For the next few days I’ll be at the 99U conference in New York City and will be giving it my full attention and will not be blogging*. It is essential that all creative people take some time to get input from time to time. We are usually the ones making things happen, thinking of ideas, and creating them into reality. I think of this as output. Sometimes we have to stop, restore and let some input happen. It’s why we visit museums, read books, search the internet, read blogs (like this one). We need that input. A space to think without a client brief in our head (although they never quite disappear.

Yesterday I went to see the Bjork Exhibition at MOMA and the Basquiat notebook exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum. I learned a lot from both – I came away with a few found fascination for Bjork, and a love of the technology that MOMA is using to make the experience refreshing and different. Basquiat made me feel like dancing. That’s one of the highest compliments I can pay an exhibition. It’s a feeling I get when I stand surrounded by beauty – like I want to dance around the halls (think Christopher Walken in this video). Both the exhibitions featured the notebooks of the artists – and that was a giant sign for me and what is next in my creative life.

Even if you can’t escape to another city for a while, take a Creative break, allow input – it will make the output even better.

You can follow my New York journey through my notebook over on instagram: follow aileensnotebook  – I’ll see you over on instgram, and back here next week.

*Yes, I understand the irony in writing a blog post explaining how I won’t be blogging for a few days. Life is like that.