Studio J

Rob Provencher, a photographer I admire and the co-founder of No BS Photo Success wrote those words, and they really struck a chord with me.
This has been a powerful theme in my life over the last year. I learned it through photography and I think it’s useful far beyond capturing images. It really can be boiled down to that bumper sticker: Fear Kills Creativity.

Over the past year, I’ve gone through periods of terrible, boring, uninspired work (work that could land me a job shooting for a department store portrait studio). I’ve also had periods when I was continually surprising myself with the quality and creativity in my work.

What made the difference?

FEAR. Fear of failure, of under-performing, of embarrassment. That fear pre-occupies your mind. Makes it unavailable for close concentration and focused attention on a problem.

The same lesson is repeated in my Toast Masters public speaking group; a principal they keep in their manuals and guides. Your speech will be so much better if you focus on your involvement in the subject matter, rather than turning inwards, pre-occupied by your anxieties.

I know, and you all know, that there are many other ingredients to creativity: work from your passion, steep yourself in it, seek creative ideas during your most energetic time of day, … but I’m talking about the most powerful one; one which I have had vividly demonstrated to me in my own life. Pre-occupation sounds too mild to describe it, because the inspiration and flow of creative ideas that comes with putting fear and self-doubt (even temporarily) behind you is very very powerful!
BELIEVE in your ability to approach creative endeavours resourcefully and you will be creative. You will delight and surprise yourself.

I have learned that the best route to creativity, the most essential element, is an unwavering confidence that you will find solutions to creative problems.

OK, it’s fine for me to say, you just need confidence in your work, in your abilities.

How do you get there?

Preparation and practice. ….and follow that up with evaluation or critique by your peers.
You have to produce a large body of work before you don’t suck anymore. You may start out with great, discerning taste and a beautiful, inspired vision in your head – but without the expertise and talent to pull it off as well as you had imagined it. It can be painful to look at your own early efforts. You have to get those mistakes made now and put them behind you.

Preparation, practice, evaluation. If you think about it, I’m sure you’ll find many areas in your life where the same simple principles will work for you too.

She describes her 1st day on the job to me as we’re driving home.
I took my kids aside, sat them down and told them, I want to know everything you’d like to do and learn here.
Brilliant!! …was my 1st thought. Her 1st day and she already grasps that her gymnasts will learn more, develop faster and enjoy themselves better when their motivation is engaged by learning what they want to learn.

We talk about coaching and motivation, about making things fun. She describes redirecting a gymnast to a new activity before the frustration of repeated failed attempts makes it too difficult to focus. I get the scoop on the gymnasts in her groups. She sees each person with their own desires and needs and changes her approach to suit them. I hear about her ideas on bringing along a shy person.

I’m getting goose bumps by now. How did you learn so much about being a great coach? I ask. There’s people who have coached for years that still don’t understand the positive influence they could be, if they could just take on your attitude and approach.

That’s how I learned from Laura and Marlene, she tells me. The coaches she changed gymnastics clubs for to follow them to their new club. I already knew they were something special; I’m getting a better idea now why.

What I thought was a good summer job for my daughter Kayla has transformed into a great summer job. The opportunity to try your best and stretch yourself at something worthwhile; the teaching, the leadership, the practice at helping individuals and groups, ….

Try learning that, operating the deep fryer all summer.

Kayla, I stopped genuinely worrying about what kind of monkey you would become when you got together with some grade school friends 5 years ago and organized a bucket brigade. Hundreds of emergency care kits went to Iraqi refugee families through the Mennonite Central Committee.

It’s silly that I didn’t know your good heart before then. I haven’t stopped noticing ever since.

I’ve been happy with you and proud of you for a long time now. On this occasion, I’m happy for you.

The new coach:

I’ve been thrilled with the early feedback on this website. Special credit has to go to my friend Laurie Skantzos, the artist who painted the background just for this site.

Laurie also finishes my custom studio cabinets with paintings and finishes that become objects of art themselves. She has been instrumental in my photography. The comfort and ease I felt working with Laurie on her promotional portraits turned a switch on in me that has changed my interactions and creativity as a photographer ever since. Overnight, I became a much better photographer. More relaxed, comfortable and easy-going with my subjects. More creative. More confident. More playful.

It was her beautiful paintings that 1st stirred my interest in abstract art (something I avoided whenever I could, before then). That is no small change of heart; my mind was closed!

I don’t think it’s in many lists of what a friend does but I’d like to add to my list that a friend helps change you, without consciously trying, to become a better person. Here’s some pictures of my good friend, Laurie Skantzos and some samples from her work:

If you love art, put on your favourite walking shoes and get yourself to Toronto this weekend for the Toronto Outdoor Art Exhibition at Nathan Philips Square (Fri July 11th – Sun July 13th, 2008 – rain or shine). This is Canada’s biggest outdoor art event, featuring over 500 artists of all mediums.

Laurie Skantzos will be featured there at booth 132 in the Pink section (it’s a corner booth near the pool).

Artist Locator Map for the show

laurieskantzos.com

I owe some thanks to dizzain.com in New York for taking my design and reproducing it down to every detail as a working wordpress site. This was a unique and difficult design to do with some big technical hurdles. I don’t think there’s many web developers out there with this level of wordpress design expertise. I’m so happy they pulled it off! My apologies to internet explorer users during some of these early days. I kept breaking the site in IE with sloppy code in my posts and then asking Nicole James at Dizzain if they were having problems! She was probably forming a Neanderthal brow ridge from rolling her eyes at my emails! Thanks for patiently pointing out my mistakes Nicole!