How to bring your creativity to work
The Inventor makes new things so she can solve existing problems
The Crafter thinks about how things are put together to create a useful outcome
The Tinker uses her skills to imagine, organise, dismantle and revitalise
The Painter creates a broad-stroke vision of the future
As a jobbing artist, I created every day. Over the years I’ve moved between industries, my world looks very different, but space to continue my arts practice has been vital. At work I now, I rarely pick up a paintbrush, but creativity shows up when I need it, often emerging as personas to guide my work.
Under pressure the inventor takes the lead, she is pragmatic, purposeful and tests ideas, she outsources equipment and materials, she invents solutions.
When things slow and time is plentiful, when there are multiple components and techniques and relationships in a piece of work, the crafter comes. She takes her time to make choices and connections. She allows the picture to emerge stitch by stitch, strong with linked knits and lasting form.
The tinker plays around the edges, making and remaking. Often, she sits in my imagination turning an idea over, shaping and unpicking. She fidgets, waking me up in the night when something isn’t right. In the energy of a group she shines, contributing, challenging, reflecting, and making.
The painter helps communicate ideas, she’s there when I want to pull together disparate elements into a colourful story, she draws people in, gathers everyone in front of the vision. She turns us to face the same way, all feeling and seeing together.
Sometimes the characters arrive together, the crafter and tinker run the codesign workshop, the painter shows how the inventors plan works in the future. Sometimes I forget these characters or try to embody new ones that don’t fit as well. I’d love to bring the precise silversmith to the table or the performative juggler, but my creativity doesn’t stretch that way.
My podcast list, allies and inboxes all brim with crafters and tinkers, I follow painters and respect and learn from inventors, but the magic comes when I seek out other characters who round my perspective, embellish and transform my ideas, coproduce our work together.
So welcome to the method actors and designers, come in jewellers and calligraphers, greetings sculptors and printmakers. Even if your canvas is a laptop and your tools are made of plastic, your creative characters are needed. Bring them with you to your next meeting and let’s see what we can make?
