New Year has a tendency to induce our continuous attempts to follow our dreams. After all, you never work a day in your life if you are doing something you love (apparently). Well, I currently have an enjoyable and rewarding job. However, during 2012 I rediscovered a long-lost love I’ve had since childhood that made me rethink my position. This love is design.
In my (not so distant) youth, I spent many hours, day and night, creating designs and images on paper (and other surfaces), or copying stuff I saw around me. Thankfully, in my childhood, someone else was looking after the cooking, cleaning, childcare and bill paying so I had plenty of time for this creativity. Once I became the person responsible for all these tasks I seemed to have forgotten about design and focused on a more ‘practical’ role. Life hasn’t been bad over the years, but I definitely knew that something was missing in my life.
The age of the internet and the smart phone have brought more distractions, but thankfully some have been a blessing to me. Dwell, Wallpaper*, Dribbble and Pinterest are great to watch the creativity of others. It is now easier than ever before to see so many variations of design in a short space of time. The browsing I’ve done on these sites has reminded me of what I hoped to do when I was younger. Unfortunately at that time, I never realised how to turn my passion for design into a ‘practical’ income-earning task. It was easier to gain finances elsewhere and that’s where I went.
Over the last two years I have assisted my wife in (one of) her passions and it allowed me to be creative. The time we could afford within the family to do this has often been restrictive, so not giving it the commitment it needs has often been demoralising. However, in recent months I have tried to create a positive outlook on this and say some time is better than no time. We all have to start somewhere, don’t we?
The year 2012 was coming to an end and I was determined to create a design life for myself. Income from this is not essential but will be a bonus when it happens. Maybe I’ll be saying something different in a few years from now!! However, an inspiration to me during 2012 was a new magazine I subscribe to called Offscreen. The man behind it is Kai Brach and his blog post for December 29th was a good read for me, and I hope to others.
It’s a simple reflection on what he has learnt over the last twelve months as a publisher. But in the opening paragraph he briefly describes what he did to start this magazine. It’s a great achievement and a wonderfully enjoyable read. The work is inspirational to me, the content is educational. I’m using his creativity as a starting block to my dream.
The pace I will take will be more erratic, but the path to design will be followed. Diversions from this path will hopefully be interesting. I’m willing to learn how to be creative (again). I’m hoping designers I meet along the route will teach me what they know. This blog is my way of reflecting on this learning, sharing my experiences with others and hoping I can look back in twelve months and appreciate what I have achieved. Hopefully the love of the subject will still overshadow the idea of it being work. I hope you might be interested in walking with me.
rothklee 