Something I’ve discovered in my travels with yarn and designing, is that those who work hard, knit from their heart and are open to new ideas are always ready to praise someone elses work freely. They get it – they see the work, and even if they don’t always love the design concept, they can appreciate the work.
When I used to be a costumer I made the same connection. The actresses who worked hard treated acting as a craft.
They tended to be quite good – or at least interesting to watch – and were also the easiest to work with. †As professionals, they expected professionalism from the support staff and treated everyone with respect. Love that!
I enjoyed working in Opera for that very reason. No matter how demanding a singer might be, they tended to be professional (all of the hours of training, practicing, etc. showed in many ways) and thus – for the most part – treated the folks who worked around them as professionals, too!
When an actress would come into a fitting with an attitude, act nasty to the stitchers and treat the costume assistant dismissively, we could all pretty much be assured that her performance would stink. This goes for actors, too – pettiness knows no gender.
I find a parallel in folks who roundly (and smugly) criticize designs freely. I think a good critique is worth ten times as much as feined praise, and I like to hear solid, worthwhile comments on my designs and writing which will help me improve.
But the table-in-the-back-of-the-cafeteria crowd who simply cut folks down in small and nasty ways do little more than highlight their own personal sense of inadequacy (or jealousy). Very telling are the “If I were designing that, I would… comments. Yeah, right.
Those who sit on their fannies, don’t design anything but pretend that they are designers and are locked in some bizzaro this-is-the-right-way world can rarely do anything but make sour comments which masquerade as criticism.
Thus endeth our lesson. I’ll get off the soapbox now, eyow I sound bitter! I don’t mean to, but I feel that sometimes this has to be said.
Now go have a beer (or martini, or glass of wine, or chocolate bar) and chill out! It’s FRIDAY ya’ bast’ds!
…and I’m dying my greying hair myself today – details at 11:00…