Permission To Suck

Ok, that’s it, you’re disrupting my musings, and this has got to stop, my creativity depends on it. I need the discipline to waste time purposely daydreaming.

I think maybe we are fortunate to be living a global transformation. You’re trying to find solid ground and if you’re lucky you won’t find it too soon or if you’re Raghava KK you move on as soon as the ground stops shifting.

Complexity assaults me because I’m not close enough to what’s important or it overwhelms me because I haven’t stepped back far enough. John Maeda wrote the laws of Simplicity a few years ago and I pressed a few into service on a trip to Bulls Island, SC.

In this video interview, Milton Glaser offers a definition of art, or at least what art isn’t. “If it moves you to attentiveness it is art, if it doesn’t it’s something else.” – Milton

Meet Adam. He’s determined to unite talent – his own. A first-class writer and a first-rate illustrator equals a great cartoonist. A great cartoonist makes an exceptional ad man, screen writer and film director. Listen to his insightful thoughts about creativity.

To be creative is to develop the intuition, shut down what makes sense and follow intuition. Feeding the hunger we’ll look, listen, study and practice, but if we try to follow information to a commonsensical conclusion, there are no surprises only boredom. In this video, Bob Dylan talks about the mystery of creativity.

Defining art has never been all that controversial; it’s the “good” part that carries the debate. New tools have made discernment tougher still. It’s not all that hard to make the work appear good through imitation or mechanized craft and then assert its worthiness.

If one more person relates the K.I.S.S. principle like it’s a revelation I swear I’ll throw them in the middle of Time Square at rush hour and yell: “OK Smart-ass keep THAT simple.” Nearly impossible, Jason Fried would die to do it.

Film delayed gratification long enough so those behind a camera needed to see the image in their minds eye and exhaust possibilities to make it happen at the moment of exposure. Technology has changed that – call it postvisualization.

Visual metaphor is not only the staple of advertising but the backbone of all art. James Geary points out in his TED presentation (embedded) that metaphor is when we perceive X = Y. Though, in our struggle to understand visual abstractions, I believe we search for metaphor rather than analogy. We adore closure.