Keep Going: 10 Ways to Stay Creative in Good Times and Bad (Austin Kleon)

1) Write. There is no substitute. Write what you most passionately want to write, not blogs, posts, tweets or all the disposable bubblewrap in which modern life is cushioned. But start small: write a good sentence, then a good paragraph, and don’t be dreaming about writing the great American novel or what you’ll wear at the awards ceremony becaus

... See more

When you’re an artist, all the material is in the dance of life, in taking the time to go camping with your friend or watch tons of movies. It’s in getting back to your play self and being excited to pick up a crayon. Where did you get this idea that you should be constantly producing? Are you alive? Are you getting out of bed? Well, good. You did ... See more

My entire philosophy of how I organize myself as a working painter can be summed up by something George Carlin said: “Just keep movin’ straight ahead. Every now and then you find yourself in a different place.”

You hear a lot in art school about how painters must continue to “grow” and “evolve”—but I think those are such bullshit words. There is gre... See more

No way was I going to give up on my work simply because it wasn’t “working.” That wasn’t the point of it. The rewards could not come from the external results—I knew that. The rewards had to come from the joy of puzzling out the work itself, and from the private awareness I held that I had chosen a devotional path and I was being true to it. If som

... See more