Two sayings ring true with me of late. “You can’t see the wood for the trees” and “A change is as good as a rest” can be ever so true, especially in this modern world of sharing, social networks and instant gratification. It is easy to be bogged down within this cacophony of still and moving image and get stuck in a selected stream of digital experiences.
My biggest moments of inspiration come when I pull myself out of this cycle and expose myself to other influences especially those outside the confines of the monitor.
I took time to spend an afternoon at the Tate Modern last week, and amongst the various galleries spent a great deal of time in the William Klein exhibition.
A montage of his moving image pieces was so engaging, and felt somehow current despite it being films from the 60s-80s. Slowly moving around the gallery taking in his use of gritty monochrome images and the way he captured an unassuming America left me feeling charged. We left the exhibition and I found myself looking at my surroundings slightly differently, as if he had left some tangible imprint in my thought processes, albeit temporarily.
Despite being a Web designer/developer the exposure to this different media in a real life environment was so uplifting, it made me feel excited and eager to get back to the studio and get stuck into some projects.
It doesn’t have to be man made creativity, nature can offer up just the sort of visual feast needed to get you on track. A walk up a mountain or a cycle along some countryside lanes will throw up an early morning landscape or a perfectly framed shot that is just yours for that moment.
Sometimes your brain just needs this jolt of creativity to fire it back into action rather like a defibrillator for the mind. Often I will find this sort of “left field” experience from the usual day to day routine will somehow make my brain pull forth the solution to a problem I have been puzzling over or clear a case of “designer’s block”. So I would urge you take the time to remove your virtual blinkers and breath in the world around you, you never know where it might lead you!
Originally published on thebran.ch - ( http://thebran.ch/articles/taking-the-blinkers-off )