johnmichaelschert-blog

[johnmichaelschert-blog]

The First 3 Weeks

It’s been three weeks since I have returned to my professional home of Chicago, Illinois. My loft in the Fulton Market District of the West Loop was waiting for me with my suits, dress shirts and winter coats on the rack after a summer in Idaho wearing shorts, tank tops and Toms. The return was a little daunting and a lot humbling. Who am I as a creative, and what is the role of a creative in modern-day America? 

My title at The University of Chicago Booth School of Business is Visiting Artist and Social Entrepreneur. I have been a dancer now for almost 27 years, in my 15th year as a professional. I was the Co-Founder and Executive Director of Trey McIntyre Project concurrently while dancing there for nine years, and am now entering the third phase of my professional growth. I look at the utility of the creative process and the role of people like myself in our society. Not just for the “products” they put forth: the performance, the film, the painting, the food, the clothing, the book; but the process they use to arrive at their product, and the assets built/acquired from that process. As my Idaho friend, author Tony Doerr (whose book, All the Light We Cannot See, is now enjoying its 25th week as a New York Times bestseller) said during a recent reading when asked which of his works is his favorite work of art: “it isn’t the book that is the art, but the making of the book that is the art.” So what is my art now? What is my practice? What is my process? Is the practice of my process my art? 

In the first three weeks in Chicago, back for the fall quarter, beginning my second academic year serving in this newly-created position designed for me by Harry Davis, 52-year veteran of Chicago Booth, and a small group of leaders I have dubbed the “team”: Rob Gertner, Deputy Dean of Chicago Booth; Carroll Joynes, philanthropist and Senior Research Fellow at Chicago Harris; Christina Hachikian, Director of the Social Enterprise Initiative at Chicago Booth; and Bill Michel, Executive Director of the Logan Center for the Arts; I return with a level of clarity, and perhaps articulation, I didn’t have in the first year. Not necessarily confidence, but clarity. The first year was, according to what I learned this summer at the IIT Design Camp, the research and analysis phases. Embedded research, observatory, direct interviews, anthropological, and analysis: pulling out the themes. What am I seeing? Don’t know what it means yet, but who am I in this context? How am I interfacing in this disparate world of academia and big business that I have never before been immersed in, having not gotten an undergrad or any form of graduate degree. Instead I went deep into the art of ballet and arts administration for the majority of my life. What is this role that I am seeking now?

Prototyping has now begun. The research project I proposed last year, Beyond Mastery, has begun with a group of esteemed colleagues at the University of Chicago, looking at masters who have achieved great success in their chosen field, but also exhibited levels of wisdom, purpose and creative process allowing them to make lateral transfers to new domains. More on that soon...

Looking at these three weeks, I am seeing an incredible complexity of events, interactions, people, ideas, opportunities, possibilities, objections, contradictions, unknowns, knowns, frustrations, elations, joys, drawbacks, setbacks and ultimately clarity, appreciation and a deeper sense of ownership over my ideas. The Soho House has given me a home. It is the best physical embodiment of the unmarked zone I am living in, the space in between, where creatives and other sectors combine. My loft in the Fulton Market District has given me access to the excellent food of Chicago: PQM, Green Street Smoked Meats, High Five Ramen, Avec and Blackbird, but it is the Soho House where I have spent my time working, working out, meeting, eating, convening, learning, exploring, thinking, writing and creating. It houses my potential. Looking at the below timeline of the events shaping my return to Chicago, I am struck by how far along my position already is. In meeting with my mentor Harry Davis, we have begun to say this position has permanence. Thinking to the speech he gave one year ago October: “it might seem odd now to have an artist embedded in a business school, but in five years time, my hope is that it will be completely commonplace.” Thinking now of succession, who will be the next Visiting Artist and Social Entrepreneur at Chicago Booth and how do I want to better prototype what I have helped create. Embarking on the synthesis and prototyping phase of my position, I have listed all of the activities of the past year not to say these have to be exactly replicated by my successor, but what are the 3-4 that are worthwhile? Through my interactions with such a wide array of creatives, academics, financiers, politicians, civic leaders, community leaders, chefs, friends and family I am beginning to see not just the path, but my role in it, and the role of those like me.

This year will be challenging; full of many possibilities and insights. Many setbacks. I believe there will be many who publicly resist what I have to say. I will contradict myself. I will push boundaries that will at times be seen as groundbreaking and at other times seen as frustrating. I will be told I am wrong, and at times told I am right. I know I will be supported, mentored, funded and given collaborators, partners and friends to help guide me on this path. Ultimately it’s my ability to better embrace, understand, articulate, prove, design and create from my own intrinsic motivations, listening and learning from the venerable structures and schools of thought around me, that will guide me towards stating the utility of the creative process. I do not yet know, but looking back at these first three weeks in Chicago, I know I am on the right path.

[johnmichaelschert-blog]

The irony of many great discoveries is that they really weren't discoveries at all, at least not in the sense that Columbus discovered America. In actuality, they came from people who took well established concepts and applied them to new domains.

Combinatorial Creativity feels like it could be the strength of generalists. We exalt specialists for their incredible ability to go deep, master (conquer), a subject; but what of those who can see how it all comes together in new, revolutionary ways.

[johnmichaelschert-blog]

This page explains Abraham Maslow's theory of Human Development as it relates to man's needs as a human being. Now commonly referred to as Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs.

Pondering today Maslow's hierarchy and the correlations I am seeing in knowledge, connectedness, creativity and wisdom. Maslow states that you progress up the triangle when you have attained, or secured, the previous level. Looking at this approach, it seems much of an academic pursuit seeks to get the student to level 5: Cognitive Needs. This also suggests that an academic education will help give the student levels 1-4 in their professional life. Level 4: Esteem Needs seems to me "success". So we are teaching our students in higher ed to reach success and also to learn how to acquire further knowledge while maintaing levels 1-3.

Where does creativity come into play? Wisdom? 

Level 6: Aesthetic Needs feels like the ability to know your "desire." To know how you process input. How you listen. Empathy. Also, how to observe, enjoy and appreciate the "product" of artists and creatives; to understand the power, beauty and novelty of the creation (and those that created it). 

Level 7: Self-Actualization feels like creativity. Not just the maximizing of the "known", but the exploration into the "unknown" which results in original thought. Or just the application of combinatorial creativity resulting in new sequencing, not necessarily new ideas. George Balanchine said: "There are no new steps, only new combinations." It also reminds me of what noted psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi describes in his work "Flow" as "...the mental state of operation in which a person performing an activity is fully immersed in a feeling of energized focus, full involvement, and enjoyment in the process of the activity. In essence, flow is characterized by complete absorption in what one does."

Level 8: Transcendence is akin to wisdom. Transcending one's own ego to do social good with epistemic humility. Process the knowledge, experiences, connectedness, security and creativity attained in levels 1-7 to be able to do good. Transforming the world around them through their leadership.

Should we not be more focused on helping students, and our communities, live in levels 6, 7 and 8 more so than 4 and 5?

[johnmichaelschert-blog]

Dance without knowing the next step

What is the elusive balance of form and feeling? How do we perform/produce with greater knowledge and training, but do so in a way where it is alive in that moment and not just a collection of our past experiences and successes?

[johnmichaelschert-blog]

We have art in order not to die from the truth

Nietzsche

[johnmichaelschert-blog]

Cultural Policy Center discussion - April 15, 2014

University of Chicago Harris School