So many artists get bogged down in the criticism! I think it stems from studio classes in art school. Anyone who has ever been through a critique knows that is can be a real tough thing at first to take open criticism. It doesn’t matter if it’s from the instructor or other students. You fear it. But it’s not personal… unless it is personal.
I mean, there’s always sniping. Someone makes a valid (or invalid) comment concerning another person’s work. And then… you can watch the criticized student wait… like a vulture… circling until his criticizer’s work comes up for comment. And then, THEY STRIKE!
This type of mentality can lead to über-unhealthy attitudes later in life. I know many artists who look at the work around them and complain at how bad it is executed, or that the choices the artist made were all wrong. Fine. If you have a valid point, complain all day long! But poor design doesn’t need to be something to snarl about between sips of coffee. Turn the bad into an opportunity.
While I was in South Florida, where I attended art school for a brief time, there was news story I will always remember. A small children’s daycare center just off I-95 somewhere between Miami and Fort Lauderdale became the center of a legal battle. It seems that on the exterior of this modest little building, someone had painted a few of the trademark Disney characters. The likenesses were crude, but you could recognize Goofy, Mickey and Donald on the stucco wall. Disney came down on them with their lawyers to remove the characters. The daycare complied, but then something else happened.
Shortly after this David and Goliath story hit the evening news, Universal Studios (Disney’s Orlando neighbor) showed up at the daycare. They put a fresh coat of paint on the place and installed huge Hanna-Barbera and Walter Lantz characters all over the outside of the building. They turned a PR nightmare for big bad Disney, into a win for Universal.
The moral is, it’s not enough to be critical, or to sue. You need to be proactive. All criticism is valid. It’s what you do with it that makes you win or fail. Last week I was sitting in a local lunch spot when I saw a flyer in the window. There was nothing at all special about it. The thing that caught my eye was a logo I had designed, in the corner of the lettersized sheet.
The flyer
The logo was pretty low res and the flyer was pretty awful. I got critical… but then I stopped and thought about it. I went home and redesigned the flyer as an 11 x 17 poster and sent it to them. I don’t do this everyday, but it just didn’t seem right to have this flyer out there. You can’ expect people to be excited about your event, when it looks like you don’t care.
So I sent them this:
Reworked event promotion
It’s been a week and they did seem to like this better, but I haven’t seen any of them up. I do see the original flyer all over the place. I’m sure they are busy, but the next time they need event promotion, they might just give me a call. I mean, who knows??!
Turning failure into opportunity is one way to keep yourself busy and sane. Without a viable solution to a problem, you’re just a professional complainer, and I have yet to find a paying position for that skill set.
Posted in DESIGN
Tags: Criticism, Design, Poster, Promotion
I was looking at a bunch of Magritte paintings this week and became inspired. I was also looking at some Art Nouveau borders and old seed packet and fruit crate artwork.
