Communications Primer

What made me really think? Why?

Tim Brown talking about thinking with your hands and how we learn by making. I think it’s fascinating how by quickly making something tangible, we can improve and accelerate the creative process.

Which one comment will I still remember next year? Why?

Paula Scher saying that creativity is about defiance and misbehaving, I think it’s so true because it most certainly isn’t about following the rules, setting rules on art limits creativity, although I suppose that having rules to break does help creativity in a way.

Which one of these talks would I tell a friend to watch? Why?

I would recommend Tim Brown’s talk because it really changed the way I think about the creative process and products in general. And how in order to not be embarrassed of the work you have created; you must have trust in the people around you and be free of the expectations of others.

How could these talks influence my own approach to my work?

I am definitely more inclined to let myself go through the creative process without being too precious and without trying to make everything perfect because I now understand the importance of just making something tangible first.

Tim Brown: Tales of Creativity and Play

Don’t fear the judgement of your peers- it causes you to be conservative with your art, the embarrassment of the opinions of others limits freedom and risk-taking in creativity- do not forget to be playful

Children are more creative because they’re freer from the opinions of others

Playfulness helps us be more creative, kids are more engaged with the open possibilities of objects- using one thing to create many things

Go for it and explore lots of things even if they end up like others’

Adult behaviours get in the way of creativity- continue stretching the initial idea until you get something completely different

‘thinking with your hands’- involves making multiple low-resolution prototypes very quickly (often using found elements) to get a solution- quickly getting something into the real world and having your thinking advance as a result- gets a more efficient product

Role Play is very efficient in understanding user experience and seeing flaws in systems because you put yourself in the shoes of the user

We need trust to be creative

Paula Scher on Creativity as a Small Act of Misbehaving

Creativity is misbehaving- comes from being uncomfortable with a situation

Creativity is about defiance

Defying the bounds of appropriate creativity

You should trust the feelings a project brings out in you because even despising space and wanting to cover it up it a creative start

Being in a bind makes you more creative because you need to create a whole new type of solution

Giving a group of people one prompt and loose rules will result in a large variety of results because everyone thinks differently

Not being able to get a group of people to behave insures a better result

Often designs continue to evolve after you finish then because other artists take inspiration from your work

Sometimes, a bad brief forces you to think outside of the box

Typography is punched into the walls of the theatre permanently as opposed to slathered onto the walls

Meklit Hadero: The Unexpected Beauty of Everyday Sounds

Nature, Language, and (the impossibility of) Silence

When bird song is slowed down, human ears mistake it for human singing

The natural world can be a teacher

Pitch is important to language, it shows different meaning

Emphatic language- language that’s meant to highlight or that springs from surprise

Words and phrases turn to music

Silence can be music, the music of the everyday sounds of the audience existing- never truly silent world

John Cage- on its own, the environment is musically generative, it is generous, and we are already immersed

We are the audience and we are the composers

Part 1: Communications Rotation

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