Art in the Everyday– it’s everywhere you look! (This may be why I appreciate Andy Warhol so much. It’s largely where he came from in creating his own art and I so respect that about him! You can read more in this older post— https://charrcrail.org/2014/02/06/lets-talk-art/)
I teach and speak to classes on a regular basis and one of the things I talk about is how we are all creative and art is everywhere even if we don’t really pay attention or notice it as we go though our days. I actually use the example of a wall switch. We flick a switch to get light into a room and we go on our way and never even pay the slightest bit of attention to something so seemingly mundane.
But that wall switch was designed by a creative mind with multiple considerations for functionality and appearance. Someone had to actually put a lot of thought into what it would look like, how it would be shaped, what materials it might be made of, how it would attach, where the nails go, the size of the holes, it’s specific size, what it might cover or surround, how something would plug into it and what color it would be coming out of the factory.
And that’s just the considerations of person sitting in the seat as the designer mapping it out. There were many many people involved in this item prior and probably many more in the actual manufacture of it. There were supervisors, testers, research and development types and ultimately there were people involved in the actual moulding and creating of it. There were people who made the first working model of it before it was approved for the public and went forward to the production line. And then there was the actual production line.
At the core of even this one small item there were many many questions that had to be carefully considered and answered before it could even be manufactured. And it’s something we need and use everyday, each and everyone of us. Yes, there always is someone— some ONE person, designer, artist, creative— who first conceives of something, probably makes a sketch of it before we even know it exists. And then it exists because someone created it.
Wow, what a long way around such a simple idea. Just start noticing what you see. Start noticing the art in the everyday and soon it will be illuminating itself to you regularly and you will delight as much as I do in the beauty that creativity is.
We will keep talking about this and how it relates to us as creators. Because Art is Everywhere and Life is Art. We create. Humans were born to create. We simply can’t help ourselves and we will talk about that and about the extraordinary Art in the Everyday a lot more on this blog!
Have something you want to add to this conversation? Please comment and share!
