The first iteration of my personal website is live: www.thezenabsurdist.com
For the first time, my daily essays and paintings have a shared home. The site pulls together work I’ve been posting across different places online and will continue updating as new material is published.
My writing and painting have always felt like different expressions of the same thing, so I’m excited to finally see them occupying the same space.
I built the site from scratch using Astra. It took a little over two weeks, mostly because the $20 plan releases credits slowly enough that I could only make a little progress at a time. Oddly enough, that became part of the fun. I’d make a few changes, hit the limit, live with them for a while, then come back and keep shaping it.
I’ve built websites before—for myself and for businesses I’ve managed—but they were always built and maintained through WordPress or more expensive hosting platforms. This one is different. Aside from the domain, there are no ongoing hosting fees or API keys required to keep it running.
Even with the slow drip of credits, building it this way was more than worth it.
And it’s only the first iteration.
Over the next few days I’m adding some stickers I’ve created, a few smaller paintings that never made it to Instagram, and a calendar for upcoming shows. I’ve also kept painting on larger pieces while working on the site, so now it’s time to get the posts caught up with the work.
It feels good to have the different parts of what I make beginning to live together.
The Zen Absurdist:
www.thezenabsurdist.com