The Dark Side of Crafting for Public Consumption

There's a lot of great things about having a creative job in the crafts industry. Most people tend to focus on them when asked about their jobs in this industry. Few of us acknowledge the darker side of being publicly creative: unsolicited criticism. It can come in the form of web comments, emails, forum posts, or social media or blog entries...but you can be guaranteed that it will come.

Learning how to handle that, how to develop a thick skin, is an important part of having a career in a creative field, be it crafting, architecture, dance - or photography. It's from the field of photography that I want to bring you a wonderful lesson on how to sort through this criticism to find the nuggets of gold, and how to hold your head high in the face of it. It comes from the online show The Grid, a production of KelbyTV, which is hosted by well-known photographers Scott Kelby and Matt Kloskowski.

On last week's episode #141, which they called "The Power of the Unsolicited Critique", Matt and Scott talked at length about hearing that a photographer that they admire was considering quitting after getting an email criticizing her work. Their advice to her was inspiring, uplifting and touching (Scott even teared up at one point) and was a powerful lesson for anyone working publicly in a creative space. It's definitely worth the time to watch, even if you never use a camera at all.

We've set the video to start at 7:30 minutes into the show to get to the topic discussed here but please feel free to rewind and watch the entire video if you wish.