Alex Chemla: My Creative Process

It's difficult for me to narrowly describe my creative process because it varies depending on the nature of the 'creative task' (for lack of a better term). What I can say about my process, however, is that it always begins with a stimulus--that stimulus could be the assignment, something I see in an art show, something I read in a magazine, or simply something mentioned in conversation. The stimuli are everywhere and all I have to do is respond. 

I am non-linear thinker and any one idea/word/stimulus inevitably generates a series of new ideas which then serve as the stimuli for other ideas and so on and so forth. As a result I easily get off topic and sometimes too quickly abandon ideas without exploring or developing them. At the same time, however, I am always willing and excited to explore new mediums and try new techniques. I am not afraid to make mistakes; in fact making mistakes is a very big part of my creative process. It would be impossible for me to constantly try new things if I were afraid of failure. To complicate things, however, I am also a perfectionist when it comes to the final product of any work of mine, so while the creative process may rely largely on failure, the end result always has to be (in my eyes) a success.