I've been a fan of Amanda Jones for sometime now. She's an incredible designer, photographer (she also designs Kinfolk Magazine, one of my absolute favorites!). I hope you'll enjoy Amanda's take on this little reminder that I hold very near and dear to my heart. You can download her wallpaper for your desktop, iPad, and iPhone here.

The quote comes from a story in UNTITLED that I tell about my wife. It goes like this...

This is something my wife taught me when we were in college and something she learned from an incredible woman named Firenza Guidi, who heads the European Live Arts Network, a performance, training, research, and production company from Wales. 

They were working on a performance art piece based on the famous German play, Woyzeck, in a hidden, underground market beneath the streets of Indianapolis. Towards the end of their rehearsals, each small group responsible for telling their part of the story was asked to perform it for the whole group. My wife's group went and their scene was met with applause. Firenza leaned in and said, "Close. Now do it without words."

Our tendency when trying to explain ourselves (through words or art) is to add instead of subtract.

You don't understand? Well then, let me tell you more!

Instead of adding more words, or images, or lines, or verses to clear things up, we should be thinking about what can we remove. Sure, throw everything on the table when you start something, but then your goal must be to edit until you have only what you need.

Eventually you must subtract until you have only the pieces necessary to tell your story.

Remove everything but the essential bits.