Creative: For Who and For Why?

Daniel Milnor

March 8

I am extremely photographically fortunate, and I don't mean with my own photography. I am fortunate because I spend my weeks, months and years in conversation with the world's best photographers. Sometimes these "conversations," are text messages, sometimes they are emails, sometimes they are phone calls, and when the stars align these conversations are face to face.

Wasted youth. Paris, late 1990s.

I would credit this post to a conversation I had earlier this week, face to face, with someone I consider a legend, but this post was also influenced by my old friend David Myers who has been a reader of this site for many years. David replied to my last post with several questions of his own.

Dan, your discussion about "creativity and practice" is refreshing. I am curious, when you think about the book or whatever it is in the end, what will become of it? Will it become a piece of your collected work and success comes from the accomplishment? Will success come in other ways from the effort?

Success. There you have it. There is that word again. We are now at the point in the post where you should see an enormous caution sign coming into view. DANGER AHEAD. Now, let's go back to my face to face conversation from earlier this week. My friend, the legend, sat down across from me and we began stitching out current events, our lives, projects, families, etc. He mentioned he was approached about doing a show and was initially excited about the prospects, but after learning the gallery refused to pay for framing, printing, shipping, marketing, and the opening he said "Don't think this is for me." (Yes, ever after a forty year career, this shit still happens. Galleries know there are willing folks out there, and yes, they do have overhead.)

This is where things get interesting. The third party involved in our conversation attempted to find a workaround so he might be able to find a better path while still landing the show. And then I asked, "But why?" "Why do you even want this in the first place?" He smiled and said "That's it." "That's the real question." He used a specific word. "Strive." He explained that he had been "striving" on a daily basis since he was eighteen years old. Every single day, even all these decades later, he felt intense pressure to strive. If a single day passed where he felt he did not put in a full "striving" effort he would find himself feeling intense guilt.

So, he made some changes. He talked about reading a "real, paper book," in the middle of the day. Initially, the shift was painful and anxiety filled but over time the routine began to feel normal. And now, he has come to grips with not needing to strive so much. You might credit this to age, and I would agree, but I would also attribute this to experience and intelligence. And perhaps knowing you have a forty year archive that is a visual testament that most photographers can only dream of.

Because I'm a self-centered douche, I added my own thoughts. I admitted that I was still very much driven, that striving was embedded in my brain and I didn't see that departing anytime soon. However, I also admitted that I had a secret weapon. I don't care. I don't care about you. And I don't care about him. I don't care about photographers, the YouTube-verse, Nelson Mandela, or U2 or Jennifer Aniston, or Stephen Hawking or Jesus Christ. Don't care.

Well, I DO care, but not in the way you might think. I care about you, and these folks I list above, as human beings, but I don't care what you think of me and I don't care what you think of my work. This is the dream situation. It makes everything exponentially better. It makes life better. Caring enough not to care. So, when David asked his questions I felt like this post was meant to be, and I also felt like this is a critically important message for you many of you.

"Cat in the Hat," painting. Made for no particular reason.

If you create for "them," you are in a for a long, long road. "Them" could be clients, agents, gallerists, curators, or something as toxic as a social audience. These people and entities will turn you inside out and they will assure you never figure out who you truly are. If you never figure out who you are, you will never determine what it is you are supposed to be making. You will never meet you, and you will never learn to be original. (Being original is no guarantee anyone will like what you do.)

When David asked about the book I'm making and what will become of it, my first thought was "Nothing." But nothing in the classic sense of something created for someone or something else. Do I have tasks to complete for Blurb? Tasks that include my work? Yes. Those are tasks. I check them off and get back to working on my own things because my own things are where my creative breakthroughs come from. A brand can't fail and experiment like I do. A brand wants no part of what is happening in my little brain.

David also asked, "Will it become a piece of your collected work and success comes from the accomplishment? Will success come in other ways from the effort?" Great questions in my book. I don't look for success. Never even think about it. I am my harshest critic, and most of the time I can see through myself with ease. I make a sketch and I see a hack. Make a picture and I know where that picture lives on the scale of good vs evil. I don't lie to myself because I don't have the time to waste. When I work on a book for myself, I am setting a goal to learn something. It might be a better understanding of the work itself, or a new design technique. I then print the book and move on.

In the coming months, I hope to undertake an experiment.

The success of this experiment, at this point, is a long shot. But the experiment is as much about you as it is about me. I want to try to create, presell, print and deliver two hundred copies of a custom book. The book won't be a traditional photobook. I've got enough of those already. The book will be about a photography project, but it will also be about the process, the behind-the-scenes and anything else I see fits the mood. I believe this is the future of photobook publishing. Small runs completely controlled by the artist. Presell the book, print it, deliver it and MOVE ON WITH YOUR LIFE.

Do I personally have a goal of doing this? No. But I believe this model is doable for many of the folks I see going down the traditional publishing path where they are spending tens of thousands of dollars, and eighteen months of their life, to get a book they may or may not like. So, for the first time in a long while, I DO have a plan for success. But I still see myself as the middle man. I'm just the guy who might have the connections to pull this off. (It still depends on several things out of my control.) When the test is over I will go back to making things for myself, and being very content with this little model.

Remember, you are CREATIVE. You have a responsibility to be the best creative you can be. You won't ever find that person if your drive for success is the most dominant force pressing on your back. You will make what is acceptable and what is popular, and we all know where those roads end. I need to end this five star beauty of a post with a disclaimer. This system works for me, but it might not work for you. Everyone defines success in their own way. Mine happens to live and die with me, but yours might not. We are all obtuse shaped humans moving through a world that loves the more traditional three, four, five or six sided shapes. Fit in, get in line, don't rock the boat. I find myself drawn to those who have repeatedly failed at fitting in. My parents told me in elementary school that our family did not fit in. (True story.) This was not a brag, this was just boring fact.

Perhaps the best solution here is to question ourselves. Why? Why do we want what we want? Do we crave for inherent, personal reasons or due to outside forces, and if we do crave for outside forces, how do those cravings differ from our very own? This will be sobering for some of you, but that's okay. Life ain't supposed to be easy. Just walk to the plate and take your best swing, and if you strike out, that's okay. There is another game tomorrow.