Modern Material

As a begin to embark on a new adventure as creative director by finally casting humans in the roles of characters who have been the center of my attention for four years, I find myself letting go of anything and anyone who stifles my creativity.

Creativity isn’t something that you can force out of an uninspiring beige corporate cubicle. It’s not something you can schedule from 9-5. It’s not stable. It’s not measurable. It’s not like anything you’ve seen before. It doesn’t have rules. It doesn’t have levels. It does not come when you ask it to. It does not stay in your brain like knowledge.

Creativity is fickle. It flows fast and dries up. It hits you in the middle of the night and and is gone by morning. It interrupts your ability to listen when someone says something that sparks your own thoughts. It gives you something to look forward to and nothing to forget. For everything is a seed that can be grown into a tree. You might find use for that useless object.

Creativity is a gift, but it’s also a curse. It makes you do things you shouldn’t do. It feels like a love affair that can break your heart from betrayal. It can trap you in the past with a desperate need to change the story. It can take you so far into the future that it takes lightyears for the rest of the world to catch up.

Creativity isn’t a job you can quit. It’s not a job you can just start. It’s a lifestyle everyone in your life must follow. You won’t be normal. You can’t be calm. You’ll be bored out of your mind in any life that repeats. You need passion. You need risk. You need chaos that keeps your canvas unfinished.

Creativity is your life not a career. It consumes you more than any person can and will. It will test your love and twist your mind. Then leave you empty with a newfound sadness. You’ll lose ambition and forget all the things you know that make you good at your job. For your job isn’t doing something that’s been done. Its about connecting the dots for something that still needs to be done.

Creativity is about being the first and making sure there is never a last. Its about leaving a lasting impression on the first impression. It’s a craft. Its like crack. It’s an obsession that makes you work until you achieve perfection. It can make you anxious and fear judgement or your work. It’s not a job that you just get done. Its a challenge that you get the honor to solve.

I would not trade my life for anything as long as I’m given the right to have creative freedom. And when it’s taken away or taken for granted, I must go on a crusade to save myself. No amount of money can convince me to sell my soul. No soul can convince me to buy into a belief system that does not let me live my life the way I want to live my life. Love is fleeting and life is lonely. Having money is freedom. How you make money can be restrictive. But as long as I can imagine a world in which I can make a living using my creativity, I will always believe that nothing I did was time wasted. It was time spent building each dot.

I’m so incredibly grateful to have found a team who is able to ignite my passion and add fuel to the fire, but be able to harness my energy and help me operate a business. (Details to soon come) Now begins the path to making connections between all my dots before we turn on the electricity. Selling my work to any creative person who wants to be a dot in Modern Material so they can to connect to my dots and I can connect to their dots.

Don’t ever ask me to shutdown the system because even in darkness I will find a way to turn the lightbulb back on and come with a replacement to fix all my mistakes. A light may still be flickering where a bulb used to shine. And I may have to finally except what can’t be fixed if it isn’t mine to fix. All I can do is try my hardest to see what works to get the lights back on. It’s not always a simple fix, but if you get creative, you might just solve one of life’s biggest problems and realize you can turn it into a business if other people have the same problem.

That’s what makes me, me. I look for problems and need to solve them. I don’t look for perfection and want to settle for being a part of what’s already been done. For it’s the work I do to make life perfect for me, not the life I have that I’m happy with that truly makes me happy.

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- Annie Travis