Have you ever looked at a post-it note and thought, "Why don't you make yourself useful already and get a job? I mean another job... a real job... a job in the arts!"
If not, don't feel bad. Illustrator Arthur Jones has already beat you to it anyway. Since 2001 he has been transforming the humble post-it note into heroic narrative canvas. He first got the idea back when he was working at a marketing company in Chicago, laying out advertisements for various hotel chains. It was exactly how you might imagine a job of this sort might be, boring, monotonous, we've all been there. In between pounding his forehead against his particle board desk, Jones spent a lot of time sitting in his cubicle, pondering office supplies, and their untapped artistic potential. He created a huge rubber ball by adding one rubber band to it for every day that he worked. He crafted a little mouse out of masking tape. And every day for month, he drew tiny works of art onto post-it notes using a Sharpie.
Eventually he gathered it all up and turned it into an art show called "Day Job." The centerpiece was a portrait of Lee Iaccoca composed of 5000 bright blue push pins stolen from his office, stuck into the gallery wall.
Five years later, Jones has transformed his favorite time-kill activity into a full-fledged obsession. He has created the Post-It Note Reading series, where writers read their original stories, while corresponding illustrations drawn entirely on Post-It Notes are projected behind them.
please direct questions + comments to Arthur Jones
text: Starlee Kine, photo: Maria Schoenherr