{"id":240,"date":"2000-09-12T22:43:47","date_gmt":"2000-09-12T22:43:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/2000\/09\/12\/work_ethic\/"},"modified":"2024-12-01T20:16:27","modified_gmt":"2024-12-02T04:16:27","slug":"work_ethic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/2000\/09\/12\/work_ethic\/","title":{"rendered":"Work Ethic"},"content":{"rendered":"

Although I\u2019ve heard some bad reviews of it,<\/strong> I finally watched Cradle Will Rock<\/a><\/i> and thought it was fantastic. Like a lot of films that try to bea little epic in scope, it relied on developing some characters in broad strokes and schtick (although Bill Murray<\/a> did wonders within that), but the overall effect was wonderful. Just watch it some time, OK?<\/p>\n

It poses an interesting question: At what point do you become a prostitute for your work? I\u2019ve wrestled with that one a lot over the years — it’s hard to avoid in graphic design. I can’t say that always made the noble choice, but I\u2019ve at least tried to be pretty selective about my bedfellows and choose, whenever possible, to do work that I felt good about in the end. It’s a tough one.<\/p>\n

One of the toughest realizations I ever made was about the nature of my work: I\u2019m not interested in pure artistry as much as I am in good craftsmanship and good communication. Even when I\u2019ve worked in more traditionally artsy media, I have always been more interested in exploring the medium or fine-tuning my skills than in making art for art’s sake. There have been times, and there are sure to be more, when I have become my own client and chosen to use my skills to communicate some idea of my own, but that\u2019s not the reason I work. When my own agenda and my work come together, that may be art, but I\u2019m not so interested in pursuing it by that name. Let someone else decide if what I do is art or not: I\u2019m more interested in knowing if I\u2019ve solved the problem at hand. Maybe that makes me a whore once in a while, but at least I\u2019m a whore not trying to convince himself he’s a paragon of virtue.<\/p>\n

As for Bill Murray<\/a>, before I completely forget, I\u2019d like to know when his comic antics crossed that line into sublime performance. Watch Cradle Will Rock<\/a><\/i> or Rushmore<\/a><\/i> and you’ll see that he’s not just a goofball, but that he’s also capable of some really subtle, underplayed brilliance. I would recommend watching the Criterion Edition DVD<\/a> of Rushmore<\/i> so you can see Murray’s wry smarts in full effect on an episode of Charlie Rose<\/a>.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Although I\u2019ve heard some bad reviews of it, I finally watched Cradle Will Rock and thought it was fantastic. Like a lot of films that try to bea little epic in scope, it relied on developing some characters in broad strokes and schtick (although Bill Murray did wonders within that), but the overall effect was … Continue reading “Work Ethic”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-240","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ultracultural","category-ultrapersonal"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/240","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=240"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/240\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":69638,"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/240\/revisions\/69638"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=240"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=240"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ultrasparky.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=240"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}