OpenInvo Studio. unexpected education.

Originality: Strategies for Obstacle Removal 
Instructor: Adrienne Leban

(full day)

Some say that originality is impossible, everything has been done, there is nothing new under the sun. I say, not so.

Originality is possible once we become conscious of the preconceived ideas and beliefs we hold habitually. These ideas function as the subliminal constraints for most of what we see, think, and do. Yet, without bringing them to awareness, we can only reproduce them endlessly, with minor variations. I call this mental status quo the Prison of the Preconceived Idea—the antithesis of an incubator for fresh thinking.

The goal of this workshop is to demystify originality, first by defining it and its stages (which include invisibility and resistance to the unknown). Then, through various hands-on creativity exercises and discussions designed to elicit the creator in each person, and to excavate the assumptions, standards and criteria which constitute the obstacles to originality, participants in this workshop acquire the experiential tools for producing the New.

Objectives and Skills Acquired:

• Seeing, thinking, and doing in new ways
• Reforming standards of judgment
• Experiencing yourself as a creator
• Developing confidence and courage for risk

Adrienne Leban

Adrienne Leban has taught her Originality course at the renown art college, the School of Visual Arts in New York City, for almost four decades. Her former students include creative directors of major advertising agencies, many entrepreneurs (including the co-founder of OpenInvo), acclaimed painters and designers, teachers, animators, musicians, web designers/programmers, the creator of the syndicated cartoon strip Mutts, a venture capitalist, a chef, inventors, as well as a few who have their own television programs. 

Adrienne is the founder/creative director of The Lifework Studio, through which she does fine art and design, public interest communications, and creativity publications. Her work has been exhibited in galleries and museums, seen in major magazines and books, and is in private collections and the Library of Congress Permanent Poster Collection.