You read the title and thought I was talking smack. But in fact, on last week’s special addition of chasejarvisLIVE (during the week-long creativeLIVE broadcast extravaganza of FREE photo education PhotoWeek) we connected LIVE with the creator of THE manifesto for creativity in the digital age Steal Like an Artist. Intrigued? Well you ought to be. Austin Kleon is a brilliant artist (Newspaper Blackout), speaker (giving the keynote this year at SXSW!), a NY Times best seller, and Austin is perhaps the most articulate artist alive at discussing creative inspiration, how we find it, and HOW to find those things which elude most every photographer/creative — your very own style and vision. He was my guest on last week’s chasejarvisLIVE and it’s no exaggeration to say that it was one of the most inspirational episodes to date.
Here’s a taste of what you’ll learn from the re-watch of Austin on the show:
-How to Steal Like an Artist (no, seriously, you need to start doing this….)
-How to find that creative vision that is truly your own
-How side projects and hobbies are critical – it’s what you make that matters
-How to promote your work in a way that doesn’t feel gross
-That geography is no longer our master – you can live anywhere and make it big
-That creativity is about subtraction
Just like Austin, Picasso, and many others….Jim Jarmusch says it clearly:
“Nothing is original. Steal from anywhere that resonates with inspiration or fuels your imagination. Devour old films, new films, music, books, paintings, photographs, poems, dreams, random conversations, architecture, bridges, street signs, trees, clouds, bodies of water, light and shadows. Select only things to steal from that speak directly to your soul. If you do this, your work (and theft) will be authentic. Authenticity is invaluable; originality is nonexistent.”
Enjoy!
A reminder that all of life is a collage.
Brilliant design there of the note box with the drawing.
“Creativity is knowing how to hide your sources.” –Albert Einstein.
http://roeschphotography.blogspot.com/2012/06/thought-of-day-albert-einstein-on.html
Thanks, Chase, for posting content like this. It is really great. Keep it up.
(My last comment here.)
Austin steal some of these quotes on stealing.
Post your collected quotes on stealing so I can steal them.
Wait … isn’t this called sharing?
😉
30 Quotes On Stealing
“To steal ideas from one person is plagiarism; to steal from many is research.” – Anonymous
“If we steal thoughts from the moderns, it will be cried down as plagiarism; if from the ancients, it will be cried up as erudition.” – Charles Caleb Colton
“Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal.” – T. S. Eliot
“Good artists copy, great artists steal.” – Pablo Picasso
“Lesser artists borrow, great artists steal.” – Igor Stravinsky
“Immature artists imitate. Mature artists steal.” – Lionel Trilling
“Good writers borrow from other writers. Great writers steal from them outright.” – Aaron Sorkin
“If you’re going to steal, steal from the best.” – Woody Allen
“Somebody told me long ago that in acting, it’s okay to steal, just steal from the best.” – Nathan Fillion
“About the most originality that any writer can hope to achieve honestly is to steal with good judgment.” – Josh Billings
“Gary Oldman is impossible to steal a movie from. He’s such a great actor.” – Kevin Bacon
“I think all comics borrow from each other. Only a few have an original voice, and I wasn’t one of them. In the end, I couldn’t figure out who to steal from, so I stopped doing it.” – Steve Buscemi
“Stealing things is a glorious occupations, particularly in the art world.” – Malcolm Mclaren
“The only way you can get good, unless you’re a genius, is to copy. That’s the best thing. Just steal.” – Ritchie Blackmore
“The number one rule of thieves is that nothing is too small to steal.” – Jimmy Breslin
“It’s nice to sometimes get things out of life, rather than stealing from other artists. I’m trying to steal from the real people.” – John Hawkes
“There’s no shame in stealing – any actor who says he doesn’t is lying. You steal from everything.” – Benedict Cumberbatch
“I steal from every movie ever made.” – Quentin Tarantino
“There’s a lot for screenwriters to steal from songwriters, in terms of getting to the point.” – Paul Thomas Anderson
“Nothing is original. Steal from anywhere that resonates with inspiration or fuels your imagination. Devour old films, new films, music, books, paintings, photographs, poems, dreams, random conversations, architecture, bridges, street signs, trees, clouds, bodies of water, light and shadows. Select only things to steal from that speak directly to your soul. If you do this, your work (and theft) will be authentic. Authenticity is invaluable; originality is nonexistent.” – Jim Jarmusch
“A real writer learns from earlier writers the way a boy learns from an apple orchard-by stealing what he has a taste for and can carry off.” – Archibald MacLeish
“I don’t want to steal anybody’s story. I very much want to use the stories that I hear to get lost in my mind, to tell a larger story.” – David Levithan
“People see the ‘steal’ and they forget the ‘like an artist’ part.” – Austin Kleon
“You don’t want to steal the style, you want to steal the thinking behind the style. You don’t want to look like your heroes. You want to see like your heroes.” – Austin Kleon
“Don’t sell yourself short. No one will value you. Set a fair price for you, your book, your services, whatever it is that you have to offer. Most of us set way too low a price. Put it a little higher than you would normally be inclined to do. The worst that can happen is someone will come along and steal it.” – John Kremer
“They copied all they could follow but they couldn’t copy my mind so I left them sweating and stealing a year and a half behind” – Rudyard Kipling
“If you have to lie, cheat, steal, obstruct and bully to get your point across, it must not be a point capable of surviving on its own merits.” – Steven Weber
“If you ever have the good fortune to create a great advertising campaign, you will soon see another agency steal it. This is irritating, but don’t let it worry you; nobody has ever built a brand by imitating somebody else’s advertising.” – David Ogilvy
“Don’t worry about people stealing your ideas. If your ideas are any good, you’ll have to ram them down people’s throats.” – Howard Aiken
“I would like to make a toast to lying, stealing, cheating and drinking. If you’re going to lie, lie for a friend. If you’re going to steal, steal a heart. If your going to cheat, cheat death. And if you’re going to drink, drink with me.” – Anonymous
Austin is eminently quotable!
“People see the ‘steal’ and they forget the ‘like an artist’ part.” – Austin Kleon
“You don’t want to steal the style, you want to steal the thinking behind the style. You don’t want to look like your heroes. You want to see like your heroes.” – Austin Kleon
“By studying and stealing you’re trying to see what these people didn’t do – and where the gaps are that you can fill.” – Austin Kleon
“You’re looking for the voids to fill with your own work.” – Austin Kleon
“Your job is to do the work that you want to see done.” – Austin Kleon
“I call it chain-smoking … use the end of one (project) to light the other.” – Austin Kleon
“That’s the thing you have to understand about the whole process of art (or the work that we do) – you’re only half of the equation. It’s an interaction between you and the person who’s going to experience the work. The person who’s going to experience the work is bringing just as much to it and is just as important as you are.” – Austin Kleon
“I think a lot of people want to be the noun without being the verb.” – Austin Kleon
“When you become a (professional) writer are you still doing the thing you love?” – Austin Kleon
“Be as generous as you can and selfish enough to get your work done.” – Austin Kleon
“You could spend the rest of your life talking about creativity rather than being creative.” – Austin Kleon
Thanks for a great creative conversation!
Here’s the 280 character quote you mention at minute 15. Break it into 2 pieces or excerpt if you want to share it on Twitter.
“That’s the thing you have to understand about the whole process of art (or the work that we do) – you’re only half of the equation. It’s an interaction between you and the person who’s going to experience the work. The person who’s going to experience the work is bringing just as much to it and is just as important as you are.” – Austin Kleon