School of Creative Business - Creative Entrepreneurship

Learning More About Color

Understanding color and using color in our artist life is essential. I found a few color forecasting videos that may help with creating new products for the fall 2010.

 

 

 

10 Attributes of Creative Types

We all have heard it before, "You are one of those Creative Types". And typically my response is, "Yes I am, so I'm to assume you are not". The statement of being creative can come across as condensing or sympathetic , like we have problems.  Others just don't know how to deal with us. Like we are a mystery.

But honestly the other types are the people  I sympathize with. Being creative is a freeing and joyous experience. Creative people live creative, colorful, self reflecting lives. We love spending time with ourselves - because we can entertain ourselves with the most creative things. We enjoy being around other creative souls because we feed off of each other.

10 Attributes of Creative Types. 

I've listed 10 of those attributes and have provided brief explanations of each.

1. Creatives are highly intuitive, big picture visionaries. We are at our best when we are working with abstract, analytic work that utilizes our divergent thinking. We can envision possibilities that don't exist, connecting the dots and recognizing what's missing in a given situation.

2. Creatives are agents of change. Because of our divergent thinking we often see problems before they arise. And this thinking on many levels places us in roles of critics or evaluators. 

3. Creatives want and need to be seen and appreciated for their uniqueness. We have an unusually high need to be seen and heard. We often work in companies that are small or in small groups. We need to be recognized and appreciated for being forward thinkers.

4. Creative are nonconformists. We like to do things our way. We like to define our own work and be able to take action without asking for permission. We hate to be micromanaged and we can feel stifled in companies with strict norms of behavior, excessive amounts of rules or large bureaucracies.

5.  Creatives have their own internalized standards of quality. We may often outperform other employees, but this is because we have a personal, intrinsic commitment to work and feel creative ownership over our work and personal projects.

6. Creatives have a strong need to believe in what they do. Our engagement with work is first and foremost must have a sense of purpose and meaning for us. New projects, creative freedom, and unlimited resources are high on our wish list. If we are not stimulated and engaged in our work, we can in fact "Rust Out" - present a lack energy, sleeplessness, loss of creative ideas and withdraw from others, resulting into a debilitating depression.

7. Creative have many talents and enthusiasms. We tend to have 3 to 4 highly developed skills and enthusiasms far many more activities than most. As soon as we loose interest in one area, we move on to the next subject with great enthusiasm.

8. Creatives have an insatiable appetite for learning opportunities and new challenges that utilize their diverse talents. We need a place where our intellectual and creative boundaries are limitless and where there is an abundant of opportunities for self-expression and personal and professional growth.  Many times if our day job isn't satisfying us, we have to seek other ways to express ourselves with hobbies and projects outside of our day -to- day work lives.

9. Creatives like variety and dislike routine. We like to use different skill sets on evolving projects. Rarely do like repetitive work. Working on an assembly line would just kill us.

10. Creatives often have acute sensitivities. It's very common for creatives like us to have one or two areas of hypersensitivity. We can have anything from a strong intuition, an appreciation of nature to an extraordinary sense of taste or smell.

Well, Do you see yourself in any of these attributes? I did! I totally understand why I do what I do.

I am a college professor at the Art Institute of Charlotte who conducts classes on a quarterly system ( every 4 months courses and times change), my work environment is filled with collaborative projects that require me to manage without someone looking over my shoulder. I am encouraged and celebrated when I work on projects outside of work and I have a flexible schedule that allows me to work from home on a few assignments and work on my doctoral degree.

I Love Being Creative!

Post your thoughts on being a Creative Type and how you overcame living  a mundane life .  I love to hear about your expereinces.

Artist Who Blog: Dolan Geiman

Dolan Geiman is a nationally recognized mixed media artist creating original paintings, collages, constructions, and limited-edition reproductions. Dolan and his partner Ali Walsh are bloggers who blog about the latest news from his studio and as well offers tips, and general inspiration from the creative community. 

I believe Dolan is a great example of what other artist should be doing. Check out his website and look at all the items and extras he offers his customers. This is true art marketing.  I need to get myself on this level. But what I great mentor to learn from.

Read the  The Daily Dolan Geimanfor more insight on Dolan Geriman.

Also check out interviews about Dolan artist experiences.

 Gapers Block  Interview with Geiman and Walsh

Etsy Interview "Quit Your Day Job: dolangeiman" 

Great Example of Documenting the Artist Process

Learning to document the process as we are working on our art projects can be time consuming and down right impossible. I have tried my best to document my artist process. but sometimes I get so involved in the actual doing of the artwork, that I forget to take pictures of the steps.

Art of Wyanne, does a great job with documenting her artist process through video. It actually tells story and where her inspiration comes from. By the way, buyers love background information about the art pieces we create.

Check Out Wyanne creative process below.

Happy Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day Everyone. I hope your day is a loving and blessed one. If you are interested in viewing more of my Valentine Day art - just

click here

and you will be transported to my artist blog -

Studio 2229 

A Gift for his Sister

Over the holidays, I was commissioned to create a mixed media collage for a co-worker's sister. Well of course I completed it before Christmas, but I did not want to post it, caused I feared that maybe his sister would view my post from his blog. So I decided I would post it today.

I going to send you to my new blog -Studio 2229. Here is where I have posted A Gift for His Sister.

Note: Studio 2229 will serve as a place I'll discuss my artwork in progress, art shows, and anything relating to me creating artwork. I will still post to the Mixed Media blog- it will still remain a place I write about the business of being an artist. I will write more about the purpose of these two blogs later in the week. But for now go read- A Gift for His Sister.

10 Tips to Staying Happy and Positive

Today I wanted to share 10 of my favorite Tips of on Staying Happy and Positive.  During the stuff times I have to often reflect on these tips to help me get through my day. We all have bad days, but what is important is how we handle those days so they don't become part of our everyday lives. Take some time and read over the following 10 Tips of Staying Happy and Positive.

1. Don't Put Yourself Down- It's important to recognize your weak areas, but it's not important to beat yourself up. Instead of thinking about your weaknesses, match them with strengths to help keep confidence levels high.

2. Stretch Away Toxins - During the winter months we sometimes neglect exercise. But still try to add some type of activity to your lives, even in the cold months. Try walking around the house, or doing yoga or pilates by video. Keep your body's circulation going and get rid of those winter blues.

3. Have a Tea Party - Simply going through the motions of making a cup of tea can reduce stress. There are four (black, green, white, & oolong) types of teas that have their own health- giving benefit.

4. Make it Moody- Put on your favorite piece of music. It can be something that reminds you of a pleasant memory like a happy holiday (Christmas music is my favorite) or your first romance. Then sit back in a comfortable chair, dim the lights and just listen. Music is said to appeal  directly to the primal part of the brain to calm and soothe.

5. Be Beautiful - Fill your home with things that give you the most pleasure. Do worry about conforming to others' perception of beauty; simply choose things that appeal to you and just sit around and enjoy your beautiful things.

6. Write it Down - Keep a pen and paper by your bedside. It can help you in two ways: first, write a list of things you need to tackle the next day; second writing it down allows you to let go of anything playing on your mind.

7. Bath before Bed- A warm bath will gently warm and relax you, and not only that, the reduction in your  body temperature mimics your body's natural sleep rhythms.

8. Learn for Another - Find a story about someone who has achieve greatness. Use their story to help you stay positive about your life and the opportunities you have.

9. Admire your Reflection- Make time each week to reflect on the decisions you have made and how they affected your life positively or negatively. Then make a promise to yourself to learn from your successes and failures.

10. Embrace Challenges- It's all too easy to be grateful for things like your house, family and loved ones, but remember to be grateful for life's challenges too. Often, it's facing challenges that helps uncover hidden strengths.

If you have any tips on how you stay happy and positive, please share them, I would love to add them to my list.-

Pictorial Webster's: Inspiration to Completion by John Carrera

Pictorial Webster's: Inspiration to Completion from John Carrera on Vimeo.

Check this video out. It is a wonderful piece of art. The actual start to end process of creating this book. Please watch it, especially if you have a love for books and book making & binding

Quoted from John site:The deluxe copy shown in the video is from an edition of 26 is $4600, but there is also the regular run of 100 books (doesn't have fingertabs) in $3200 binding, $2600, and $1800, and now from Chronicle Books a very splendid $35 version. Chronicle has a contest on their website where you can WIN the deluxe in the photo!

Creative Collage Workshop Went Very Well

Friday was my Creative Collage Workshop on Story Telling Through Collage. 10 creative souls attended the workshop and I must say I have a blast and the participants all seem to enjoyed the workshop as well.

Below are photos from the workshop.

 

 

Package Tape Transfer

Creating package tape transfers has to be the simplest and cheapest transfer technique I know of. It is a cool and neat trick- how the image sticks to the tape. I call it my magic trick- I once showed it to my dad and he was just amazed. He wanted me to tell him my secret.

Today I wanted to share my magic trick with you. - well am not, but The One Minute Musewill, she has posted a great youtube video on how to create a package tape transfer.

Below are examples of my attempts of using package tape transfers in my artwork.