I am asking for volunteers from among our artist community to help me with a new project: "What do creative artists want?"

In order to be a more effective creative catalyst we want to know what creative people want. In the past we have chosen our video workshop artists and subjects based on a "seat of the pants" intuition about what we think you want: professional artists, high quality, information-rich presentation at a fair price. We have also created a web site and e-newsletter from the same reservoir of information. I read a book last week coming back from the workshops in Burbank and Pasadena which got me thinking – we don’t really know what you, our artist community really want.

So, we are beginning a process, with your help, to figure this out. I think what we learn will also be useful to artists as they chart their own careers. And I hope to create some tools for artists as a result of what we learn here.

Today I am asking for volunteers to help with Step 1. If you are interested please email me at

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What are all the tasks or activities creative artists are trying to carry out. These can be:

1. Functional jobs: such as: to sell more art to galleries, to build a better web site, to have more time to paint, to attend more workshops, to learn to draw better, to have more time for art, to have a better place to work, etc.
2. Personal feelings you want from your artistic endeavors, such as: I want feel more relaxed while I paint. I want to feel that my art is worthwhile. And,
3. Social goals for your artistic endeavors, such as: To feel that my work is appreciated by my peers, my husband, etc. I want other artists to tell me my work is great.

Each creative person can uncover and identify many different "jobs" that they do or want to do as part of their creative, artistic process. Understanding these can add clarity to ones life of an artist.

I would like you to help me gather a list of all of the possible tasks or activities artists can identify that are important to their creative life. I would like to communicate with each of you through email and keep our conversation private until we synthesize the results of this process. This may be 3 or 6 months from now or even later. I plan to release a report of our findings in a format that I think will help professional artists build their careers.

Contact me if you are interested in helping with this project or have questions.

 Read more about the Creative Artist Process.

Regards,

Jim Powers

Creative Catalyst Productions