Steal Like An Artist

Great artistry is grand larceny. So here’s your manual for “How To Steal Like An Artist:”

Every artist gets asked the question, “Where do you get your ideas?”

The honest artist answers, “I steal them.”

Nothing is Original. It says it right there in the Bible. Ecclesiastes: “That which has been is what will be, That which is done is what will be done, And there is nothing new under the sun.”

1 + 1 = 3.

Every new idea is just a mashup or a remix of previous ideas…

You are, in fact, a mashup of what you choose to let into your life. You are the sum of your influences. The German writer Goethe said, “We are shaped and fashioned by what we love.”

The Artist is a Collector…

We make art because we like art.

All fiction, in fact, is fan fiction.

The best way to find the work you should be doing is to think about the work you want to see done that isn’t being done, and then go do it.

Draw the art you want to see, make the music you want to hear, write the books you want to read.

—Austin Kleon, “How To Steal Like An Artist (And 9 Other Things Nobody Told Me)”

Austin TX author/artist Austin Kleon wrote Newspaper Blackout:

Just one more nugget from Austin’s essay: “The more I stay away from the computer, the better my ideas get.”

via Comma-Q.