On this weekend, I watched a video of a speech by Paula Scher on the topic of Do What You’ve Never Done Before.
Paula Scher talked about how she learned that the way stuff gets made is actually accidental and circumstantial. She talked about four of her landmark projects that had almost very little to do with anything she did before, but they worked out really well eventually. That really inspired me. Because I am always afraid to do things that I’ve never done before, even in life. Especially as a designer, I should always keep exploring and trying with confidence when going into uncharted territory. Something unexpected and surprising might just happen.
Paula Scher also talked about sometimes just ignore the creative brief. She was hired to design a logo for a town called the Northside and picked in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania. There is an underpass of the train trellis where people don’t want to across it, so the businesses don’t get as much business as they would. But she didn’t think following the brief to make a logo can get people to go to the Northside. What she ended up doing was to do stuff to the underpass and make it a landmark of the place. What I learned from that is I should always try to think beyond the brief and not limited myself to the brief.
Paula Scher mentioned about the different between design and art. She said that design has purpose and art does not. I am not sure if I agree with that. I think everything has some purpose to it.
