Hello all. My name is Michelle Hoppen, and I’m applying for an internship with Play. About a month ago, while browsing the crafts section of Barnes & Noble the spine of a book caught my eye. That book was How to be an Explorer of the World: Portable Art Life museum by Keri Smith.  It’s a treasure chest of ideas to get you to do what Play wants you to do most: look at more stuff. Observe a space closely and write down ten things you didn’t notice before. Get paint chips and match them to colors in your world. Document words and phrases you overhear. <a href=" http://blog.wired.com/geekdad/2008/12/how-to-be-an-ex.html">You can find a great interview with Keri here where she explains her philosophy of “deep looking.”</a>

 

While I, like many people both much younger and much older than me, am not sure exactly what I want to be “when I grow up,” I do know what I want to do for my entire life: create beautiful things. Beautiful ideas, objects, solutions, environments. Through her book, Keri Smith demonstrates that everyone has the ability to create beauty with the tools they have available to them, if they’re only willing to look at the world differently, make connections between seemingly disparate ideas, and alter where they think they’re heading. And while doing these things can create some odd stares and a lack of storage space (the closet is now filled with dozens of CD spindles just waiting to become art) they also open up a new world to anyone curious enough to follow them.

 

Go create something beautiful!