The Mundane Routine - Breaking It Up
More often than not creatives find it challenging to keep up with the visions of their projects. In the evolving tech community, there are more and more creative entrepreneurs establishing their works towards a cumulative storyline for the greater community. With everyone having distinctive stances to share, those who do it on a full-time basis, have the tendency to find themselves in positions of fluctuating focus of evolving ideas. Integration of the next with the already, and the cumulation of what’s possible creatively in their chosen mediums, stories and artworks are crafted intentionally and thoughtfully. The process of creation usually takes time, introducing even more influences to works during production.
Digital platforms with the power to store archives dating back years, project documentations have become a vital point of reference for the generation of new ideas and development of old ones. As easy as it may seem to scan, record, upload, and write a brief about the works and call it a day, curating them and referencing back to them again is the real challenge. Some find it easier to have a sketchbook with mini printed versions of projects they can swift through, others find coding them into convenient scroll-worthy digital spheres more up to their liking, refer to Eliasson Olafur’s archival set. While some just stick to Instagram, not bad really. Keeping up with art projects is a time consuming task in itself but what is coherence if not coherence.
Organization using a sketchbook or an online platform to keep a record of unformed ideas always works like a charm. It’s good practice to implement new found research to the previous collection of jotted down formations. Developing old ideas is key to any studio or production house branding as in most cases the storyline/tagline of the brand only strengthens in doing so.
Feeling daunted with being low on ideas, or having too much of them? Take a break, and enjoy something completely else. This is where having an hobby outside of your creative work becomes purposeful. For some it’s working out, for others, watching movies, hanging out with friends, or listening to music. Almost always, the etch of something missing finds itself back to you. Like a word on the tip of your tongue that you can’t seem to remember for the life of you. Ideas and creativity are similar. Don’t force it, allow it.
Having a good couple of weeks? Everything seems to be going according to production plans? And you’re hit with unforeseeable events, anything from health concerns to unplanned gatherings. Make it a priority to take care of yourself first. Go ahead, take the much needed major break from work. As creatives, we’re almost always working in overdrive and overtime, giving our all to the craft. This is when the archives save the day- or the week- or the month- heck- or the year. Open up any unfinished projects, and fix them up. If the projects are still apparently beyond fixture, turn to lighter mediums like drawing or writing. Feeling lazy or short on time, even so? A good practice can also is to repost some of your old work to market yourself better, or repost works of other artists you’ve crossed paths with during your research time.
Every artist has a distinctive art style. One that makes or breaks them. Being too rigid with ideas, to condense it, is bad practice. Art style comes to form over time. Every project need not speak volumes for itself. The whole point of branding is to develop on itself. As it goes with storytelling. Storytelling being a good reference point to crafting anything that has structure, direction, and need. Events shape up the story, of course as much as the story does the events, but only as an overview final result. With having the mission statement cleared out for the brand, any projects that meet or don’t meet the criteria, have a reference point to go off of.
Projects are flagged as not useful when they either don’t meet the brand guidelines, or are not up to par with how the artist is envisioning them. To reiterate, being rigid with ideas only hinders what they could become. With the right kind of technology, craft medium, or the help of artists who have made something similar, researching your needs for the project becomes the first steps of addressing the issues you find with the project. This should be followed by drafting variations of the work to suit your style. If all else fails, archive them back already.
Taking criticism like a champ. Any curation set up for others to see will naturally do the same well. Be perceptible to the opinions of others. Needless to say, the point of any artist work is to influence the audience or get influenced by the audience, or both. All worthy works often fall into the category of both, participating in the conversation by themselves. This should ease the maker of any unwanted anxieties about going on to make their next projects. Just do it, with stride.
What’s mundane about this ever-changing ever-growing routine? We all have 24 hours in a day with only so much to tell about the tasks for the next day. While this blog makes it sound all cake, living the dream comes with exhaustion of its own. Losing the enthusiasm to keep making, is what most people are met with when they’re just starting off. With social media being an enormous presence of appreciation, the numbers affect the creators both ways. To see the work of art as a static force, creators tend to slow down and sometimes give up. To this there’s an already established easy fix- keep on building. The stronger the brand identity gets, the more the artist learns in the process, the more clearer the works themselves become.
