Small-batch, craft automation
Last month, Poornima and I visited the Edward Gorey House on Cape Cod, where the famous book illustrator lived. The house is now a museum that shows some of his works.
Of course, we love his art, and the museum is highly recommended!
What I found inspiring was his dedication to his craft. Edward Gorey really liked to create entire books designed and crafted with his unique sensibility: his retro Anglo-Gothic pen drawings and whimsical verses.
Commercial book publishers wouldn't touch his books because they found it hard to classify them: were they children's books? Then why so gory? Or were they grown-up books? Gothic? Too whimsical. Comic? Too serious and macabre.
So, to support himself, Gorey did commercial illustrations for others' books and animation art for WGBH television, and got some money from set design for Dracula on Broadway in New York. Nights and evenings, he created his weird little books with a couple of small publishers.
That's what I want for myself.
I'm trying to build software tools for people around me. The work aligns with my own values and interests and keeps me happy.
I'll continue to write columns in Robots in Plain English, and when I do, I'll blog about them here. You can subscribe to my RSS feed to get updates.