Jason Terhorst

The Rut

Sometimes, it just happens: through a variety of factors - emotional, physical, environmental, etc. - you find yourself stuck creatively. Unable to move, unable to produce.It all looks like the same boring drivel as before, or you’ve simply given up, allowing forces you can’t control, can’t fight, or simply don’t want to fight completely take control of the creative process. Then what?

Sure, the opposing forces on the chain will tell you that they give you “creative freedom” - but that’s wrong. One of two things ends up happening: either they overrule the key decisions you make, with vague instructions (before and after, and tell you that you didn’t follow said vague instructions after), or they simply micromanage every step in the process, leaving you as nothing more than a Photoshop jockey. Or they do both.

That’s why I actually pulled away from the creative side for a while. And, for the most part, I still don’t do any design. Unless the client is me, I’m dropping design work, and ignoring general requests in other design areas. It’s just too frustrating and anger-inducing. Code always has a nice, solid rigid structure, where I can pretty much say “nope, you’re an idiot”, and give them a nice, satisfying knock on the head when they ask something impossible. Unfortunately, it still doesn’t address the issue where the client will become incredibly vague, and then get frustrated with me when I tell them they’re not specific enough.

I’m starting to see why commercial graphic designers and artists start to develop this sort of Helvetica/Impact/Bold/perfect-grid (or similar) style, with few or no variations: they don’t want to take risks, and through “design-by-committee” or “design-by-bean-counter”, they tend to gravitate that way. Either the big wigs demand it, or the artists just give up and go with it, because it’s easy, and is always accepted. That apathy, that frustration, has driven me away.

But through my “creative reclusion” over the past 6 months, I’m finding a new sort of peace in my mind. The part of me that went into hiding, shaking in fear from the corporate world and its constant raping, has returned. While still cautious, it has returned from the shadows enough to allow me to explore some designs for my own projects.

I’m not really doing creative for others; only for me. Because when other stakeholders, even if only one come into play, things start to suck.