A running collection of things I’ve found interesting, well-made, or worth spreading—mostly from art, design, tech, photography, and film, with the occasional thought or two of my own.
Stanley Kubrick in his acceptance speech for the D.W. Griffith lifetime achievement award from the Director’s Guild of America in 1998:
I’ve compared Griffith’s career to the Icarus myth, but at the same time I’ve never been certain whether the moral of the Icarus story should only be, as is generally accepted, “Don’t try to fly too high,” or whether it might also be thought of as “Forget the wax and feathers, and do a better job on the wings.”
The lead client blinked, cleared his throat, and finally said, in a thick Irish brogue:
“I’m afraid it’s far too clever for our needs. It calls too much attention to itself on the page,” he explained—as if getting a distracted newspaper reader to notice his company’s message was a bad thing.
The lead client asked us to set “Ireland $399” in bold type, stick a shamrock in one of the 9s, and call it a day.
Fear of getting noticed is a terrible thing. It’s also a self-fulfilling prophecy.