Austin Kleon

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Weirdos who left Texas and brought back art

Texas highways page

After I wrote about the painter Julian Onderdonk for Texas Highways, editor Michael Hoinski asked me if I’d write another piece, this time about The Texas State Museum of Asian Cultures in Corpus Christi. This posed a particular problem, as I have never visited to Corpus Christi, nor do I plan on traveling there, or anywhere, anytime soon.

I scratched around online and scratched my head wondering how I was going to find anything interesting to say about a museum I’ve never visited until I came across this video of the museum’s founder in the wonderful Texas Archive of the Moving Image.

“Bringo!” I thought, and suddenly, because two is a pattern for me, a weirdos who left Texas and brought back art theme emerged. (I admit I had the Mütter Museum and Mr. Wilson’s Cabinet of Wonders in mind, and this idea that often a museum starts with the obsessions and collections of a single individual.)

You can read the piece here.

Nothing matters and nothing works

A still life left behind by one of my children

In Paul Ford’s funny and informative guide for people who have been asked to be in the media, he lays out “the most important rule of media”:

Nothing matters, and nothing works. If you’re selling a book, everyone will want you to go on TV to promote the book. That will sell negative ten books. Some stupid tweet will sell 1,600 copies of the book. I mean obviously if Oprah wants to feature you and tells people to get your book, the math changes. Sometimes things do work! But in general nothing matters, and nothing works. You won’t cost yourself your career if you say no.

In my experience, this is (sometimes painfully) very true.

For more of Paul’s wisdom, see: “Why wasn’t I consulted?” and “What to say when you don’t know what to say”

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