Steal Like An Artist by Austin Kleon
As an artist, I’d always strive for originality. I’d strive to stand-out, to be different from the rest. When I’d fall short of the “out of the box” creativity, I’d feel like a sham…an impostor.
Until…..
Steal like an Artist by Austin Kleon.
It unburdened me. It allowed me to give room for unoriginality and ordinary. It allowed me to be inspired by great creative minds and begin from there.
Inspiration not plagiarism is the theme of the book.
This book is as charming as it is practical. I reveled in each chapter.
One particular chapter hit me right in the gut and had me gasping for air. Chapter two: “Don’t wait until you know who you are to get started.”
For a long time my work had stalled. I would kill certain projects before they even hit the drawing board. I felt I didn’t know what I was doing. I felt I was all over the place and didn’t have an ‘authentic,’ ‘original’ voice. I Felt like a fraud!
But No more. Now, “I steal like an artist”, “I use my hands”…I just begin.
Kleon says, “…..limitations mean freedom. Write a song on your lunch break. Paint a painting with only one color. Start a business without any start-up capital. Shoot a movie with your iPhone and a few of your friends. Build a machine out of spare parts. Don’t make excuses for not working — make things with the time, space, and materials you have, right now.”
The book is quick, it’s punchy, entertaining, filled with real life advice from Kleon himself, with the use of illustrations, and exercises.
Here are the 10 chapters:
- Steal like an artist.
- Don’t wait until you know who you are to get started.
- Write the book you want to read.
- Use your hands.
- Side projects and hobbies are important.
- The secret: do good work and share it with people.
- Geography is no longer our master.
- Be nice. (The world is a small town.)
- Be boring. (It’s the only way to get work done.)
- Creativity is subtraction.
In essence, Kleon’s book is a manifesto that outlines how we’re all artists, how creativity allows for the boring and mundane, and how to allow for influence in our work.
Buy now on Amazon: steal like an artist
~Sibongile “sibo” Tshabalala
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