Design & Technology Illuminated

When I asked for questions, this isn’t entirely what I was expecting. That being said, this is actually a worthwhile question to answer.

When I was four years old, my dad took me to see Star Wars at Indian Hills Theatre here in Omaha. If you never got a chance to see a great movie on the Cinerama wide screen, you missed out. But I digress.

Star Wars was the first movie I saw in a theatre, and as you can imagine, it made quite an impression on me.

When I was six years old, Dad brought home a book called “The Art of Star Wars.” It was basically the script from the movie, shoehorned in between reproductions of the original concept drawings, paintings and renderings for the movie.

Until I saw those images, it never occured to me that Star Wars was fiction. As far as I was concerned, it was a documentary. When you’re six, you live in a constant suspension of disbelief. It was a revelation.

It was followed by a second revelation – it was somebody’s job to make Star Wars. This epiphany set of a creative boom that arguably lasted for years. I might actually still be functioning in it, I’m not sure. I drew Star Wars stuff constantly, inventing new ships and characters, the whole nine yards.

Gradually, I branched out into drawing other things, which evolved into art classes throughout school, a BFA in drawing, and the eventual MFA in design.

During all these years, I always seemed to have a Star Wars thing around in my room or in my office. For example, early in my undergraduate years, I bought a Darth Vader helmet that lived on my shelf in Kiewit, and then went to my studio in Indiana. It followed me to my offices in Omaha. It was always accompanied by a few trinkets, a figure here, a keychain there.

Over the years, this collection kept growing. And when I got stuck on a project, I’d stare off at these trinkets, space out, and begin to arrive at an answer. They functioned as a creative “restart” button.

It wasn’t until I really thought about why I kept this Star Wars security blanket around that I realized that all this stuff literally resets me to that mental mode I had when I was six years old. That discovery that I could create something cool that would affect people, looking at all this stuff takes me back to that state. In short, it provides a mental creative reset that helps me melt away creative blocks.

It’s only recently that I had the insight that the introduction of a movie and subsequent book had such a massive impact on my life. A book and a movie basically opened the door to my profession when I was six. Talk about your nature versus nature.

So now I have a not-too expensive habit of snagging cool Star Wars guys when I’m wandering through Target. And I have a very understanding wife who gets me big expensive Star Wars things on special occasions. And when she’s not feeling very understanding about me standing in front of a toy display shopping for both me and my four old son (fledgling Star Wars freak himself), I have a standard answer to why I’m wired this way.

It’s my dad’s fault.