|
|
|
|
Mar
2007 : Embedded Design
by Guest Editor Cybil Weigel
It's
a Saturday morning and I am sitting by the pool at my apartment
with my colleague and collaborator. We are waiting on the
talent to show up at one of our casting calls. It’s
an unusually rainy day in Southern California and we are talking
about everything from our friends on the east coast, to our
jobs in California. We are trying to come up with ideas for
a commercial that an ad agency sought us out for. In our mid-twenties,
it is amazing and sometimes unbelievable how we could be in
this position: producing, teaching, making work in my creative
world and being successful. Some people would look at me and
think I was a sell-out to the art world I came from, going
to an art school and then graduating to a strict graduate
design school. I
was bred from free-thinking hippies who raised me to make
it in any condition, including my own. I have worked in the
most creative cities all over world, now I reside in Southern
California working for ad agencies, TV networks, teaching
at colleges, and running my own production company, EMBEDDEDIN.LA.
|
I
started teaching college in Los Angeles in my early twenties
after I earned my MFA. People consider 'being signed' as being
related to sports or modeling contracts, but in the creative
industries, you can be signed to ad agencies, educational institutions,
TV networks who want you to work for them because you are a
young talent. They want to buy your knowledge and creativity
as a means to market their brand, or, teach their students who
can reach your level or "out-do" you. You essentially
are the face and work for the companies or educational institutions.
Your vision, your work, and your words are a reflection of who
you represent in commercial and college worlds.
Essentially, creatives in this
position are role models, but more than models, we are educational
inspirations. I have taught students who have gone on to the
most prestigious ad agencies, and who create commercials that
you watch everyday for the products that you have in your home.
It is amazing to see how my methodology has had an impact on
my students' creative careers, but most importantly how the
students have influenced my own.
|
embedded:
teaching at
otis
|
We
look good and speak well with our methodologies, our reels,
our teaching resumes, our published works. We are comfortably
hidden; sitting outside of plush condos alongside pools with
water fountains talking about commercial concepts. Our hard
work and creative chameleon work ethics have earned us comfort.
My
methodology, 'embedded design', is a thesis concept from graduate
school that has developed into my own practice. It’s “design
+ direction = production.” I work with a myriad of
national and international creatives and talent depending upon
the project where I work as the producer. I hire creatives based
upon the work given to me by my reps or by word of mouth.
I
consider myself a creative nomad working with every genre of
work from hip-hop music culture to some of the most conservative
ad agencies for products I would never buy. EMBEDDEDIN.LA is
known for its embedded graphics and its embedded work practice.
This past fall, I was speaking at an arts conference at the
University of Edinburgh in Scotland and was asked ”Was
I selling out my own creativity to the commercial world?”
When you work for an agency or a client, you have to follow
their guidelines to sell their product, communication design
is not the same as art. But you can ask, why an imagination
like Leonardo DaVinci designed weapons for his wealthy patrons?
You can ask, “Why did David Lynch make Twin Peaks for
a national mainstream television station?” What about
those videos Michael Gondry did? I utilize my art and design
skills to make the product stand out. Those skills, those ideas,
are before the product and after its time. Being a creative
in the commercial world is important; it’s more than inspiration,
you must have a deep awareness and understanding for business,
management, communication. You have to know what to keep, and,
what to let go of---if this is where you want to be. You never
hear about an architect selling out, you never hear of a furniture
designer selling out. We live in a rich media environment, and
people have choices to make. I don't want to struggle. The work
is for sale, I am not. I want to make it work. It is not the
only work. I teach it to my students too. It’s not a creative
failure when I sell 24 seconds of a commercial for more money
than someone can make in months. In fact, it can be a rewarding
feeling to see your work on TV or billboard, on a website and
know that you did it. Rewarding to work and be around so much
creative energy. I practice what I teach, and learn from it
too. Those students, they are asking good questions. ---Cybil
Weigel March 4, 2007
| 
|
|
c+,
romeo and a treo in my mom's bathroom |
|
| |
|
|
|
