Mysterious Flame

I’m sure you know Paul McCartney as a singer and song-writer. But did you know the ex-Beatle also paints?

A few years ago, I got the book Paul McCartney: Paintings. He does these big, expressive, semi-abstract pieces that have a sort of visceral effect, with lots of drips and runs. Very much influenced by Willem de Kooning’s abstract expressionism.

With all his talent, even Paul McCartney can get stuck. In Paintings, he shares a fun, creative little strategy he has devised for dealing with stuckness. Read the rest of this entry »

As you can tell from what I’ve written elsewhere, I’ve come to the conclusion that “productivity” is not the point. And being organized is not the point, either, although it can be tremendously helpful in a number of ways (that we’re not going to delve into today).

The point is whether you are making anything at all. You can plan and plan and plan all day long and have little to show for it, except for a bunch of plans. I’m reminded of the Beatles song “Nowhere Man,” which is about this indecisive head-in-the-sand guy who makes “all his nowhere plans for nobody.” In fact, “isn’t he a bit like you and me?” Read the rest of this entry »

When you’re creating things, you can’t rely on inspiration alone, only painting, writing, sculpting, whatever, when the mood strikes. You have to show up on a regular basis, day in and day out. Creative efforts require a lot of commitment and professionalism. When you do this, you will be “favored by the Muse(s),” if you follow a more mystical viewpoint a la Stephen Pressfield or Julia Cameron. I like how Chuck Close puts it:

“I always say that inspiration is for amateurs; the rest of us just show up and get to work.”

In an interview with NPR, Chuck Close talks about how his modular marks (I think of them as hot dogs) wind up becoming massive nine-foot self-portraits just through hard work and dedication.

Put this practice into action by setting specific times to work, then stick to it. It doesn’t necessarily have to be 8:00 am to 5:00 PM, but it does need to be consistent and regular. (I know one artist who goes to bed at 8 or 9 PM and gets up at 3 AM to paint, and he does some pretty amazing stuff.) Personally, I try to set aside Tuesday evenings and Saturday afternoons to paint, since that’s what works best with my schedule.

Morning Pages are another form of showing up. (In fact, I think Julia Cameron uses the phrase “showing up at the page” in her book The Artist’s Way.) You show up and you write, dumping out everything that’s in your mind and on your chest, stream-of-conscious style. Showing up like this also gives you the benefit of figuring out what you really need to be doing.

So if you really want to bust creative block and “turn professional,” you have to show up on a regular basis.

I’ve talked about gumption traps a lot recently: gumption traps in general and in specific for artists and graphic designers. Gumption traps, or creative blocks as they’re more commonly called when applied to creative disciplines, are common to all, but they appear to crop up most often for beginners. The seasoned artist experiences blocks, too. Perhaps as often if not more often than the beginner. The thing is, the pro isn’t set back for very long, while the beginner may get stuck on something for a long time.

How the Professional Confronts Creative Blocks

When faced with a trap or a block, the seasoned professional:

• Recognizes traps for what they are
  They’re setbacks that can get you stuck if you let them, but nothing that can’t be overcome.
• Has dealt with them before
  He or she knows from experience what to do in those tricky situations that stump beginners. Not to imply that every problem has a ready-made solution out there, but an artist will encounter a lot of similar problems in his lifetime.

Does an experienced artist whine, gripe, and complain about a particular piece? You betcha. But he moves on and keeps doing his work, not letting a little setback keep him down. It’s part of “turning pro” as it’s explained in The War of Art. It’s all about attitude.

I’m not dead yet!

The bottom line is this: the dedicated professional knows he’ll survive no matter what blocks come his way. He’s lived through them before. So why get worked up over one little setback now, if the setbacks in the past were overcome at some point?

On Tuesday I wrote about gumption traps for artists. Today I’m going to talk about gumption traps for a subset of artists, graphic designers. I figure I’m pretty qualified to write about this since I myself am a graphic designer, and I’ve been pushing pixels and type for about 9 years now.

In thinking about the different things that frustrate the fire out of designers, I’ve realized that you can group them into categories different from the ones discussed in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. There are internal and external frustrations, like with everything else. It should be noted that where fine art is internally driven, graphic design is externally driven. A graphic designer is quite often given a task by someone else, or the designer creates his/her own tasks in order to fulfill some external requirement (such as generating new business). The same principles of line, color, form, texture are at work in both disciplines, so the two practices have a lot in common. But Graphic Design, formerly known as Commerical Art, is driven by commerce rather than self-expression. This is an important distinction to make, and if a new designer isn’t careful, it can be the source of many frustrations. I can’t remember who said it, but I remember reading many years ago an interview with some late, great designer who said that “design is about solving problems, and art is about making them.”

External Gumption Traps

So with the thought in mind that many of the gumption traps for designers are external, I’ve found they fall into four main categories:

• Environmental Traps
• Communication Traps
• People Traps
• Project Traps

Environmental Traps

These are the ones where your environment prevents you from accomplishing what you need to do.

• Insufficient equipment - If your computer is 10 years old and has almost no RAM or hard drive space, you’re sunk. You’ll be watching spinning beach balls all day while Photoshop tries to do a Gaussian Blur. Get the best equipment you can afford. It’ll save you hours of frustration. It’ll make you a faster and more productive worker in the end.
• Poor ergonomics - When your mouse makes your wrist hurt constantly or your chair makes your lower back hurt, or you’re otherwise uncomfortable, it distracts you from focusing on doing good work. I want to encourage design managers everywhere to invest in good furniture that won’t hurt workers.

Communication Traps

There are a lot of problems that can be prevented by clear communication upfront, regardless of what field you’re in. One thing I’ve learned: never assume anything. If you’re in any doubt, ask.

• Unclear communication - When objectives are unclear or there’s a lack of communication, it’s hard to know what to do on a project. Once I was working on a project I thought was a trifold, but it turned out to be a rack card (roughly 4 by 9 inches, two-sided). It was an embarrassing miscommunication. The trick here is to be pro-active and ask. Don’t be afraid to ask questions, no matter how dumb or silly it may seem. Remember that the only dumb question is the one that goes unasked. This is important to remember no matter what your role is. If someone asks you a question you think is dumb, bite your tongue. they’re trying to save themselves (and you) a lot of trouble later on.
• Client expectations are way off or just plain wrong, or they dumb down the work - When this happens, you need to be proactive in communicating to the client what to expect, and make sure you have all the project details in writing, agreed upon by both sides.

People Traps

Unfortunately they don’t teach interpersonal relations in art school, and I’ve learned that it’s important to have a thick skin around other designers. If somebody doesn’t like the logo you’ve done, don’t take it personally. Commerce is objective, not subjective, and that objective is to sell something. You have to remember that design work is not personal; it’s commercial. Save the personal expression for your fine art.

• Office politics - This happens just about wherever you go, no matter what industry you’re in. The key here is to learn how to work with people.
• Someone else is in a bad mood - If you’re in a small office, this can be demoralizing. Learn how to deflect people’s bad moods, or learn to ignore it. If there’s someone who absolutely can’t stand being around, you may need to talk to your manager and request to be moved farther from that annoying peson. If all else fails, consider a change of jobs. Life is too short and too long to work with obnoxious people, although it can do a lot to build your character.

Project Traps

Sometimes it’s the work itself that saps your enthusiasm.

• Work is tedious and repetitive - It may be OK for some people, but most really creative people tend to like variety. I think a lot of designers are bored easily, so tedious projects get old in a hurry. However, this may be a good time to sharpen your organizational skills, since it’s easy to get sloppy with tedious work. Take pride in a tightly-assembled project.
• Deadlines are too tight or close together, or there are too many at once - Nothing causes burnout faster than burning the candle at both ends to get everything done. If you’re in the position to do it, learn to say “no” when necessary. You’ll be doing everyone a favor, not only because you’ll cause less stress for yourself and your team, but the client won’t get a hastily-put-together product.
• Skills/talents are underused/undervalued - This is perhaps the most frustrating issue of all. Let’s say you’ve got a knack for a certain type of project that you always gets assigned to someone else. If you’re unsuccessful at convincing management to grant you more of those projects, or you can’t come up with these sort of projects on your own free time, it’s probably time to look for a job that lets you do these things. Or you feel like you’ve maxed out at this particular job. In that case, it’s probably time to move on.

Internal Gumption Traps

As for the internal gumption traps that come to designers, they’re very often the same as those of artists (coming at something from the wrong angle, focus is too narrow or too broad, fussiness, mistaken either/or thinking, etc.). If you’re still stuck by running through all of those, it’s probably a good idea to step away from your work for a little bit and come back with fresh eyes. Take a walk around the building to clear your head. Or go peruse the design annuals. A change of environment can do you good. Also, try to get another pair of eyes looking at your work. Two heads are always better than one.

This is by no means complete, and I’m sure that as I move on up into more and more senior positions, I’ll discover other kinds of problems that destroy enthusiasm. I get the feeling that those kinds of problems are more common among management than design.

Have any gumption traps you’ve run into as a designer? Feel free to share in the comments.