There was a time when you drew pictures.

With crayons and fat pencils you traced your world, oblivious to constraints that now stifle your creativity. There wasn’t a right or wrong way to draw, you just created. Your eyes savored everything they saw and you learned to explain this on paper with scribbles.

You drew things from all sides because that is how you saw them. Front, back, and inside-out. Proportion was something you felt rather than measured. Literal perspective didn’t interest you so you drew what something felt like, not how it appeared.

You drew the things you knew and loved. Your bike, mom and dad, and your pet. Love was expressed not by the accuracy of your lines but by the feelings inside you as you would drag your pencil across the paper. And for a while these treasures were posted on household monuments, held up by loose magnets and pushpins.

Then something terrible happened.

Criticism crept it. It no longer looked right. You become unsatisfied with the result. Maybe you came to this harsh realization on your own, or maybe someone corrected you. All of a sudden a new goal was imposed upon your drawings: realism.

And that was the day when your appreciation for abstraction died. Perfection became the goal and you never recovered.

From that day forward you held your drawing up and compared it against a more photographic representation of your world. Some of us gave up and never seriously drew a picture again. The fun was gone because we thought that drawing was really hard.

Some of us dug in and set out to perfect our drawings. We put down our crayons and started using both sides of the pencil. We burned through erasers as corrections were made. We learned to shade. We took measurements and traced photographs. Eventually our drawings started to look more like photographs. And that pleased us for a while.

A rare few became experts at drawing, refining the craft and creating stunning artifacts. Others embraced the camera and the literal renderings it delivers, pushing reality to reveal things that people have never seen before. Still others found other ways of expression leaving drawing behind in favor of music, writing, engineering, or some other profession where creativity is rewarded. We usually call these people artists. But most people never recover from the shock that they experienced when realism was imposed on their drawings as a child.

What if the oppression of realism was an artifact of adulthood that could be shed just as suddenly as your childhood realization that your drawings didn’t look right? Perhaps our understanding of the world is a constant revelation and not a two-stroke experience of pre/post adulthood. What is the next discovery of your life after you abandon your quest for perfection? Could it begin today?

Yesterday on the kitchen table was a newspaper. That in itself would be unusual given that I don’t subscribe to a newspaper, but this one was particularly different.The masthead of this paper said, “The Pirate News.” It was hand-written, photocopied, then colored by some eight-year-olds. It was fantastic. I asked my son what the story behind the newspaper was and he explained that he had started a pirate club with his friends. Obviously, Rian was the captain and his friends all became his first, second, and third mates respectively. I asked him where he got the idea and he said, “It just came to me. I like pirates so I thought I would start a pirate club.”

Beyond just being a proud dad, I love seeing what my son is interested in. He is at an age where you can visibly see him learning. You see it on his face when he makes a new connection. A look of determination relaxes into accomplishment as he uses his hands to build something. But most of all he is excited about what he is doing. He can’t wait to show me the things that he is creating. The same thing is true of Camden, our 9 month old. Everything he sees and hears is a fascinating new discovery. Wouldn’t it be nice to have that kind of excitement as an adult?

Somewhere along the way to becoming grownups we get the idea that you have to have a really good reason to create something. So when we meet someone who is spending their free time building things we ask questions like, “How do you find the time?” or “How long did that take?” We wonder how people can justify quitting their job to pursue a crazy dream. We roll our eyes at the dreamers and say, “It must be nice to have that much free time.” And the worst question is just, “Why?” Because we expect a profound answer that might push us out of our complacency. And when the answer is “because I like pirates” we are disappointed. Just loving something isn’t a good enough excuse for most people to take the risk. I think that’s why most grown-ups have lost the enthusiasm for learning that they had as children.

I am not big on resolutions, but this year I am going to worry less about justifying my creations. I will create things because I love them, and that will be enough. It might be a chess app, a camera made of Legos, or a Scotch tasting club. Will you join me in embracing this attitude? Will you join my pirate club?

I was recently included in a book called Cult of Lego. I am honored that my Lego camera continues to resonate with people six years after it made the rounds on the internet. Cult of Lego is a really impressive book, weighing in at almost 300 pages of fascinating photos, amazing projects, and colorful personalities. If you are a Lego fan, I encourage you to pick up the book.

Reading Cult of Lego has got me thinking about why people love Lego so much. What is it that has made Lego more than a kids toy and has elevated it to cult status? I think it boils down to a couple things that are happening in a child’s brain at the age when they discover Lego. Let me explain…

Most of us start building with Lego blocks at a critical point in our childhood development. It is at the age where our imagination is still alive and limitless. Our fantasies are real to us and we spend our days passing back and forth between the “real” world and the imaginary. And this doesn’t feel weird, yet. It is only later that adults convince us that our fantasies are silly, unimportant, or just a waste of time. That tragedy will happen soon enough, but for now, our toys still maintain our full attention. Toys consume our reality and we are happy.

The other thing that is happening in our childhood brain is a huge discovery. We learn that we have an amazing power. We can create things. Anything that we imagine we can build. Space ships, castles, trucks, ships, trains and anything we desire. Toys aren’t just something that we play with, they are something that we create worlds for. And since our imaginary worlds haven’t yet been severed from the physical world, our creations are as real to us as anything else. We really are creating bridges. The race car is real and it was created by you. This isn’t trivial. This is an achievement that will echo into our adulthood. You remember the sense of achievement from your childhood forever. And many of us spend our adult lives trying to recreate that feeling. Is it any wonder that so many engineers, designers, and professional builders still love Lego with the zeal of an 8 year old? I don’t think so.

I have a collection of toys on my desk at work. I am sure it causes some people to roll their eyes or maybe even take my work less seriously. I don’t know. But more than anything these toys are just a reminder to myself that I used to be 8 years old. I had the power to create planes that traveled at light speed. I could engineer a city beneath the ocean. I could create anything that my imagination could think of. I still can. And so can you.

It is fascinating to study how our brains work. Understanding what makes people do what they do opens the door to seriously powerful abilities. You can influence behavior. You can predict people’s actions. You can inspire people. You can overcome fear. You can produce meaningful work. Here are some videos that talk about our brains and give insight into how humans think:

Simon Sinek: How great leaders inspire action

Seth Godin: Quieting the Lizard Brain

Seth Godin: Quieting the Lizard Brain from 99% on Vimeo.

For the last week or so I have been thinking about the term zugzwang. Have you ever heard that word before? Zugzwang is created when you put someone in a situation where they are forced to move even though any movement would weaken their position. Isn’t that a beautiful idea? In our hyper-competitive society it seems foreign to use a strategy like that, whether it is in sports, business, politics, or even our relationships. Instead of praising the silent winners, the people who get the attention are the ones who defeat their opponents as graphically as possible. It is refreshing to think of someone with so much skill that they win by simply forcing their opponent to make a move – any move.

The thing that appeals to me about zugzwang is the idea that you can be in a situation where doing nothing is better than doing something. How un-American is that? Could it be possible that we are in constant self-imposed zugzwang? How long could you sit at your desk in silent contemplation without actually producing something? Deep thought might be what we really need, but instead we surround ourselves with devices that ping us constantly. This puts us in a constant state of motion and it kind of feels like we are doing something meaningful. And we get used to that feeling. Silence makes us uncomfortable. Stopping seems like an unthinkable strategy for success. Are we our own worst enemy, always overfilling our schedules, always promising more than we can deliver, and never saying no? We feel forced to do things that actually hurt us. And don’t get me started about procrastination. That sounds an awful lot like zugzwang to me.

So what is the secret to escaping zugzwang? First you have to do is be aware that it is happening. Life isn’t a chess game where you are required to move your pieces. You rarely if ever are in a situation where you absolutely have to do something. Seriously. You can find the time to isolate yourself from distraction. You can tell your spouse/boss/friends no. You can reduce your work load. You can stop procrastinating. You can be decisive and stop relying on others to make decisions for you. Easier said than done, but it at least is something to think about. I better wrap this up – I have work to do…

Disclaimer: Before I lose 90% of you when you realize that this post is chess related, I urge you to stick with me because I think there are some ideas here that you can actually benefit from even if you have never played a game of chess in your life!

In preparation for an iTunes app that I am developing, I have been studying some of the greatest chess games ever played. I expected these games to pivot on a moment in the game when one player had a spark of insight that led to a crushing defeat. I suppose to a certain extent that is true, but the impression I am left with isn’t how “good” the player’s moves were but exactly the opposite. These players weren’t making extremely “good” moves, they were actually making amazingly “bad” moves – that are only later realized as being correct. This has got me thinking about how our minds work and what we might be able to do to train ourselves to identify the difference between “bad” moves and moves that just look bad but prove to be correct in the end.

To me this is the fascinating thing about studying great chess players. While a computer can plow through massive amounts of data to find the answer, humans have a huge burden of experience tied to their analysis of game situations. In order to make a move that goes against everything you have ever been taught is a rare achievement that takes real courage. Brilliance occurs not by following the established formulas precisely but by knowing when it is appropriate to break the rules. The amazing only happens when canonical knowledge is abandoned in favor of a decision to do something that everyone else in the world would agree is “wrong.”

A computer doesn’t have to worry about breaking from tradition. All it has to do is crunch numbers. Humans can’t possibly process as much data as a computer so we create shortcuts. We boil things down to rules that are easy to remember. We make lists of exceptions to our rules. We look for patterns that match scenarios that are familiar. We survive based heavily on the shortcuts we make. We memorize answers in school because it is easier than solving problems repeatedly. We paraphrase. We summarize. And so we become a population of know-it-alls even though our knowledge is based on generalities and abbreviated summaries. Like walking CliffsNotes we each carry a knowledge base that is very wide, but rarely very deep. We get the “big picture” concepts and let Wikipedia fill in the blanks if we ever need to support our claims. This works really wonderfully except for the times when…

We make mistakes.
Our shortcuts fail us. The stats and research that was once so reassuring ends up being flawed. We are so used to trusting our machines that we stop questioning conventional wisdom. Oops. But that’s just the exception – most of the time we get it right. Right? I am not so sure. While we rarely run into catastrophic mistakes, we also rarely encounter amazing victories. Our days are filled with predictable, mundane, uninspiring, unexciting routine. You know that tomorrow will be pretty much like yesterday. Millions of games of chess are played every day and almost all of them are just like our every day life. They follow the established ideas. Risk is avoided at all cost. At the end of the day there are winners and losers but nobody really cares enough to figure out which is which. And most people are comfortable in this scenario. After all, it seems better to be moderately successful than to be a complete failure.

But maybe you don’t want to be mediocre. Maybe you aren’t satisfied with the status quo. Maybe you want to do something big and memorable. If you are serious about setting yourself apart you might want to seriously consider making more “wrong” decisions. It would be counterproductive to try to debate what exactly a “wrong” decision would look like, so let me just wrap this up by giving you three thoughts that may or may not prove to be helpful to you…

Three Rules For Breaking the Rules:

1. Deep Trumps Wide
With wikipedia only a click away it is much easier to understand a little bit about everything than it is to be the world’s authority on a single subject. That is why there are so many “jack-of-all-trades” and so few true masters in any given field. Strive to be a master. Know even the tiniest detail inside and out. Know exactly what you know as well as what you don’t know. Don’t ever “fake” knowledge on a subject that you are fuzzy about. Dig deeper, work harder, and never stop learning about your area of expertise. If you can truly attain mastership of something then making the “wrong” decision is no longer a risk. While everyone else is blinded by their incomplete knowledge you will be able to see the solution they are dismissing.

2. iPhone Defeats iClone
It would seem that patterning your project after someone else’s success would be a foolproof way of avoiding failure. Contrary to poplular belief, Apple doesn’t have the market cornered on innovation. Anyone can create the next revolutionary product. And yet the biggest competition of the iPhone isn’t from competing ideas. The only competition is from phones that function and look remarkably similar to the iPhone. This happens in almost every market. As soon as one company innovates there is a competitor waiting to copy their success. Don’t be the copycat. Embrace concepts that don’t look like something your competitor would make. Champion ideas that don’t fit nicely in the marketplace as it exists today. Look at how different the phone market is compared to pre-iPhone. This might feel like a mistake since it puts you all alone and separate from your competition. You won’t be alone for long.

3. Conviction or Death
If you are going to boldly break the rules there is one thing that you can’t do without: conviction. If you aren’t willing to defend your idea to the death then you might as well not even try. Lack of conviction leads to compromise. Compromise results in watered-down versions of your vision. Mediocrity is sure to follow and you will be left with nothing. But if you have conviction, the hard decisions will come easily because you know what needs to be done. This is the only way to achieve the impossible.

Since the difference between insanity and genius is measured by success, you should understand that fully embracing these ideas means that people will probably question your sanity. But what really do you have to lose? Go crazy.

P.S. Oh, I didn’t want to leave you hanging without a great chess game for your enjoyment. Here is a classic Bobby Fischer victory:

This is a post from the ongoing blog-to-blog conversation between myself and my friend Jason Simanek. If you need to catch up, here are our previous posts:

1. In Search of a Truly Creative Occupation
2. Fine Art in Museums: Tigers in Zoos
3. Invisible Artwork: If we ignore it maybe it will go away
4. Art is Communication, Getting Yelled At by Art Is as Much Fun as Getting Yelled At by People

“It is a certain kind of educated, intelligent and intellectually hungry person that seeks out and enjoys encountering things and people that challenge their own culture. To have any hope that the general public would embrace this practice is foolish.” – Jason Simanek

I am debating whether the population of people who embrace “a challenge to their own culture” is growing or shrinking in response to the internet age where everyone is networked together. On the one hand, people are connecting with people far different from themselves that they never would have encountered in the past. But people are also digging deeper into communities of like minded people. Is it better to be loosely connected to a physical community centered around ancestry and tradition or is it better to be tightly connected to an online community that passionately supports your obscure interests? There are pros and cons to both I suppose and a healthy person would benefit from both.

In general, I have more hope in the public than I think I have ever had in my life. One of the exciting things about the age of the internet is that the population of “intellectually hungry” people that you describe is exploding. While the walls of our homes may not reflect it, the population of artists has exploded thanks to the internet and technology.

Most people can afford a computer that makes it relatively easy to create something. Sure, the first thing they create with these machines is a video/photo/blog about their cat, but nevertheless, this has huge implications. It has changed the general public from a passive participant in our culture into an active member who is adding to and shaping the world. Now, rather than copying the rich “culture makers” sense of art, each person can define the meaning of their culture individually. And is it any wonder that the walls of most people’s homes isn’t where they choose to display their work? Now you can share your creations online with people who might actually appreciate what you are doing. The walls of the home seem pretty limiting by comparison.

So now we are shifting into a creative culture that encourages participation. We are all asking ourselves these questions: “Now that I have these tools, what should I create? Who can I share my creations with? Now that I have found a community of people who share my passions, what can I contribute? How can I improve the work that I am creating? How can I help others improve their skills?” In addition, people are forming opinions about things that they never would have thought about before.

“Only recently has the general public had the free time and money to attempt to emulate the rich by thoughtfully decorating their homes with the mass-produced copies of images that have already been defined as ‘good art’ by rich people in the past. Its as though they have a nostalgia for someone else’s past. They’ve replaced what was most likely their own relatively simple but rich folk art tradition with thoughtless, mass produced imagery.”

There is an article in Wired this month called “The Great Cognitive Surplus” that talks about how differently people are spending there time compared to a decade ago. Clay Shirky makes a great statement that, “When someone buys a TV, the number of consumers goes up by one, but the number of producers stays the same. When someone buys a computer or mobile phone, the number of consumers and producers both increase by one.” I think that the general public is shifting from a population that spends their free time into a population that uses their free time. (On a side note, the other voice in that Wired article is Daniel Pink who has a great video on YouTube talking about “the surprising truth about what motivates us.”

Five years ago it was almost impossible to connect with people who would stop and notice my work. The best I could do was offend a few people in the middle of a small town in the middle of Nebraska. Today I can share pinhole photos with hundreds of like-minded enthusiasts who appreciate what I do without giving me strange looks. These people are invested in the same kind of work and willing to contribute to my improvement.

Admittedly, I am blurring the lines between traditional artists (Warhol, Pollock, etc.) and people who just like to create things – whether that is open source software, Widipedia entries, blogs, or whatever. The internet isn’t going to transform everyone into artists and there are plenty of downsides to what the internet has contributed to society. But overall, I think it is an exciting time to be alive.

Andy Warhol is the last celebrity artist the world may ever know. While there are more artists living today than ever before, it is hard to imagine an artist personality today rising to the level of national awareness the way Warhol did. That is as much a statement about modern times as it is about the larger than life persona of Warhol himself. In the era of the blog Warhol’s insight that “in the future everyone will be famous for fifteen minutes” seems more prophetic than ever. The implication that is often ignored in this quote is that if everyone is famous, than nobody is. Twenty two years after Warhol’s death, there are countless fifteen minute celebs, but not a single artist more famous than Andy Warhol.

Warhol’s fascination with the notion of celebrity is simply one chapter in a body of work that explores dehumanization, consumerism, cultural desensitization, and materialization – all very “American” virtues. His charismatic life was so intertwined with American society that a study of Andy Warhol becomes a sociological commentary on American culture itself. Warhol recognized his connection saying, “I feel very much a part of my times, of my culture, as much a part of it as rockets and television.” In many ways Andy was the American dream. He overcame poverty, physical flaws, and pathological shyness to become the king of pop culture. But Warhol’s story is even more than a rags to riches tale. Andy Warhol packaged himself as a product for consumption just like the cans of soup and bottles of Coke that he painted. Andy Warhol’s life was just as much a work of art as his paintings.

Pick any of the many books written about Andy Warhol and you will observe that nobody really ever has a solid grasp on who he actually was or what he was trying to do. Was he the voyeur he claimed to be or critic of the culture he commented on? Was he sincerely promoting beauty of ordinary objects or was he showing the absurdity of consumerism? Was he really callous towards life and death, or was he pointing out how valuable our lives should be? Was he a shy socialite or a cunning businessman? Was he the ultimate hipster, casually dismissing the importance of his art, or was he a philosopher with a firm grasp on art history? To fall for any single side of these arguments is to oversimplify his art. His popularity can be attributed to how easily it is for anyone (from art critic to blue collar worker) to add their own meaning to his work.

Andy, the non-stereotypical artist
Even if we have deep respect for art, most of us also carry a negative stereotype around with us about artists. Have you ever listened to an artist gush about their work talking about things that couldn’t possibly have any relevance to your life? You probably rolled your eyes and questioned the sanity of this person. When a person’s words don’t align with their artwork and the art fails to connect with the audience you have a recipe for irrelevance. That is the real genius of Andy Warhol. His artwork could be appreciated by almost anyone. When questioned about the meaning of his work he could have said something like, “I feel that the pressures of society have polluted the beauty of the common object irrevocably and I want to represent the impact that the ordinary has had on the bourgeois blah blah blah.” Instead he let his artwork stand on its own merits and allowed the audience to decide for themselves what it is all about.” That’s why Andy’s most memorable quotes are contradicting thoughts like:

“I’m afraid that if you look at a thing long enough, it loses all of its meaning.”

“In the future everyone will be famous for fifteen minutes.”

“I am a deeply superficial person.”

“I never wanted to be a painter; I wanted to be a tap dancer.”

“It’s not what you are that counts, it’s what they think you are.”

The exception to the self-contradicting element in his work is his least successful work done in the 1980s. His portraits of celebrities were not very well received and are criticized for being too commercial. The irony of course is that this was exactly why Andy chose this subject matter. It was the same reason he painted Coke cans and soup labels – celebrities are also products of American consumerism. Nevertheless, Warhol’s work in the 80s does feel less timeless than his earlier work and there is truth to the notion that Andy was existing more and more as a business man and less as a pure artist. Had he not died in 1987 it is interesting to speculate about whether Warhol’s work would have continued towards the “business” side of the spectrum or if he would have regained a second wind and taken his art in a brand new direction.

What if Andy Warhol were still alive?
The thought of Warhol living in 2010 is worth a couple final thoughts. I joked with a friend recently that had he been alive today, Andy Warhol would most certainly have been a judge on American Idol. This position would give him the ability to single handedly dish out fame to people neatly packaged in fifteen minute packages. What else would Andy be involved with if he were still alive?

Perhaps Andy’s blog would be regularly updated with long posts about his cats and other less than fascinating insights into his life. The posts are tediously detailed and never talk about art directly. It is unclear whether Andy writes these posts himself or if he has assistants that help with the writing.

Andy Warhol wouldn’t have a twitter feed, instead favoring a more visual micro-blogging format. Andy Warhol’s flickr stream would be massive with photos of everything he consumed. The photos would be neatly categorized into collections like shoes, candy, weapons, condiments, and toiletries. All his photos are uploaded at high resolution and are released under a creative commons license that requires only that his name be displayed prominently with the reproduction.

What else do you think Andy’s life would include if he lived today? A reality show? Product endorsements? I am curious what you think, so please leave a comment if you have more ideas.

In 1927, Richard was a suicidal drunk without a job. He was bankrupt and living in the slums of Chicago. He had been expelled from Harvard twice for bad behavior. The business he started with his father had failed. His daughter died after struggling with complications from polio and spinal meningitis. To say that things were tough is an understatement. It was at this low point in his life that he made a decision to turn his life around. He committed his life to changing the world to the benefit of all humanity. It sounds audacious doesn’t it? You bet it was. But that is exactly what he did.

Over the next 56 years R. Buckminster Fuller would live an extraordinary life that did change the world. If you are unfamiliar with Fuller’s life and his work, I would like to give you a brief introduction to the achievements of a truly fascinating man.

Buckminster Fuller is best known for designing the geodesic dome. Actually, Fuller only popularized the dome which was invented 30 years prior to Fuller’s work. Nevertheless, his contributions to the geodesic dome, including some patents, will probably be the most visible part of Buckminster’s legacy. You know the iconic sphere at Epcot Center? It is also know as Spaceship Earth and is probably the most prominent example of Bucky’s geodesic structures. The thousands of domes in existence are fascinating structures, but they aren’t the most interesting of Fuller’s ideas in my opinion.

There are three words that Buckminster Fuller invented that pretty much sum up his design philosophy. Those words are livingry, tensegrity, and dymaxion. The fact that all three of these words get flagged by spellcheck is by itself a testament to Fuller’s personality as the definition of a non-conformist. If you read his writing you will probably laugh at some of the sentences he concocts. Not only did he make up words, he would write the longest run-on sentences you have ever heard. My point isn’t to ridicule his writing, but to point out that Buckminster had no use for the conventional obstacles that humanity had built around society. When language was insufficient for his purposes he would invent new words. When traditional rules of English limited his ability to explain his ideas, he unapologetically broke the rules. But I digress. Let me get back to the the concepts of livingry, tensegrity, and dymaxion.

Livingry
Livingry is the opposite of weaponry. Fuller believed that the goal of all professions should be in the support of life. His term for the world is “Spaceship Earth,” a term meant to recognize that our planet has a limited amount of resources. We are hurdling through space without an instruction manual and we need to learn how to best manage life here. Indeed, Fuller was in fact an environmental activist long before that term was perverted into the modern day stereotype.

Tensegrity
The word tensegrity is a combination of the words tension and integrity. You may have seen sculptures made of only steel cables and long metal rods. Without any outside support, these structures seem to defy gravity as they rise into the air.

Dymaxion
While the word dymaxion comes from “dynamic maximum tension,” it really is just a brand name that Buckminster used for several of his projects including his dymaxion car and the dymaxion house. Buckminster’s ideas about housing and the car were decades ahead of their time. The dymaxion house was designed for energy efficiency. The plan was to make the house easy to ship and assemble on any terrain. The three wheeled dymaxion car was fuel efficient, fast, and seated 11 passengers. Unfortunately, the world wasn’t ready for these inventions and both the dymaxion car and house never went into production. Here’s a video of the dymaxion car in action. Note the amazing turning radius:

Perhaps the world wasn’t ready for many of Fuller’s ideas. He has a great quote that says, “This is the real news of our century. It is highly feasible to take care of all of humanity at a higher standard of living than anybody has ever experienced or dreamt of. To do so without having anybody profit at the expense of another so that everybody can enjoy the whole earth. And it can all be done by 1985.”

Buckminster Fuller died in 1983. His gravestone says “Call me trimtab.” This is a reference to an interview where Fuller observes how a tiny rudder (the trim tab) can change the course of a giant ship. Bucky said “The little individual can be a trim tab…If you’re doing dynamic things mentally, the fact is that you can just put your foot out like that and [change the direction of] the whole big ship…”

If you are interested in learning more about Buckminster Fuller, I encourage you to read his books, especially “Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth
.” The Buckmister Fuller Institute website is also worth a visit.

My dad has been getting some recognition for his sculptures lately, so I thought I would brag about him a little bit…

The story of my dad’s sculptures is in many ways the story of what it means to be a Christian and an artist. The reality of our culture is that Christianity often gets marginalized when it comes to “relevant” issues. Most of us are aware of the separation of church and state, but the church is separated from more than just government. Unfortunately, church has also been separated from the artistic community. If you attend my church you may wonder if there are many things that it actually is connected to. That’s a rant for another day, but my point is that being an artist and a Christian can seem like an invitation to not be taken seriously. So to see my dad being recognized for his artistic abilities as well as his Christianity feels like an amazing achievement. Listen to my dad’s interview on NPR to understand what I am talking about:

Interview with Adrian Hanft, II on Nebraska NPR show, Friday Live NET Radio (5.75mb)

It takes an amazing amount of determination to decide to carve in granite. With much softer stones available you really need to be committed to the task if you are going to carve granite. The dust is toxic, the tools are expensive, the stones are heavy and dangerous, and it takes a long time to complete a sculpture. Why would anyone voluntarily do this? The crazy thing is that deciding to become a pastor is an equally absurd decision. The pay is low, church politics are bitter and petty, and society has all but written off the church as irrelevant. Why would anyone voluntarily do this?

From the outside my father’s decision to be a pastor and a sculptor may seem hard to understand, but the reason is actually pretty simple. This is just who my dad is. The fact that his chosen task is difficult doesn’t even register on my his radar. He is just doing what he was meant to be. More than being true to himself, this is who God created my dad to for.

As I write this I understand for the first time a verse that says “My yoke is easy, and my burden is light. When you live a life that is in alignment with God’s plan for you, your challenges won’t be a burden. In fact, you will actually find joy in the trials you face. Joy is exactly what will surprise you when you hear my dad talk about his work. You won’t hear my dad complaining or bragging about the challenges involved in his work. All you will hear is his joy as he talks about the process. I truly admire my dad for accepting the role that God has chosen for him.

If you are interested in seeing some more of my dad’s sculptures, you can go to stonesofscion.com.