Wednesday 4 January 2012

How to be inspired

I do love my Guardian newspaper. My day isn’t complete without it; I always feel it’s such a shame my birthday is one of only two days a year (apart from Sundays) it’s never published!

Anyway it came up trumps again yesterday with a long feature on how a variety of creative people find creative inspiration – artists, musicians, dancers, playwrights etc. You can read it here.

If you haven’t got time for the whole article, these are my favourite bits from artist Polly Morgan:

• Don't wait for a good idea to come to you. Start by realising an average idea – no one has to see it. If I hadn't made the works I'm ashamed of, the ones I'm proud of wouldn't exist.

• Don't try to second-guess what people will want to buy. Successful artists have been so because they have shown people something they hadn't imagined. If buyers all knew what they wanted before it had been made, they could have made it themselves, or at least commissioned it.

• Don't be afraid to scrap all your hard work and planning and do it differently at the last minute. It's easier to hold on to an idea because you're afraid to admit you were wrong than to let it go.

OK, these might not be totally original ideas, but they’re certainly ones I need reminding of now and then!

1 comment:

Gina said...

Just the sort of ideas I need at the moment too.