Process General
“ The beginning of my creative process is deconstructed and non-linear. It’s like the law of energy where nothing is neither created nor destroyed, but instead is continually transforming meaning that a new idea is simply the product of many combined elements, each of which are reduced components of one image or idea. These ideas come into my realm by chance, and I start to add many layers through multiple directions of research which is both structured and logical, and messy and intuitive, where I look into every possible avenue. It is a process that captures the chaos of imagination.
After this intuitive phase of collecting, comes the more logical phase where, through brute force, I extract all possible thematic and design ideas from each reference, image, or idea through drawing, writing and material experimentation. Once I’ve exhausted all possible ideas, the real work starts in connecting everything together. Even though in the beginning I try to piece things together in a linear way, like this idea plus that idea, this is not how the process actually happens. In reality, it’s incomprehensible and messy, as things start to develop and make sense subconsciously and by chance. I keep drawing and redrawing ideas and prototyping elements, ultimately layering ideas upon ideas, sometimes breaking down those combinations again by taking an element or idea and combining it with something else.
After developing some kind of aesthetic harmony, I now start to conceptualize my work as it appears before me. Contrary to the traditional approach where designs are created from concepts, I use my designs as the inspiration for something greater. They now become part of a larger story, as I pull from my research and intuitively link in new cultural associations, many from literature, film, or even my every day encounters and impressions of things and people around me. This process is inherently unpredictable and non-linear: individual stories get created by using instinct, by building connections and by creating associations that, when layered, become fantasies and worlds around each design and/ or the whole collection.
In essence, my whole creative process leads me to create something entirely new and unexpected. When starting a new collection, I set out with a blank mindset, and do not have a pre-conceived notion of what I want it to say. Instead, I focus on truly being present and let what is happening in the moment guide me. I constantly review everything through some type of loose focus, trying to achieve something that is not pre- determined, and that also can change throughout the process. In other words, it is all very open-ended, and it is only towards the end that I pick up on subconscious patterns and see connections and purpose through my designs. I then frame the collection as “x”, as “something”, which usually lies in the realm of a character or a story, which I then develop into immersive world around each piece. “