Creative Interpretation
Posted September 10, 2011
"...three painters, three distinct interpretations of the same thing, all good in their own right but none exactly the same in the style or presentation of the original."
Trying to inject myself with a dose of cool and trendy I recently went online to research today’s art world. I came across a review for an up and coming artist in New York whose work drew long lines at the gallery. The thumb nails that accompanied the glowing review included captions of how this artist is so fresh and creative and what a promising future he has in the art world. Ok, I tried my best to go along with it but that didn’t last long. In my eyes it was some of the most hideous 
stuff I had ever seen and I couldn’t talk myself out of feeling that way. I thought “People are actually going to pay big money for this stuff and display it in their living room?” Beauty is in the eye of the beholder but creative interpretation is in the eye of the designer.
A couple of weeks ago my friends and I had a girl’s night out. We did our own version of “Sips and Strokes” which is a popular destination in my area. An inspiration painting is selected and then everyone paints that picture while enjoying each other’s company and a glass of wine. We pulled up Van Gogh’s “Sunflower” painting on the lap top, broke out the acrylics and popped the top on a bottle of Merlot then proceeded to do our thing. Caught up in conversation and a good time, we didn’t look at each others paintings until we had all finished our masterpieces. Although each painting was a fine representation of the original art, each looked very different from one another. My friend who is naturally very creative painted an abstract version of the Sunflowers. My other friend chose to paint a close up of just one of the sunflowers that bled off the upper left corner of the canvas only allowing the viewer to see a portion of the flower. That portion of the flower was definitely a 
copy of the original yet totally different in the presentation. My poor little sunflower picture looked nothing like theirs but did manage to hold its own and was quite pretty if I do say so myself. Here we have three painters, three distinct interpretations of the same thing, all good in their own right but none exactly the same in the style or presentation of the original.
Graphic design is an art form that falls within these same guidelines. Creative interpretation is the designers’ prerogative, even initiative, to project his or hers own visoin of the project outline to deliver the best end result. The product produced is an expression from the mind of the creator. If there were a golden key that could unlock the mind of a client so that a graphic designer could peek in to see what the client sees it would sell for millions. A good sales person does their best to ask the right probing questions in an effort to 
gather insight of what the client would like to see for the project and then relays this to the designer. In the end, the process boils down to creative interpretation. When given the opportunity to shine, a designer often delivers a product that surpasses the expectations of the client. Most artists strive to achieve praise and acceptance of their work and a satisfied client is the fuel that burns within a commercial graphic designer to produce a pleasing result. That satisfaction forms a bridge between creative interpretation and the eye of the beholder and when the two shall meet there is beauty.
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