Four weeks into this project, two jars found and two missing. I really felt the loss of jar number 4. After the beautiful way it was placed, my heart skipped when I was told it had gone. I kept checking my email waiting with baited breath for it to be reported.
I had a conversation with a friend about it, saying each jar is like my baby, I just want to know it's safe and sound.
He reminded me that although it is great, instant gratification isn't the name of the game.
'On an endeavour like this, you've gotta look at it all as whole. Not every jar is going to get reported, but they're all necessary for the brilliant moments the project brings. Every unreported jar is a down payment on a new friend, or a touching message, or a moment of personal accomplishment.'
I bow to my friend for reminding me what this project is about and why I started it. It's very easy to get caught up in the excitement of a found jar and forget about what it meant to make it and set it out in the wild.
I have also come to realise that it is a little about letting go. I don't have much control over my life, so the things I can control a little, I tend to hold onto for dear life.
But this project is teaching me that really there is no control. The harder I hold onto something, the more pain and panic I experience.
Kirsty, the women who inspired me to start this said in her blog: "Its a very Zen experience, sometimes mired in struggle but there's a beauty to it too: the jars truly are my greatest teacher this year"
Jar Number 4
(the serendipity jar)
Not a lot in my life is serendipitous, and I don't get use that word enough. But this jar and it's placing can only be described as pure serendipity.
Firstly, to start at the start with the making of this jar. I have a love of trees, the way nature has evolved to make these beautiful subcultures out of wood. I am in awe. I am not as clever as nature so I made a tree out of green wire.
Secondly, I planed to place this jar in Stoke Gifford and my previously mentioned friend Mark, (of Jarchives fame) was going to come and keep me company. But life went against us and he couldn't make it down. So I decided to go up to him in Clifton and place my first jar up there.
It just so happened that he had found a prefect place to put a jar. He had found it a little while ago and thought he would show me to see if I agreed.
Now at this point he had not seen the jar I had created. But guess where he thought to put it?????
In the hollow of a tree, the most perfectly, jar sized hollow you have ever seen. I am in awe of the wonderful place my jar now lives.
A tree inside a jar, inside a tree.
I cannot tell you how happy this has made me, serendipity rules the day!
Contents: Wire and Beads
Released into wild: 23rd June 7:30pm
General Location: Clifton, Bristol
Status: Found September 2015
I could go on to how our jar placing turned into a unsuccessful jar hunt, but how we did manage to find some of the previous hiding places (and help a man who was lost). I think, however it would take away from the truly magical moment that this day has created.
Tonight I can go to sleep, happy in the knowledge that today was magically serendipitous.
Jar Found
There was a bit of a race to find this one. A friend of mine saw it and was going to come visit so he could hunt for it. But it seems I have jar hunters on my hands, who got there first. Joseph and his dad Andy, who found my first jar, have been searching for jar 2 all week, and final found it Monday night. They are now on the hunt for number 3 I am told.
Good Hunting Lads!
Jar Number 3
No real story behind the making of this one, I just thought of it and made it.
This one however has gone a little further a field. It came to the movies with me to see X-Men (which is very good by the way). I'll admit to wanting to put it into the Pix+Mix (well who wouldn't), but after further thought, I decided against it.
Contents: Clear beads and wire
Released into wild: 17-06-11 at 5:15pm
General Location: Cribbs Causeway, Bristol, BS10
Status: Missing 28-6-11
I am over the moon to announce that jar number 1 has been reported found by Joseph on the 4th June. I received a lovely email today from his Dad and would like to thank them both, truly, for making my day.
Jar Number 2
The kitchen clock recently broke, so it was time to throw it out.
Since I have started this project I've been reluctant to throw anything out incase I can use it. I thought the clock looked interesting and wondered if I could make it into something. But, as I looked at the broken pieces, I got to thinking about time.
I'm sure, at some point, we have all wished time would slow down.
I know, as a ill person, I often wish time would slow, for me to catch up. I got sick when I was young. I watched my friends and family grow up, evolve and move on with their lives. Where as I stayed still, stagnate, unable to catch up.
I suspect also at some point or another, we have also had a moment we wish we could capture. A time so perfect, we want it to last. To put a lid on it and remember forever.
So this is how Jar 2 evolved. From looking at the mechanics of a broken clock, trying to merge the pieces into something new. To making a new clock, putting it into a jar and closing the lid. Thereby freezing that moment in time, forever staying still but yet life moving forward outside the glass.
Contents: Cardboard Clock
Released into wild: 10/6/11 at 9:30am
General Location: Stoke Gifford, Bristol
Status: Found by Joseph and Andy 20th June
Jar Number 1
Jar number 1 is filled with stamps. Like jars, i love stamps. Each one is taken from a piece of post sent to me by a friend. So it is a jar of friendship.
Contents: Stamps stuck to plastic
Released into wild: 3-6-2011
General Location: Stoke Gifford. Bristol BS34
Status: Found by Joseph on the 4th June
Hello All,
A little while ago I was introduced, by jar hunter Mark, to a wonderful project running in Clifton. A local artist by the name of Kirsty Hall, fills jam jars with art and leaves them out in the wild to be found. 365jars
After reading her website and Mark's hunting blog I was inspired to start my own similar project. It's not as ambitions as Kirsty's but it's along the same lines.
For as long as I remember i have collected empty glass jars and bottles. I love the way light goes through them and I often fill them with little things I find.
Now, as a sort of budding artist, I will fill them with my creations and set them out into the wild to be found.
Hopefully they will be found and reported, otherwise this blog could just turn into a archive of jars made and lost.
The plan is to do one a week for a year. 52 all together. I will post when a new one goes out and will post clues to it's location.
Fingers crossed, like Kirsty, i get some followers and maybe, if i'm lucky, a hunter or two.
Thank you
