Rubber Band Ball

Every morning, a skinny brown elastic band comes wrapped around my newspaper. Others make their way home on broccoli stalks and asparagus. Those are the much coveted beefy ones that come in bright colours. Sadly, I think about these things. In the past, they were either thrown out or tossed in a drawer until a mission came their way. Now, all that’s changed.

I live in a home where golf balls roam, and one day I saw an opportunity: “Balls + Elastics!” I said to myself. My results are rather pitiful when you consider that the ball above represents several years commitment, but that’s because I basically settle for whatever elastics come my way. I do not actively hunt them down, which reassures me that bizarre activities will not get the better of me.

Instructions

All you need to make one of these is some kind of base, like a golf ball or rubber ball; you know, the kind you get in loot bags which your child enjoys for about half an hour, before it ends up in your neighbour’s back yard. After that, it’s all about patience really, unless you cave and find yourself buying bags of elastics to speed things up a bit.

With March Break looming, and parents frantically thinking of activities to occupy their children, why not sit them down with a ball and bag of elastics, show them a couple of amazing images to inspire them (eg. http://www.boingboing.net/esidfklg.jpg 
and http://www.ripleys.com/warehouse/worlds-largest-rubber-band-ball/), and pray this will kill an afternoon for you.

Gone Shopping, Back Soon by Joanna Strong

Joanna Strong is an artist whose work I came across during Nuit Blanche in Toronto last year. She has made some amazing paintings of rubber band balls, like the one above. They look incredibly realistic. Her website is worth taking a look: http://www.joannastrong.com