Author: Sara Abo Madalala

Hello, so for my project, I decided to create a video diary of very important snippets of Berlin and of things that have had an impact on me in the past few weeks; I wanted to share the fact that I didn’t feel like a stranger in Berlin despite it being my first time here.

I walk around, stop, take a 5-second shot, make sure it’s stable, and keep walking; and “Khalas” stop asking myself why this shot, why this angle, just felt right and resonated with me in the moment. This is how I usually stop multiple times throughout the day to shoot this movie. Sometimes the place/scene would make sense, and sometimes I would have to use lateral thinking to make sense of it and tie it to the rest of the movie.

To me, the shots I was taking initially weren’t supposed to be for a movie or a film, they were supposed to be for my gallery because I felt like the photos weren’t doing justice to a lot of things, next thing you know, I have over 15 minutes of footage available for me to play with. So, I thought to myself, why not make a movie and try editing and filmmaking?

This movie is for all J-term students who end up getting so connected and can’t stop talking about their J-term for a while (which is going to be me, which is fine) because of all the growth and self-care they have felt on this trip.

As always, in my eyes, Berlin is a Hub for Creativity, and the city itself looks like someone kept asking why? And adding up to what the city looks like. You can tell that everyone leaves a little bit of them in Berlin, and people build on it and create this bigger picture.

My challenge here was the medium, as I have never worked with film before but wanted to challenge myself out of my comfort zone, which is what happened, and to be honest, I am proud of my work and this experimentation that Berlin and many other factors have given me to pursue it.

I hope you enjoy this movie, as I worked hard on it and could barely sleep 🙂

The course “Creating” has been an invaluable motivation for my personal and artistic growth. My perspective on arts and creativity has undergone a significant transformation throughout its duration, leading to a deeper understanding of the creative process and a newfound appreciation for diverse approaches. In this essay, I aim to reflect upon the various aspects of the course, including class visits, reflections, contemplative practices, readings, and the engaging “making” assignments, which have collectively contributed to my growth and evolution as an artist in the past three weeks.

The class visits and studio sessions offered unique insights and perspectives on creativity. While opinions varied on preferences, the visit to Kollage Kolektiv and the enlightening session with Harshini encouraged me to use alternative artistic creation methods and explore techniques that resonated with many abilities. Each visit preference to me was determined by how much the speakers emphasized the creative process and their unique expression, which Harshini and Kollage Kolectiv explained and showed me very well.

The daily reflections, a crucial syllabus component, provided an invaluable opportunity to track my progress and build upon previous ideas. Writing these reflections was a profound introspection into my growth and artistic journey. Witnessing my classmates’ diverse works and perspectives fostered a deep appreciation for the manifold manifestations of creativity. Reflecting allowed me to gauge my personal development and offer insights into my artistic evolution.

Undoubtedly, the “making” assignments were the highlight of the course, as they evoked various emotions and led to immersive creative experiences. These assignments were gateways to unexplored realms of imagination, helping me navigate creative obstacles and blocks. The course readings and insights gained from class visits and studio sessions provided a rich tapestry of inspiration and guidance. Engaging in the “making” assignments enabled me to express myself and deepen my understanding of the materials we studied. Such challenges were so stimulating that I asked for additional prompts from peers, inviting them to present themes or ideas to unlock my inner creativity. Exploring parks, filming surroundings, painting in public spaces, and engaging in spontaneous artistic performances expanded my creative horizons. It pushed my comfort zone’s boundaries and made me use what we learned in class. 

One particular challenge that resonated with me involved my friend selecting a color and creating a drawing with it until my friend deemed it sufficient, at which point a new color was introduced by him for me to continue and build on my project. This made me use lateral thinking and ask myself why and where to make it work, which we learned in class through various ways, such as Bono’s “Lateral Thinking.” This exercise proved to be an intriguing endeavor, as our color choices often diverged. It compelled me to think deeply about how to maximize the potential of each color, resulting in the creation of an abstract drawing that stretched my artistic abilities beyond familiar environments. This experimentation instilled a sense of joy and liberation, reaffirming the value of stepping outside one’s comfort zone to pursue artistic and creative growth.

Furthermore, the course’s location in the vibrant city of Berlin contributed immensely to the overall experience. The city’s artistic energy, manifested through graffiti, art exhibitions, and distinctive fashion, provided a captivating backdrop for creative exploration. Navigating Berlin’s streets and public spaces exposed me to abundant inspiration. I forged a profound connection with my creativity and curiosity.

In conclusion, the course has been a transformative journey of self-discovery and artistic growth. Through class visits, reflections, contemplative practices, readings, and the immersive “making” assignments, I have assimilated newfound knowledge, refined my creative process, and expanded my artistic horizons. The diverse perspectives and experiences encountered throughout the course have instilled in me a deep appreciation for the power of creativity as a tool for personal and intellectual development. The course has given the confidence to embrace risks and experiment with new techniques, ultimately fostering a more authentic and expressive artistic and creative practice.

Incredible visuals

reading from data sets and mapping that into art (something I might be interested in working in)

collab with Samsung

doing what they love with a love, passion-driven brand.

This chapter discusses a very important topic that disrupts our thoughts in the creative process that people don’t talk about much, but everyone has felt it at some point: fear of others.

The fear of standing out, and standing out badly, has been a big thing in our societies; no matter how much we like to admit it (or not), sometimes we don’t do what we want, share our thoughts, or pursue something because we are aware of the fact that people and society as a whole has too much power to decide if your creative thought is acceptable and approvable. This is why, most times, people tend to suppress their ideas and dreams, which oftentimes leaves them very sad and regretful later in life.

While reading this chapter, I immediately remembered my feelings and emotions during my first dance class ever, where I didn’t understand the professor’s language, wasn’t as flexible, or had as much experience as the other dancers, part of me felt scared, ridiculed, and very embarrassed, at least for the first few classes, I always had ideas and build on for the choreographies but then keep them to myself because I was scared that I would be suggesting something crazy, because of that, the first few months I did dance, I didn’t feel any improvement or evolvement in my dance.

The moment I saw change and progress was when criticism of my dancing was accepted in moderation in a cheering way and from specific people. I started exploring different moves and ways to dance, experimenting with isolating different body parts. I felt so much progress when I stopped overthinking and caring so much about what other dancers would think about me. So in a way, this is what this chapter teaches us, be fearless, don’t doubt yourself too much, and allow yourself to go through the lateral process, accept it and welcome it with open arms.

Slow dance with me – choreographer

breaking barriers and exploring

very audience interactive-based art

different each time since different people and no leading actors

Tiananmen Square

exploring different types and forms of dance.

amazing speaker, and fun to learn from (most likely cause fellow Nyuad)

her work is experimental and vibrant

masters in berlin, very rushed, but very interesting

work w her if you want to work w lights or learn about those types of visuals

Upcycling, recycling, reusing.

Being creative and letting yourself flow to find sense in the collected pieces

Be open to change, move around the stuff, alter it to make it into something different

spaceship, interactive,

very interesting space, lots of objects, very random, but very creatively expressive.

For my making, my random word generator gave me “sentence monster,” despite being a bit confusing; I decided to stick with it to gain from the assignment and improve my creativity.

I thought about these two words separately but then realized that I was thinking wrong for myself and that I should see what words come to my head when I think of these two words together.

Somehow I reached “The Cookie Monster,” and I decided to turn him into “The Sentence Monster,” the difference between these two monsters is that the sentence monster eats your sentences, at least tries to “eat” the last part of it. Hence, it interrupts you and makes you forget what you will say.

I am not sure of the purpose of a sentence monster, but maybe not everything has to have a purpose, so we will let the Sentence monster live his life and enjoy it.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I present you The Sentence Monster:

Our monster Ted eats words digests them, and learns so much through eating. He finds a letter, then checks if the length of the sentence is long; if it is, he will steal the word to eat. Then he stores the words and letters in his tummy, where he has the world’s most detailed dictionary that only stores new words and lets the monster digest the words already added. (Steps shown in the second photo)

Solaris

art and play with sound and music

light plays an important role, projected in ways.

Very science-driven art

“Fear that you are not a real artist causes you to undervalue your work” (p.24)

I loved this reading because it discusses the fear people have as Artists; many artists or creatives don’t live up to their potential because of fear. The clay pot example explained this fear perfectly, how the students started theorizing on perfection to create a perfect pot instead of accepting that art is flawed and shouldn’t be fixed as it is meant to be flawed, create a pot that they will keep continuously revising and improving towards something nice.

The biggest part about being an artist is accepting that talent isn’t the playing factor in an artist’s career; it’s actually their hard work and their determination, them not caring about people’s judgments too much nor criticizing themselves too much but working hard and practicing and advancing from there on ways someone can improve their artworks. Talent should be seen as a headstart, not the winning of a “race.” practicing and putting your mind to it is how you finish the race, both the person with the “natural talent” and you.

As much as art is an expression of emotions on a medium, you need to set your emotions of fear, worry, wants, and needs aside when creating to create and not doubt yourself but build up on what you began with and watch your art improve. It makes me sad sometimes that people give up on arts. I will plead guilty to having once felt that fear because I wasn’t as good as people in the industry for years. I gave up on creating for a while, but then I realized how irrational that was of me to compare myself too much instead of putting effort, trying, and most importantly, enjoying myself. After all, big artists and prodigies exist, but this chapter perfectly illustrates two things:

1) Don’t be too hard on yourself; accept your art and its flaws, appreciate it, build on it, and improve.

2) Work hard and stay patient; no matter how frustrating, the frustration will be rewarding eventually.

At the end of this chapter, the author mentioned how we should treat our artworks as our children, which I fully agree with. I think it’s one of the best ways to approach art, a child is a lot of hard work and determination, but you don’t judge yourself; you keep teaching and keeping after the child until he can one day do the same. In this way, we are all really artists.