Next up we have my friend Katrina: writer - artist - printmaker - collector and thought-provoking junk philosopher. Hope you enjoy this as much as I did....
Hello Stash Studios friends! I'm Katrina and I'm honored to be a guest blogger for Stash Studios. I thought I'd tell you a little bit about my new favorite term, "junker", and let you decide for yourself if you are a junker or not. And if you are a junker (And I hope that you are!) then maybe you'll find you're a third, fourth, or even fifth-generation junker. Gosh, what an honor.
So, "junking" is a term that entered into my vocabulary somewhat recently. I was struck when my dear friend, Kehren Barbour, introduced herself as a fourth-generation junker. It sounded so important, declarative, and inherited nonetheless! When Kehren left the SF Bay Area for NC, she gifted me with a handful of art supplies, brilliantly random ephemera for potential crafting, and a copy of Mary Randolph Carter's book, Big City Junk.
I was mesmerized by Big City Junk, started researching Carter online, and was overjoyed to find this organized subculture of "junkers". Soon after, I eagerly deemed myself a
junker, and realized I was a third-generation junker nonetheless! Dating back to my grandparents' little antique shop in rural New York, I saw the junker lineage so clearly in
my father's barn, shed, and garage full of treasures and my mother's basement shelves filled with
goodies for all seasons.
But it wasn't just the collecting side of junking I associated with. It was also the treasure-hunting. Fond childhood memories of waking up early on Sunday mornings to load up into the truck and take to the local flea markets, auctions, and estate sales only to come home w/ boxes or bushels full of "junk"! Sweet bliss. Not too surprising, my brother just opened up an antiquing business of his own, now spending his weekends at antique fairs and other fine junking venues. It's in our blood!
Junking (or collecting, or recycling, or a penchant for vintage, or treasure-hunting, etc.) is something that also feels very relevant for my creative life. You could look at Brenda Coultas' book of poems, A Handmade Museum, or Joseph Cornell's assemblages to see how other artists are using this subject matter in their work. In junking, certainly the items are recycled/ re-purposed and often vintage or otherwise full of stories, history, even archeology of sorts. But the actual act of junking even feels like a creative pursuit: the sifting, the considering, the analyzing of odd objects, the honing of instincts and aesthetics, the balance between intellect and instinct until you settle in on your beloved junk collection.
It's like interior decorating meets assemblage-making meets green consumer dollars. What joy! Also, you enter into the subculture of junkers keeping beloved items out of landfills and preserving cultural histories. And with this, you can consider yourself a treasure-hunter, collector, green buyer, vintage addict, pack rat, or otherwise: junker of fine junk.
(P.S. Check out Poppy Talk's articles on collections, very much along these junker lines.)
