Enough.

3 time Academy Award winner James Acheson was my first mentor for design. He taught me a great deal for which I am ever grateful. One piece of advice that stayed with me is this. 'Never join the 'that'll do' school of design.' I didn't. I trust I know good design and I strive for it.

Over time though I have made an addition to this advice that is necessary for excellent design and art. 'Know when is enough'.

Jim's advice was about not accepting mediocrity. His was a call to arms for excellence. What it was not was a call for perfection. Perfection is a killer to great art. Perfection is unattainable. Perfectionism is the result of fear and limits the freedom creativity needs to flourish.

When striving for excellence completion of work seems a distant ambition almost out of reach.  When working with many artists the volume of ideas, options and potential increases exponentially. Without fail though moments reveal themselves when the art is both alive with potential and resolved in fulfilling its role. These moments are when the art is 'enough'.

Artists advice that knowing when to stop is as important as knowing when to add.  I've also heard that art is great not when nothing more can be added but rather when nothing more can be taken away.  Art exists in a moment of 'enough'. Art exists somewhere between beginning and end. Art is not an end. That's what makes art so exciting and alive. Art is both at the same time complete and potential.

We live now in a society of lack.  Not enough money, not enough time, not enough support, not enough love, not enough freedom. We all seek to add more and more to our lives to compensate this feeling of lack.  If we add more surely one day we will have enough, surely we will be enough?  An artist knows adding more doesn't make great art.  Why should our lives or society be any different? We could learn from art. We could stop seeing the world for what we lack and start to recognise when what we have is enough.