If there’s one thing I can take away from the very fun TEDx talk of Taika Waititi, it’s that you can always find inspiration anywhere, even in the most mundane, most unconventional, and most unassuming things.
Taika Waititi’s talk remind me so much of Tim Harford’s TEDx talk on ‘slow motion multitasking’. Taika is an artist who have tried several kinds of art just to keep his creativity flowing consistently. I really think just sticking to only one art form can make you a master of some sort, but it will surely get old quickly. I am an advocate of trying as many things as possible that this life can offer, and that is why Taika’s talk resonated so much with me.
What is an artist’s job?
Taika Waititi emphasized that as a filmmaker, his job is not to create films, but expressing himself and sharing his ideas and point of view on things. Does this remind you of Ethan Hawke’s talk, where he mentioned how art adds beauty to the world how art gives more meaning to things that happen to our lives, and how art connects the entire humanity with shared thoughts and emotions? I mean, sure, art can’t solve poverty nor bring world peace, but it always depends on our perspectives.
I mean, omg. Apparently, at the end of the day, creativity is indeed individual as it is universal.
Find Inspiration Anywhere: The Taika Waititi Edition
Here is a laundry list of Taika Waititi’s outputs and creative inspirations from his most random creative processes:
- his father’s artworks as an “outsider artist” gave him lots of inspiration in terms of seeing things in other perspectives
- he just collected random stuff and tried to create something out of them
- he used his pop culture favorites as an inspiration to create parodies and collages
- he tried drawing the same thing over and over until he came up with THE work (like how YouTuber sruthless drew the same thing over and over again)
- he made use of ‘uncool things’ (like his Mom’s cancer, atomic bombs, Nazi, etc.) as an inspiration to create art
- he tried combining several things he likes that are unlikely to make sense (like rugby and baby), similar to Tina Seelig‘s example on the Japanese art chindogu
Other Dope Creativity Tips from Taika Waititi
Taika has created various artworks, from fashion to photography to filmmaking to performance to animation to painting to visual art. Hence, he will always advice to always look at life in the eyes of a child, keep generating stuff, ask random questions, and embrace failure. Lastly, he mentioned that success is not measured in material things like money or fame, but rather how much impact you can make to the world for the better.
I think that’s dope.