The featured illustration for this news piece is by Dan Mumford who’s work is incredible! Go check it out then come back here and read this…
We Need Help!
Ok seriously guys I really need to do something with this site!!! I’m lacking a ton of vision and direction for what I should do with it. I started this site out with a friend 10 years ago with the idea to help inspire artists and fuel their imagination. This site was built out of pure passion and a love for art. We put about a year of hard work and dedication toward it and then… We got busy! The whirlwind of life and our careers took over and we lost site of our vision for Creative Tempest.
After about a year of not doing anything we noticed on analytics our site went viral for a season. We had over a million people visit us because of all the shares and links. Really the growth came because of you guys and your amazing work. It was really incredible to see the response we received from the art community and wished we would have just stuck it out. Since then it has always been this project in the back of my mind. It was like starting a puzzle and never finishing it. So I’m needing to finally make a real decision about what to do.
How I see it, there are two options:
1. Make it Awesome or 2. Pull the plug
Lets be honest!
At this point its hard to ask for help from a community that we really haven’t been a part of. Let’s face it we got crazy busy and haven’t had the time to post inspiration or give back much to the community. So to be honest it feels like I am writing this article to a bunch of strangers. Over the years we’ve received so many talented people to our site but no real relationships haven’t been formed. I’m sure in some small ways we’ve inspired artists but it doesn’t feel like we’re really making an impact in a significant way. I’m at the point in my career where my time is very much limited. Right now I am running a wedding photography and photo booth brand which takes up the majority of my working hours. I would love to remove myself more from the day to day and make Creative Tempest a primary focus but I cannot do it alone. I’ve put this site off for years thinking that one day I would build up a team that could revive it but that just hasn’t been the case. If I’ve learned anything about myself, it’s that managing people is just not my thing. I honestly think if this site is going to make the change for becoming awesome it’s going to need the following:
- A clear vision for the future
- Small team of the right people who can serve as curators, writers, artists, etc.
- Relentless pursuit toward helping inspire, promote, equip and empower the art community.
My Vision
The following is my vision of what I think Creative Tempest could do but honestly I don’t know how any of it would be possible without the help of others. So I’ll just put it out there and see what you think:
Creative Tempest is all about helping artists succeed at creating their ideas. To make this happen we want to regularly feature and promote artists and their work by giving them a platform to be seen, heard and recognized. We want Creative Tempest to also maintain its original purpose by using your work to fuel other artists with inspiration for new ideas. We believe artists also need better ways to learn and craft their skills. So we want to provide ways to teach and equip artists well beyond just learning their craft. We want to help them learn business, marketing, sales, communication, personal growth, leadership, etc. We want to learn from those who’ve gone before us and stand on their shoulders. Finally, we want to empower artists to gain freedom and independence. Not just freedom from their day job but freedom from the whirlwind of grunt work, poverty, suffering, life challenges that gets thrown at them every day. We want to help artists to be released and free to explore and expand their creativity. We want to help artists evolve, thrive, focus, be effective, love what they do, care for themselves, build their faith, remove pride, help others, inspire the world and enjoy art for life. We believe we’re all called to create!
Your Vision
Now its your turn. We want to make all of this possible but we really need your ideas and your help. We know there are plenty of sites out there who are doing an amazing job at this already. However, we want our site to be community led in order to provide you guys with something you really want. So comment below with anything. Seriously it can be a link to a site you frequent often, an idea you’d love to see for Creative Tempest accomplish, an improvement we can make on our site, a roll you could play be involved in at Creative Tempest or your own vision plan for Creative Tempest. Seriously, no idea is too small or too big. Be open and honest with us and please make a comment below. Your feedback is greatly appreciated!