Second Century School of Thought Art:Design:Philosophy ...

I went to this really great meeting last night where designer Hugh Meade spoke on his philosophies on several things for the world but more specific Oklahoma. He has some really innovative and fascinating ideas and solutions on art, sustainability, city planning and creativity in general.He and one of the attendees, Paul had great book suggestions to further your mind on some of these topics such as: " Out of Our Minds; Learnings to be Creative" by Ken Robinson, " The Creative Brain ; The Science of Genius " by Nancy Andreasen, and " The Geography of Nowhere" by James Howard Kunstler . Hugh took an example from Nancy Andreasen's book where she discusses building "cradles of creativity" as a way to suggest that we as a state are perfectly capable of doing this and setting examples for the world. The State of Creativity campaign has attempted this is a sort of corporate way but Hugh suggested that it is up to us as creatives ourselves to really represent this and show the world what kind of innovative minds are here amongst the stockyards, dustbowls, country singers,trail of tears and bombings( which seem to be some of the only things folks know of OK outside of the statelines) There was no criticism of what the world already knows of Oklahoma, it was more to point out that, there is in fact ALOT more here. Hugh also brought up a more sustainable Oklahoma as one way to set the example for innovation and creativity and suggested that there is a perfect opportunity to build what he called "city without and electric bill" and that for us to get involved if this is a dream we also had. Oklahoma city is large in area but is still a sort of small town at heart and the city officials are alot more accessible than you would find in other towns. You can actually call them up and leave a message that they actually hear believe it or not!
The key points I got from the evening that I found the most useful to point out to others are these sort of quotes from Hugh: Remember the "usefullness of creative networking" and know that in Oklahoma there are a great amount of unexpected folks and businesses willing to open their doors to art and creativity( such as realtors and salons) , "what will we teach our future?" where he used the exapmle of how the Renaissance period teaches our kids about innovations in math, science,art, and design every day so what will we leave for those kids in the future, and the last point which is that we are perfectly capable of building a "cradle of creativity" where "creative people are bouncing around into each other" setting the example for innovation for the whole world and that other cities should do the same.
If any of this sounds like something you might be interested in being involved in or know more about then please befriend Hugh Meade on Facebook and join his Second Century School of Thought group on Facebook and consider attending the next "meeting of the minds" !