Spark & Fire: Fuel Your Creativity

From the team behind Spark & Fire, we're happy to share the first episode of Offsite Adventures, our newest show uncovering the gems, magical moments, and unique learnings in iconic business travel destinations.Three minutes before midnight in Times Square, one of the most trafficked commercial centers in the world momentarily transforms into a vibrant digital art installation, providing a refreshing pause for locals and tourists alike. It’s called the Midnight Moment, and you won’t believe how something so unexpected came together. In this episode, Janet digs into the history of this unique collaboration between the advertising and arts communities before experiencing it herself with innovative, boundary-breaking artist Shahzia Sikander.Offsite Adventures is a Masters of Scale Production presented in alliance with Capital One Business.Special thanks to Jean Cooney and Times Squares Arts and artists featured as part of the Midnight Moment episode: Artist: Shahzia Sikander | Title: Reckoning | Video by Tatyana Tenenbaum Artist: Nora Maité Nieves | Title: Eyes of the Sea | Video by Tatyana TenenbaumArtist: LuYang | Title: DOKU: Digital Reincarnation | Video by Phatt FeaturesSpecial thanks to composer Du Yun for music featured in this episode.See this story come to life in our video series on YouTube. Click here to watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ERpUrWKdCjESee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

There’s a commonly held belief that great creative work comes from pain. But comedian and writer Phoebe Robinson says that this is a myth. Instead, Phoebe believes great creative work comes from a place of joy. As Phoebe shares her personal story of writing her debut essay collection, You Can’t Touch My Hair: And Other Things I Still Have to Explain, she draws on the things that bring her the most joy in life, whether it’s her Peloton bike, or her obsession with the band U2. Her joy is what allows her to hone her unique creative voice, which she describes as having “a lot of pop culture references, but there's also some smarty smarty pants stuff that's going on.” Phoebe will inspire you to tap into what brings you joy, whatever it may be, and use it as fuel to create — and have fun doing it.Content Warning: This episode contains explicit language.Go to sparkandfire.com/download to download Spark & Fire's free creativity guide and access 100 activities designed to fuel your creative practice.Follow along (with transcript and photos) at sparkandfire.com/Subscribe to the Spark & Fire weekly newsletter for images, stories and creative prompts: http://eepurl.com/hkmyMrSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Creative conflict can destroy a work-in-progress — or it can push your work beyond good to great. What matters is how you respond. We’re going to hear from 5 creators in 5 very different fields who share actionable strategies (and great stories) about how to recognize, resolve, and harness conflict to create work that is visionary.Featuring “Frozen” songwriters Kristen Anderson Lopez and Robert Lopez, actor and comedian Cristela Alonzo, choreographer Bill T. Jones, salsa legend Rubén Blades, and “Queen’s Gambit” producers Bill Horberg and Allan Scott. Listen to the full episodes that inspired this mixtape:“Frozen” songwriters Kristen Anderson Lopez and Robert Lopez: https://sparkandfire.com/frozen/ “Cristela” creator Cristela Alonzo: https://sparkandfire.com/cristela/ “Afterwardsness” choreographer Bill T. Jones: https://sparkandfire.com/billtjones/ “Pedro Navaja” songwriter Rubén Blades: https://sparkandfire.com/rubenblades/ “Queen’s Gambit” producers Allan Scott and William Horberg: https://sparkandfire.com/queensgambit/Follow along (with transcript and photos) at sparkandfire.com/Subscribe to the Spark & Fire weekly newsletter for images, stories and creative prompts: http://eepurl.com/hkmyMrSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

To make something irresistible, get to the fun part — fast. That’s how Exploding Kittens became one of the world’s most popular games. When cartoonist Matthew Inman (The Oatmeal) and game developer Elan Lee (former Xbox) designed the card game Exploding Kittens, they took fun very seriously. This mindset unlocked their creativity in unexpected ways: They transformed a Kickstarter into a wildly successful interactive game, and radically simplified their instructions so their players could get to the fun part faster. In their story, you’ll find surprising lessons for any field on serving your audience and feeding your own creativity.Get the transcript, photos and original game sketches at https://sparkandfire.com/explodingkittens/Subscribe to the Spark & Fire weekly newsletter for images, stories and creative prompts: http://eepurl.com/hkmyMrSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.