Meditations & Affirmations: A Miniature Book of Healing

In 2019, I responded to a call from the Brooklyn Art Library to participate in its Tiny Sketchbook Project. When the blank book arrived, I was stunned by its scale: just 2.33 by 1.66 inches and less than a quarter inch thick. My original ideas immediately fell apart.

I set it aside.

When I returned to the sketchbook months later, I could look at it differently. What had initially seemed like a difficult limitation began to feel more like an intimate space to work in. Instead of trying to fit my original ideas into its tiny dimensions, I began considering what the scale itself might allow.

A short flip-through of Meditations & Affirmations, my hand-bound miniature sketchbook created in 2019 for the Tiny Sketchbook Project. This piece explores mirrored color transitions and handwritten affirmations. It now lives in the permanent collection at The Mini Time Machine Museum of Miniatures in Tuscon, AZ.

Page by page, I filled the sketchbook with handwritten affirmations: gentle reminders to focus, soften, and remain present. I created a mirrored color spectrum that moves from the outer edges toward the center and back again, allowing color and language to develop together across the book.

Once I understood what I wanted the piece to become, the making itself happened quickly. I completed the book in approximately six hours of focused, continuous work.

I almost kept it.

There was something particularly intimate about holding an artwork that small after spending hours concentrating on every page. Ultimately, I documented the finished piece, packaged it, and sent it to the Brooklyn Art Library in time to participate in the Tiny Sketchbook Project's European tour.

After the tour, Meditations & Affirmations became part of the Brooklyn Art Library's collection. Following the library's closure, the work eventually found a new home and is now held in the permanent collection of The Mini Time Machine Museum of Miniatures in Tucson, Arizona.

It remains one of the smallest works I have created, but its scale continues to interest me. The limitation that initially made me set the project aside ultimately shaped how I approached it. Instead of trying to overcome the book's size, I began working with it.

Looking back, I can recognize something in that process that has continued throughout my practice: limitations do not always have to be solved. Sometimes they change the way I look at the work.

Update, January 2026: The Sketchbook Project has since been revived, although the original Brooklyn Art Library remains closed.