is not the same as open heart surgery innit.
You’ve been working on something and it just isn’t coming through the way you’d like — do you kill your darlings and scrap the whole thing? Do you compost the idea? Do you file it away in cabinet of misfit concepts to review later?
I’m a big composter! Throw it back in the noggin, let it rot, and usually it’ll come back up to the surface with a better way to bring it to life. I spent a year chewing on the idea for my business. If I had brought the 1.0 or 2.0 to life, I don’t think I would be where I am today. Instead I kept turning it over in mind until I had a sense of clarity, which made it easy to act fast.
You do have to be careful though with composting. You might think an idea to precious to share. To that I say, sometimes ya gotta tell yourself “shit or get off the pot.”
What’s a weird superstition you subscribe to?
Not weird necessarily but a long held one. Before I understood anything about astrology or the sky, my dad would always be sure to alert everyone when it was the full moon. People being assholes on the road? It’s a full moon. Have weird dreams? Full moon. Heaven forbid you have to seek medical treatment during a full moon. To this day, armed with wayyy more knowledge about the stars, I always keep an eye on Miss Moon’s phases.
Which creative archetype are you?
I am a shapeshifter!
MICHELLE PELLIZZON
What’s your metaphorical Adderall — something that slingshots you into an inspired creative tornado of action?
Anxiety. KIDDING. (No I’m not.)
Novel tactile stimuli is usually the thing that inspires me into creative action the most. Thumbing through a book and highlighting phrases I like, visiting a cloistered away secret garden in the heart of a bustling city, sauntering through downtown without a destination in mind, seeing live performances, reading a play, going to the Korean grocery store, cutting out a sewing pattern, kneading cookie dough, stumbling into a tiny no-name gallery on a walk with my son. Physicality really unlocks something for me, maybe because it gives me time to think?
I’m a very slow thinker, and my brain sort of works at the pace of reading or writing despite the fact that I love to listen to podcasts at 1.5x speed.
I also love to research and climb down internet rabbit holes (Are.na, sponsor me). It feels like my research process creates the fuel stores in my consciousness that I dip into when I’m finally ready to Kool-Aid man-style bust through the wall with inspired action.
Research is the battery pack, physicality flicks the “ON” switch.
What idea or concept are you chewing on? Has it shown up in your work yet?
I’ve probably thought about this clip 47 times a day since I first saw it in 2016, and it has absolutely made its way into my work.
Some other concepts I’m chewing on rn:
the future of dance archiving, AI, and potential for continued development of dance as a fine art if we broaden the audience base of movement arts
baking and crafting as alchemical practice and manifestation hack
tattoos as sigils
flexible research containers as the secret passageway side door to “success” in business / making money
becoming unidentifiable
mediumship as a modern art practice
How particular are you about your notebooks? Pens? What do you write in and with?
My notebook pickiness is my original neurodivergent symptom! I prefer unlined notebooks at this stage of the game, but from third grade on I could ONLY write on five-subject college lined notebooks that laid flat when open.
My favorite notebook is the unlined Midori A4, because it’s the perfect paper heft but it’s not dark if that makes sense? Like, its soul is very light. In a pinch I’ll do a soft leather cover Moleskin in A4 but it’s not my favorite because I actually find it to be a bit dark and spooky energetically. No, I will not (cannot) explain, it’s just a vibe I get.
I’m also very ~sensitive~ about my writing implements; I like writing in script (ahem, princess font) but only with certain pens. My print handwriting is fine when I use the correct implements but borderline illegible if I have to write with a too-hard pencil or a ballpoint pen. Because I like to write on a sort of cooshy surface (I like having multiple sheets of paper under whatever I’m writing on because I don’t like feeling a hardtop desk under my pen / pencil), I really like rollerball and fountain pens. When I write in pen I prefer blue ink, and if I find a blue ink pen out in the world that I enjoy I WILL steal it or take a picture to try and buy it later.
Recently I got into using a glass pen and ink because it’s more eco friendly, but it’s hard to write quickly with it so I’ve been using my favorite mechanical pencil lately quite a bit.
When I write out my calendar and schedule on my SPACIES pad, I use pencil or erasable pens because I like the flexibility of shifting dates.
Anyway, here’s the shopping list:
What was going through your mind when you first decided to share your work?
“Oh my goddddddddddd I really wish I didn’t have to do this, but this will literally be a poltergeist that follows me around and ruins my life if I don’t.”
What’s your media diet, at present?
I’m a Substack slut, I go through a weird binge-purge cycle with publications I follow but the list is relatively trim (for me) at the moment.
Faithfully listen to “The Town,” “The Journal,” “Las Culturistas,” and “Search Engine” every week.
In college we were required to take an acting class, and while I’d rather eat soup made out of my own boiled eyeballs than say words on stage in front of people, it introduced me to the concept of reading play scripts on my own. It’s so satisfying because it takes like 90 minutes to get through a full play and it’s so cathartic. It’s giving Greek chorus vibes. Some that I’ve read lately and loved are Constellations, Lost Girl, A Strange Loop, and Art.
At the moment I’m researching Black Mountain College and Leonora Harrington, so I’ve got a bunch of books piled on my nightstand pertaining to those topics that I’m hoping will somehow seep into my consciousness while I sleep.
And generally I have a fiction book on loan from the library. I’m a non-denominational reader. Gimme literature, historical fiction, romance, avant garde experimental novels, sci-fi, horror, mystery! Low-brow, high-brow, I love it all, but I have no problem putting down books I’m not vibing with. My secret serial killer behavior is if I don’t like a book I’ll flip to the last chapter to see what happens so I can get closure whilst also reclaiming my time.
To be creative and to make things in 2024 is objectively difficult. You have to square off with distractions, global anarchy, and perpetual haunting of the existential question: “why bother?” What keeps you coming back to the ring?
Try as I might I can’t stop thinking and asking questions. It’s an illness, really, this bottomless pit of curiosity inside of me.
At my best, making things helps me experiment with answering the existential questions and that run through my head 24/7. At my not-so-best, making things distracts me from the existential questions that run through my head 24/7.
John Cage was inspired to develop his practice of composing via random chance and chaos after reading a book about the Chinese divining practice, The I-Ching. What influences or inspiration from outside of your field or profession have made the biggest impact on your work or process?
Some of my personal philosophies for how to move through life were inspired by somatics practice; Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen’s work and Alexander Technique definitely impact how I think about business and copywriting and making creative work, in some roundabout strange way.
The Akashic Records are something I think about every single day and also really inform how I make decisions — not necessarily consulting them for information, but understanding from a high level that there is so much information out there in the ether that I have access to, or I will have access to eventually. It reminds me to be patient, which I’m objectively and scientifically terrible at.
What do you “wrong” that makes your work successful?
I don’t do things I don’t want to do. I don’t have a LinkedIn (I am crazy, but I am free)
You’ve been working on something and it just isn’t coming through the way you’d like — do you kill your darlings and scrap the whole thing? Do you compost the idea? Do you file it away in cabinet of misfit concepts to review later?
I put a pin in it and trust that one door opens the next, and eventually I’ll stumble across the information I need to be able to move forward with the concept.
What’s a weird superstition you subscribe to?
If you’re a bad tipper you’re cutting off your own supply to financial abundance, always tip at least 20% 😇
Which creative archetype are you?
I am also a Shapeshifter :)
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 | A guest post by
|
I love this stack, and I loved reading about you two! these are excellent questions, I answered a couple :)
---How particular are you about your notebooks? Pens? What do you write in and with?---
Rigid yet flexible. When I'm jiving with a notebook -- the texture of the paper, the format, the layout, the binding, the ease of use -- I don't want anything but that notebook. If I see something I like, or someone or a brand I want to support, I try and do just that.
****realizes she can't link in substack comments and sheds a tear****
I'm currently using Amanda Rach Lee's dotted notebook in camel. Then I'm eager to move on to the PdiPigna's Olivetti tribute notebook, a very pink and beautifully detailed softcover in homage to the Lettera 22 typewriter. I also always, always have a stash of notebooks at the ready, a literal treasure box of notebooks if you will. In there await a ton of Moglea notebooks.
As far as pens go, my collection ranges from fancier things (like a Frank Lloyd Wright-inspired pen and the Baronfig "Atomic Habits" squire pens) to the freebies that end up enduring the test of time, i.e. the pens I "borrow" from some of my favorite restaurants or bars. The staple pens I use regularly are a Ballograf Epoca ballpoint, a Caran D'Ache 849 ballpoint and various Kaweco Sport fountain pens (I'm obsessed).
---What’s your media diet, at present?---
I'm a news editor by day, so I do read a lot of news of all kinds. (I won't get into the specifics of my news media diet, because that would be an obnoxiously long comment, but I have *thoughts*)
I'm an audiobook devotee. I got back into them ~three years ago and it really changed the way I approach consuming media for ME and for leisure. I listen to books when going on long walks through the city, putting laundry away, commuting, while playing Set on the internet (h/t Michelle for sparking that addiction). Nine out of 10 times, I'm listening to fiction.
I've also been low-key getting back into physical magazines and books lately, because sometimes, you just need to hold and smell and feel a good book. Some recent purchases: "Dancing on my Grave" by Gelsey Kirkland, "This Time Tomorrow" by Emma Straub and "Alphabetical Diaries" by Sheila Heti.
xo, a fellow shapeshifter