Yesterday, I invited all of you to step into the future with me and work together on an epic project for me – “Talking To Animals,” an exploration of a new communications, a new language with which we can talk to animals and they can talk with us. I am seeking to raise $9,000 so I can have the time and photographic equipment necessary to complete this project and capture the words and images I need. I launched the project on Kickstarter.com, a radical and very successful new idea for people in the creative arts and consumers and lovers of ideas and art to come together to do their work at a time when artists are especially pressed to get funding for their work. It is a new idea, an exciting one, a very different one.
“For the animal shall not be measured by man,” wrote Henry Beston, the author and naturalist many years ago.”In a world older and more complete than ours they move finished and complete, gifted with extensions of the senses we have lost or never attained., living by voices we shall never hear.” I believe we need to communicate with them in new and sometimes even mystical ways. Come along with me.
We work together on these projects, you support me and I share my work with you, offering concrete rewards in return for your patronage. The Internet is democratizing in many ways, patrons of the arts used to be rich and few, and now anyone can become a patron of the arts and support the art they wish to see and enjoy. It is a strange thing for me to do – I always bought the cameras I wanted, but I am learning how to be a relevant author in the new world – my blog, subscriptions, podcasts, e-books and openness to explore new ways of supporting my work online.
I do not seek support for my life, just my work.
So yesterday was the first day of this new experiment, I received 48 percent of the funding I am seeking – $4,336. I have 28 more days in which to raise these funds. The way Kickstarter works, I only receive your money and support if I reach my goal of $9,000, if I don’t no money is collected or transmitted. The money is collected through Amazon Financial Services and the process is simple and safe.
I am seeking pledges of $25 or more. The largest yesterday was $150, the smallest was $30. I’m not sure what to expect, there is real enthusiasm for my project – to advance our ability to communicate with the animals in our world, not to simply project our words and emotions onto them. This is something I have been studying for 15 years and am on fire to write about. If I do it properly and carefully, it could be my greatest work. I will work hard at it.
So I am quite in shock about all of this, 47 per cent is great for the first day, and there is room to advance to the rest – 109 people is a tiny fraction of those on the blog (about 200,000 a month, and those on Kickstarter.) I’m not sure what to expect from here, it is possible this was just a first-day rush, it is possible I might raise more than $9,000, if so it will all go to this project, and to sharing the results with those who pledge – conclusions, photos, e-books or books, if and when it comes to that. Most of the money will go to buying a new camera – mine is getting wobbly it is used so much, the rest to getting me the time I need to finish this work without too much distraction. I am focusing on my life with cows, goats, sheep, dogs, barn cats, chickens, donkeys.
I have learned so much about how to communicate with them. So I’m inviting you to become a new patron of the arts and share in this new way of collaborating – a new paradigm for the arts and the people who love ideas and wish to support the creative process. I think we are making history here. If you are so inclined, please consider supporting “Talking To Animals.” I think anyone who loves animals or live with them could benefit, that is my idea, inspired by Henry Beston’s call for us find a new language for talking to the creatures who share the world with us, and much of our lives.