I was given two pieces of advice about how to evaluate potential projects when I was in graduate school. Both came from successful designers and with me just starting out figured I would incorporate this advice as best I could. The first piece of advice had to do with criteria for evaluating projects. There are three reasons to do a show; the art, the people, or the money. So long as any two of those three were present, the job was worth taking. The second was much more straightforward, take every job you can since you have no idea where it might lead.
Over time, the criteria I use to evaluate projects has gotten more refined, but in truth, more personal. Increasingly, I find myself drawn to projects that fully meet my creative artistic needs. If I am doing a job just for the money, the money better damn well be worth it. Otherwise the project must support my artistic needs.
In these lean economic times finding work has been much more difficult than it has in years past. As a function of this I was on the path for a while of taking a few projects for which I had no artistic connection because I felt I needed the money. The more I thought of this, the more these projects would bother me. Finally, I realized what it was.
As a freelance designer I do not have the luxury of sitting in my studio and creating wholly out my mind. I do not get to generate the project. Rather, I am asked to do a project and I can either accept it or turn it down. While I learned a lot during my years of saying “yes” to everything, I am increasingly learning the value of “No.” This is not the No of negation. Rather this No is an affirmation of the aesthetic viewpoint I want to propagate in the world.
By saying No to projects that I do not wholly believe in I am saying Yes to the projects that I truly want to work on. The more I do this the more I find it has less to do with the specific pieces themselves as it does the people involved and the final product being created. In short, I have discovered that there are only two reasons for taking a project, the People and the Art. Follow those two things and the money will take care of itself.
There are a hand full of directors who I will work with at the drop of a hat and without hesitation because I believe in the work they do. One of these, a long time friend, has a very different aesthetic than I do when it comes to lighting. The process can often be quite a struggle for me as I overcome my own ways of seeing to get behind his eyes. Nonetheless, I believe in his work and larger vision strongly enough that this has sufficient artistic merit for me to take the project.
Working for the money, all you have to fall back on when things get difficult is the thought of that paycheck. Working for the Art and for the People keeps in clear view that what you are working for is something larger than yourself. It is, in fact, bigger than everyone involved.
As Moss Hart has famously said: “I have had many successes and many failures in my life. My successes have always been for different reasons, but my failures have always been for the same reason: I said yes when I meant no.”
Reading this I could not help but think back to how I choose each crochet project I embark on in my spare time. Not a life’s pursuit, not a profession, just a hobby and a bit of personal expression, and yet; unless I see an end project that is more than that, it never gets past the first few stitches. I hesitate to do it for pay because I know the second I say yes just because someone actually wants to buy my work…. it’s going to lose my interest… Maybe someday.