You are dedicated to your craft. You have spent countless hours honing your skills. You have a boundless curiosity for the underlying theories and structure of communicating ideas. You are the artist who finds the connections between your medium and other communications media. You are the artist who relishes in a setback; after all, it's a new opportunity to learn and grow. Inspiration is more than a haphazard mode of thought requiring constant nurturing: it is your natural state of mind.
Lean Into Art is where you go when you're ready to push yourself as an artist in new ways. As a place to learn communication arts online it combines an art-journaling approach, the best of live and time-shifted classes, and a recognition system that encourages students to finish projects, give feedback, even participate in teaching.
It's a big art challenge - that's why we put the enticing warning in the name. You have to lean into it.
Sunday, May 5, 2013 at 11:40PM In this episode of Extra Lean, Jerzy and Rob discuss sincerity and wonder if there are things we're really supposed to outgrow as we grow older.
Saturday, April 27, 2013 at 1:30PM Jerzy and Rob discuss how Jerzy recently took LIA Quest 6: An A-Team of Your Own into his classroom. Rob wonders if we can also make use of this kind of game-like exercise in business situations. How can we engage in conflict with ourselves and others with more fun and less focus on fear and scarcity? Losing in public can be a scary thing.
Then as a very related bonus topic, we delve into practicing teaching. How do we practice the material, what happens when the material gets too familiar, how do we discover ways of presenting the material that works for the different audiences we work with?
Saturday, April 27, 2013 at 1:26PM Jerzy and Rob discuss services like see.me, gumroad, the idea of micro-patronage, and interesting uses of it. Were Scott McCloud's Reinventing Comics predictions right after all? Then we delve into understanding the value that we share with audiences as artists and different outlooks on asking for support: "help me!" vs. "be part of this!".
Friday, March 22, 2013 at 10:32AM Why does the word "failure" carry such negative power? Many of us understand intuitively that failing is part of the process of learning, yet acknowledging failure out loud often makes us or others uncomfortable. This time Rob and Jerzy wonder aloud about the motives and assumptions behind our reactions to this divisive word, as well as the importance of choosing our battles wisely when helping others who are encountering their own failures.
Links mentioned:
Monday, March 11, 2013 at 1:50PM What's the line between ranting and leading with passion? Jerzy and Rob discuss how a combination of thoughtful consideration and passion for a subject can be a useful recipe for leadership on one's field.
