Patricia Saxton, Author at saxtonstudio blog

July 22, 2009 In creativity, intelligence, work and play By Patricia Saxton

Play More, Work Better

The Importance of Playtime

dog playing frisbee When was the last time you jumped up and down like a kid, or played frisbee in the rain … just for the fun of it? If you have, you’re better off. If you haven’t, maybe it’s time!

I recently saw bits and pieces of a TV documentary about the power of play. It showed images of wild animals, who might normally be mortal enemies, engaged in play. And children, of course, using all their natural talent for having a good time.

The essential message though, was that play is not just for fun. And it’s not just for kids or animals. It’s actually really, really good for you.

And when you think of it, who doesn’t like to play? I know I do. And knowing that it’s vitally beneficial for our well-being, makes it even more inviting.

But sometimes we adults can get so darn serious, or acquire some heavy sense of self-importance, or feel so burdened with the weight of our individual worlds (not to mention the world at large) that we don’t make room, or forget to make time, or heaven forbid lose the ability, to be playful.

By continuing to “play” throughout our lives though, we increase our brain’s learning capacity and become more productive. We’re more balanced, happier and well adjusted. We work better, and we live better. And seriously, it’s a lot more fun.

As Stuart Brown talks about in the video below, “play” seems to be its own separate biological entity. It’s inborn. It has a great evolutionary purpose. And this I believe to be 100% true. Yet there really is no particular purpose to play other than the purpose TO play. The point is to have fun. And the benefits are in the side-effects: pure, unplanned, and positively life-giving.

Dr. Stuart Brown’s research shows play is not just joyful and energizing — it’s deeply involved with human development and intelligence. Through the National Institute for Play, he’s working to better understand its significance.

July 16, 2009 In advertising, art, business, communication, creativity, graphic design, illustration, marketing, networking By Patricia Saxton

It's All About Relationships

A recurring theme has been emerging in my world quite a lot lately. In talks over the past several months with colleagues, in twitter posts directed to Seth Godin’s blog, and most recently in a conversation over lunch this week with Milton Glaser who has unarguably seen and done it all, combining art and business with unparalleled success.

The theme? It’s all about relationships. Here’s my quick take on it, with regard to the graphic design business (or any business, for that matter):

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In this day and age of computer savvy, a glutton of designers and a climate of economic strife, it’s no wonder many artist’s and agencies are having a hard go of it lately. It could be there’s too much talent and not enough demand, as everyone – from individuals to families to small businesses and large corporations – is holding tight to their purse strings.

But in any business climate – whether it’s booming or equilaterally depressed – three key elements always reign supreme: creativity, quality, and relationship.

An unfortunate side effect of a distressed economic environment such as the one we’re experiencing now, is that some media-buying decision-makers may opt for mediocrity, somehow aligning their efforts with the mood of the times – the sense of “lack” or “needing to do without” – by shopping around for the lowest price, regardless of creativity, quality or relationship. It’s easy enough to do nowadays; just google graphic design and hundreds upon hundreds will come up.

What can also happen in this kind of situation though, is that while it’s still possible to find creativity, and still possible to find certain levels of quality, relationship may well be left out of the equation. And that particular absence can kill a project, or make people wish it did.

Despite all the wonders of online connecting, the enormous choices and competitive pricing available, if you don’t like the people you work with, it can be a miserable experience. It boils down to the old adage of being a pleasure to work with.

You can be as creative as DaVinci, with the quality and craftsmanship of a Frank Lloyd Wright; and likewise, you can be a brilliant business mind with a world-changing product. But regardless of whether wallets are open or whether they’re closed, at some point human nature always plays its card – and wins.

July 13, 2009 In advertising, art, communication, creativity, graphic design, illustration, marketing By Patricia Saxton

Google's Unpopular Offer: Work For Free

Some Artist’s Say “No Thanks.”

Who doesn’t love Google? It’s friendly, fast, smart, practical and has established itself as an indispensable tool. It’s the undisputed King of search engines. But in June, word spread about a Google offer that many top illustrators felt they could refuse.

Exploitation? Good business? A dishonorable trend? Welcome exposure? … What do you think?

Read about it here in the NY Times.

July 4, 2009 In art, creativity, graphic design, illustration By Patricia Saxton

American Flag: A Visual Tribute

In May 1776, Betsy Ross sewed the first American flag. A year later in 1777, the Continental Congress passed the first Flag Act, establishing an official flag for the new nation:

“Resolved, That the flag of the United States be made of thirteen stripes, alternate red and white; that the union be thirteen stars, white in a blue field, representing a new Constellation.”

However, between 1777 and 1960, Congress passed several acts that changed the shape, design and arrangement of the flag and allowed for additional stars and stripes to be added to reflect each new state. This broad span of time without specific guidelines resulted in many design interpretations – which in a sense also reflects the deeply rooted sense of freedom so cherished by Americans. The expressions were rich and proud, eventually evolving into the flag we pledge allegiance to today.

Carrying that theme of evolvement forward, in 1986 I discovered a beautiful book by Kit Hinrichs, called “Stars and Stripes” – a compilation of exceptionally creative American Flag images created by some of the finest graphic artists of modern time. I found it absolutely delightful, and a great tribute to the creativity and talent that abounds amongst us – and the creative freedom we’re able to enjoy in this great land of the free and home of the brave.

Below are just 13 samples of the many ingenious designs from that book honoring our American flag. Enjoy!

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June 17, 2009 In art, children's books, creativity, graphic design, illustration, words and language By Patricia Saxton

Saxton's "A Book of Fairies" Receives Reviewer Praise

available for pre-order on amazon.com

From Midwest Book Review:

A Book of Fairies is a fantastic children’s picturebook that presents a fascinating listing of imaginary facts about imaginary creatures. From the nature of Fairyland, to finding fairies, the tasks of fairies, fairy secrets and language, fairy medicine, and more, A Book of Fairies is a fun source of mystical speculation. The beautiful color illustrations perfectly complement the thoughtful text. A Book of Fairies is sure to bring joy not only to young readers, but also to adults who still believe in fairies!

“Of all the earth fairies, flower fairies are around us the most. Flower fairies are the ones skipping through the ivy, or tending your vegetable patch – yet they can be awfully hard to spot. They make their clothing from leaves and colorful flower petals, so they blend right into the gardens where they play.”

June 15, 2009 In communication, marketing, presentation, words and language By Patricia Saxton

Tangled Messages

Mixed messages are rampant, and their effect is usually one of two things: confusion or fear. Both of which can lead to a state of suspended inaction. What are people to think these days? A little clarity please, would be nice, if not wise.

The jumble of words and images slung at people day after day begins to resemble a garden overgrown with weeds. Hopefully, most folks can clear away the tangled messaging and find some sense among the vines. Something that is what it is, and means what it means.

Here are a few tangled messages that come to mind:

There’s nothing to fear, but if we don’t fix this problem there could be disastrous effects.

My door is always open, just please call first and not between 8-4 or 5-9.

This new drug will cure your disease, but it may kill you.

Isn’t it fabulous? There are now 2545 channels on tv and you can watch them all day everyday, even all at once!

And then, perhaps thankfully, some mixed messages elicit humor. (What were they thinking?) Unfortunately, they still have the fear/confusion factor in play. (Apologies to Mr. Rothenberg, but one must admit this image hardly elicits optimism.)

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I like a good riddle as much as the next person, but if it’s not meant to be a riddle, please don’t go there! A little extra thought is well worth the investment of time, especially if it avoids a tangled mixed-up message.

January 23, 2009 In art, graphic design By Patricia Saxton

In Praise of Black and White: Part I

Ansel Adams, Moon and Half Dome

Each year, a new Ansel Adams wall calendar hangs on the door leading to my studio. His superbly articulated, stunning black and white photography reminds me daily of my love for the natural world as well as the innumerable shades, shapes, shadows and tones that create, change, and emerge from, the world around us.

Yet in a time when everyone wants color, the classic beauty and the powerful visual possibilities of black and white are often neglected. In the design world, black and white is often completely overlooked or passed by in favor of any use of color. As if black and white implies something less important, or something dull – even something “cheap”.

But when used well, black and white can be anything but dull, nor without value. Black and white can be intensely dramatic, elegant and rich. It can get a strong point across without the distraction of colors. It can be brilliant or moody, edgy or slick in ways that color cannot. It can sparkle with cleanliness. Black and white carries undisguised strength, character and integrity … when used well. Not all photographers have the eye nor skill of an Ansel Adams. Not all designers see in black and white. Clients rarely consider it. But it would be nice to see a greater appreciation of the noble duo of black and white.

When people want straight talk, they’ll say “tell me in black and white” – which infers that they’ll get to the truth of the matter. But more often people speak in shades of gray, or dress it up in garish colors for dramatic effect. So it is with design – a multitude of colors have the potential to become an undifferentiated sea of grays, or gussied up so much the point is lost for the color.

Of course color is beautiful. As an artist, I can’t help but adore color. Bold, rich fusions of color. Yet color alone will not make a bad design good. And it’s not so much that color is overrated, but that black and white is underrated. You don’t see it alot, which is unfortunate, because the effects of black and white can be pretty spectacular.

It’s a rich experience to see things in black and white; stripped of color, a million shades of gray become a lansdcape of lights and darks that blend and bounce against one another to create a whole. Even if you don’t see things quite like that, a striking black and white image often touches people unexpectedly. It’s raw and fundamental – and like a good story, it’s satisfying, and it allows your mind to fill in the color that’s left unsaid. Like a well-told story, black and white art can be refreshing, engaging and wonderfully, surprisingly inspiring.

Below is a broad sampling of some pretty nice black & white work. There’s a whole lot more (though not enough) than shown here, but it’s a good smattering of styles …

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January 9, 2009 In words and language By Patricia Saxton

A Matter of Words

I love words. Written words. Not everyone has this kind of voracious appetite for words, and I understand that a lot of people would rather talk, or hear words, than read or write them. Maybe it comes with breeding, or DNA. But for those of us who love writing, it’s like breathing; you feel compelled to do it.

As a child, if I wasn’t drawing, I was writing. That pretty much still holds true. I love to write … letters, stories, poems, thoughts – all of it. I love the possibilities offered up with each new ripple of intermingling letters. I like the rhythm and the play of sounds that create a sentence. I love how words flow on a page, how they fall or jump, dance or hum, whisper or smack. I like how they all come together to make sense of something.

I also like that there are thousands of words available to pick from. And I like games where you find as many words as you can from one larger word. I like making words in scrabble. Words are fun.

But I also have a deep respect for words. Spoken or written, they are reflections of thought capable of moving people to personal greatness or ruin, to love, or even war. They can calm, or outright bore. They can repulse or inspire. In a split second, the words we choose to use can hurt just as easily as heal.

Some may argue that words are just talk; words are insignificant. That actions speak louder, I do agree. And true enough, not every word uttered will have the impact to captivate, bring laughter round the world or poison a soul. But I believe that even our everyday language carries far more weight and influence than we realize.

It’s important to be careful with our words; to be mindful of what we say. Maybe to “watch your mouth” as your mother might have said. To take even just a moment before speaking to check the thought.

Whether you love words or not, the world would do well with more respect for the power words can hold.

January 5, 2009 In advertising, marketing By Patricia Saxton

Selling Dis-ease

I realize this entry may not win me many friends in the Pharmaceutical advertising world, but I just have to ask – is anyone else weary of pharmaceutical commercials on TV? Or is it just me? I find them incessant, often offensive, and insulting to one’s intelligence. Here’s why.

On the rare occasions when I do actually turn on the tube, 9 times out of 10 one drug ad or another is right there with me. Spewing an idea that if you haven’t already had a particular set of horrid symptoms related to some nasty ailment, you soon, undoubtedly, will. And then you will need such and such medication. Which may or may not make you feel better, and which is almost guaranteed to cause an interminable array of god-awful side effects, even death.

All the while, happy medication-takers are shown walking through sun-dappled gardens with ever-so-pleasant music splattering the background reminding us how wonderful we can feel if we take such and such drug – compared to how completely awful you must feel, or will inevitably feel, without taking said meds.

Number one, I’m irritated that these ads are on when I happen to turn on the TV, which isn’t often. Which causes me to think they must be on a lot more than I realize. They are incessant.

Secondly, I find the bulk of the messaging insulting. The messages, in essence, tell you that you have, or will have, one – or several – of a variety of problems. (Tapping into the aging boomer generation no doubt, convincing people of the inevitability of ill health that arrives with age.) You will most likely have this or that sickness. You will suffer. You will have to have medication. You need to see a doctor now before it becomes a reality. If you have a hang nail, it could be a serious sign of A, B , or C disease and if not treated, you will be one miserable old coot. It will be far worse to be plagued by the rampant discomforts these meds will induce than to suffer the fear that you may possibly succumb to one of these health dilemmas.

The insult is the assumption that you don’t have a mind of your own. That you don’t have a clue. That you are easily swayed and you will then surely develop the very symptoms they are suggesting. Maybe even sooner than expected.

This is good old advertising at its best. It’s called hypnosis. The power of suggestion. Persuasion. Repetitive messages delivered to reach your subconscious mind, so that doubt and worry set in. Placing the seed of need in your mind. It makes me so angry I could spit. (I’m not sure where that phrase originates, but it feels heated and angry, doesn’t it.) In a nutshell, they are basically selling dis-ease and ill-health.

I am not a fan. And it worries me that people are taken in, convinced. (The ads keep running – must be working?) They will not seek a healthy lifestyle; they will assume they are headed for the worst. They will not consider that the thoughts they think, and the fears they feel, can aid in the manifestation of unwanted experiences. They will believe that they are, or soon will be, very ill. They will need the cabinet full of pills. They will be miserable. Just like the ads’ said.

May 24, 2008 In graphic design, marketing By Patricia Saxton

Marketing Overload?

Maybe it’s because it’s the end of a work week, but my head is really beginning to swirl. I just received some “must-have” information about LinkedIn – you probably know it, the online networking tool touting more than 20 million experienced professionals and ways to discover inside connections and potentially expand your business in untold ways. And the information I just received is intended to share all the fantastic ways you can make the most of the LinkedIn environment.

But I’m feeling struck by a seemingly raging river of marketing advice out there – mostly the marketing about marketing variety. And everybody, their uncles and maybe even their pets, are jumping on the bandwagon – make that rafts – and make that plural, rafts. I’m not making a negative judgment, because it is what it is, and probably needs to be what it is, but sometimes I get what I’ll call a “New York City” feeling: a sense of stimulation overload.

In this case it also arrives with a sensation similar to desperation, or perhaps anxiety – in the form of a message implying that if you don’t do these things you will not succeed. So you must do these things, and that is that. Join or lose. Fight and wriggle for your place amongst the million others vying for virtual attention. Do, do, do. Share, share, share. Express profundities and hope to be found. Blog it, video it, radio-blog it, webinar it, get the edge. Be everywhere. And the claims are promising; if you do this, and do that, and then do enough of that and that – and if you do all that over and over again – you’ll eventually hit gold.

Don’t get me wrong; the internet is a mind-boggingly wonderful medium. The opportunities for learning and the possibilities for connecting are pretty staggering. But once you dive in to the pool of all-the-marketing-you-need-to-be-doing, it can take a toll on not only your time, but may also take a little piece of your sanity. It’ll swallow you up if you don’t take a healthy break.

This raging river is partly because, of course, no one really needs to see anyone. They can work wherever. But the hope, of course, through all of this internet marketing-you-need-to-be-doing-so-you’re-not-left-behind, is that you do connect, and maybe you will meet, and in the end everyone can make wads of money and live happily ever after. I get that. I also get that people are yearning for connection.

Normally I love learning new tools, finding new and better ways to do things. So, call it Friday afternoon blues, semi brain-dead from filtering through all this stuff … but the onslaught of marketing to-do’s leaves me feeling compelled to simply avoid the frenzy, and approach it more from a zen-like place. Using the Chicken Soup mindset, or The Secret, or a Power of the Subconscious Mind place.

That’s where I’ll be this long-weekend. Not marketing, but “knowing”. Letting the zen of knowing take over, while digging my hands into a delicious bit of garden earth with joyful mindlessness – in between, of course, working feverishly on the illustrations for my next children’s book. (there; was that a good, if not round-about, touch of self-marketing?)

In the end, I know it’s smart to do both – the zen and the marketing. You have to pull back now and then, reflect, affirm your ground and define your goals. But you also have to “do the work”, and be a part of the changing way things are done.

Virtually speaking, that is.

And, yes, by the way, I am on LinkedIn. (Isn’t everyone?)