Great designers are big babies! By Tom Vanlerberghe
Posted: February 4, 2009 at 9.38 amPosted by in Featured, design
Guest Post by Tom Vanlerberghe
Follow Tom on Twitter - @KursaalTom
It’s weird
Being creative is one of the hardest professions around. It basically means starting the day with staring at a blank page and trying to fill it with something meaningfull at the end of the day. If I were a designer, I would go from total anxiety to eternal damnation.
But they don’t. One way or another, they keep coming up with stuff that’s really amazing, even the most simple things How do they do it? I reckon creativity isn’t something you learn, it’s something you don’t lose.
Ever seen a baby playing with something so ordinary like a wooden stick? He could play with it all day and never get bored. Why? Because he’s probably the most creative of us all. When we ‘grow up’ (always hated that), we become more and more rational. We appreciate the logic in things. But why? Because creativity is ‘a problem’ and babies get absorbed by problems, everything else around them isn’t important. If they want that square wooden thingie to go into that round hole, they’ll find a way (and ruin the toy that you bought them). But from the moment we grow up logic takes over and creativity becomes a ‘problem’, and we all hate problems. We try to avoid them as much as possible. Why? Because they are time-consuming, irritating and a sure way to screw things up.
We hate taking risks, because we understand the repercussions of failing. Babies have no care in the world, they can do whatever they want, whenever they want. A great time for a designer! They don’t know failure, not because they understand the concept, but because they just don’t see it that way. Every designer knows the quote by Thomas edison about finding a 1,000 ways NOT to make a lightbulb, but he also said “Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.”
Work is such a spoilsport.
It creates bounderies. Things we can’t do. I always like the ‘How to brainstorm’-books that say we can’t enforce any restrictions, ’cause that in a fact is a restriction. Going back to that blank page. That’s just it. There’s nothing more. No rules, no authority, no compromise,… so why not get the most out of it?
I like acting like a child, doing stupid things, messing up, failing at stuff and try to pick myself up again. I like moaning, grunting and acting like a stubborn jackass. I like telling people I know better and that they should go back to school. All that and I’m not even a designer! I just try to get away with it!
Thanks so much for reading!
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17 Comments
February 4, 2009 at 11.51 am
i find that working with kids for one or two weeks a year keeps my “childlike” creativity up to speed.
Logic is indeed creativities greatest enemy: a spoon is a spoon, its made to ladle soup into your mouth, but remove all you “know” and that utensil might be used for a totally different purpose.
in short i agree with this article…
February 4, 2009 at 1.26 pm
I can vouch for what Tom is saying here. Especially the last paragraph… ;-)
For most of us, Peter Pan’s of this world, this is the main reason why we are in this business: We don’t want to grow up…
February 4, 2009 at 3.03 pm
@Thomas I don’t know if a spoon is only to ladle soup? I like to use it to catapult stuff at the person in front of me… :) But it’s true… kids are great (safe the diapers, the whining, no sleep,… that kinda sux)
@Peter I should ask Graham if he can ‘ban’ my colleagues… I’m not acting like a child… it’s called ‘boyish charm’. :p
February 4, 2009 at 3.19 pm
Children do approach life with a very simple liberating perspective.
More times than not it is because they simply don’t know any better, and the rest of the time it is because they haven’t been tainted by opinions, and what is “the right thing to say, or do” yet.
in that aspect I totally agree with you are saying… unfortunately as designers (myself most definitely included) we take ourselves way to seriously.
Good read
Aaron I
February 4, 2009 at 3.21 pm
[...] read the post here… (you know you want to) [...]
February 4, 2009 at 3.25 pm
Hey, I’ve never heard that Thomas Edison and I’m a designer. But nevertheless, great article. It’s always a good reminder to relax and not be afraid of failure. There is nothing better than not having a care in the world.
February 4, 2009 at 3.25 pm
Tom, great topic and a nice piece. I love your perspective. I know I chose art and design because I refuse to work at something that is not fun or something that I am not passionate about. It has never made sense to me how anyone can do that.
I also think it is important to remember that the best designs come by taking risks. It is so easy to forget this when working under the pressures of the corporate world.
Grow up? what’s that? hee hee
February 4, 2009 at 3.46 pm
@Chris and @Aaron. I just think you guys have the greatest talent in the world. The ability to fill a blank page with something that someone else likes. It’s easy to fill a blank page with something I like (I’m a minimalist), but doing something people like… great. It saddens me when great designers forget, like @Chris said, what they’re hired to do. But it’s also a management thing. Most freelancers I know are very creative, but have to take on too much work to make ends meet. Freelancers that work in an agency don’t have that problem, but have too much rules, meetings,… corporate stuff to worry about.
O yeah… and googoo gaga to the both of you! :)
February 4, 2009 at 3.46 pm
@Kyle On the other hand, if he wouldn’t have invented the lightbulb, he would just be “that crazy guy with the weird quotes”
February 4, 2009 at 4.39 pm
wise words my friend, wise words
February 4, 2009 at 4.57 pm
Very good point. I think compulsory play time at the office should be introduced…oh wait…that would eliminate the point…
February 4, 2009 at 5.06 pm
I agree.. i have in so many times been face to face with a blank paper and yeah sometimes it feels that it will always just be blank for a time but when we have started on that one stroke everything seems to flow naturally.
Not only do i feel that when i draw or paint but i often find myself creating via my new medium that is via my events and my blogging. I love your anology on being child like when it comes to creating, hang no cares or worries when you do any work of art or anything you are passionate about. I always believe that creativity should have no limits.. great post and incite : )
February 4, 2009 at 6.08 pm
The “childlike” references could also apply to the “primitive” which split the art world at the seams fo Picasso, Cezanne, Klee, etc etc. The blank piece of paper I can deal with provided there is good direction (i.e. creative brief, or whatever), known strategy and objectives backed up by decent research. In other words, to what end am I doing this piece. The blank page turns nightmarish when none of this has yet to be discerned and you know there are going to be many rounds and many late nights because your client/audience/patron know only what they don’t like and have no idea what they do like.
February 4, 2009 at 9.26 pm
@Misty And probably one of the reasons why it stays blank that long is because you keep thinking in terms of “I can’t do this” or “This’ll never work”,…
I went to Australia for a few months and really… the two most wonderfull words I learned there was ‘no worries’. It illustrates it so perfectly.
February 5, 2009 at 11.11 am
@John Providing a lot of clients count on your expertise as the designer, isn’t it the responsibility to ask ‘good’ questions so you can find out what they want?
The design agency I work with is lucky… I know that Adobe isn’t the capital of a African country, but I reckon I’m one of the very few. If I had no idea what the designer need, I wouldn’t have a clue what to brief them.
February 6, 2009 at 1.12 pm
Hello Tom,
I spend a bit of time thinking about creativity, but your definition about how it “isn’t something you learn, it’s something you don’t lose” is one of the best ones I’ve seen in a while. Thanks for that.
May 21, 2009 at 9.28 pm
[...] Designers are big babies right?