| 4s | We all want an interesting job by which we mean one that allows for a high degree of |
| 10s | |
| 11s | There used to be quite a lot of creative jobs around |
| 15s | But they've been disappearing since at least the middle of the 19th century |
| 19s | In that century the English art critic and social reformer |
| 23s | John Ruskin pointed out that the medieval building industry had once left its builders-- room for a huge amount of creativity |
| 31s | evident in the way that these craftsmen had had fun carving |
| 35s | Gargoyles grotesque animal or human faces in distinctive shapes high up on cathedral roofs |
| 42s | The stonemasons might have had to work to a fixed overall design and their toil was not always easy |
| 49s | but the gargoyle symbolized a fundamental freedom seen in many kinds of |
| 55s | Pre-industrial work the freedom to place a personal creative stamp on one's work |
| 62s | Nowadays, there are some creative jobs around of course |
| 66s | but the majority of those involved in |
| 69s | Making and selling say phones or furniture or buildings will have no opportunity to be creative |
| 77s | |
| 78s | They belong instead to a highly anonymous army of labour |
| 83s | Working with in vast companies and that executes the creative designs of a lucky few |
| 89s | Modern capitalism has radically reduced the number of jobs which retain any component of creativity in them |
| 97s | Take for example. The Eames chair designed by Charles and Ray Eames |
| 102s | Which went into production in? |
| 104s | 1956 it is a highly distinctive creation that deeply reflects the ideals and outlook of the couple who designed it if |
| 112s | They'd been artisans operating their own small workshop |
| 116s | They would perhaps have sold a few dozen such chairs to their local customers in a lifetime |
| 122s | instead because they worked under modern capitalism many hundreds of thousands of chairs have been and |
| 129s | |
| 131s | That's wonderful in a sense but a side effect of this triumph has been that the demand for well-designed |
| 137s | interesting chairs has been |
| 140s | |
| 142s | New creative person wanting to make a new kind of office chair nowadays has to face the fact that it's already possible |
| 149s | To buy a very nice example |
| 152s | Designed by two geniuses and available for rapid delivery at a competitive price in other words |
| 158s | You won't stand too much chance of success |
| 162s | We're familiar with the idea that the wealth of the world is being ever more tightly |
| 167s | concentrated in the hands of a relatively small number of people |
| 171s | |
| 172s | 1% but capitalism doesn't only concentrate money |
| 176s | There's a more poignant less familiar fact that it's only a small number of people are sometimes |
| 183s | Overlapping but often different 1% who can have interesting that is creative work |
| 190s | It's telling that we are at this point in history |
| 194s | Obsessed with the romance of individual creative geniuses our society has developed an ear |
| 200s | fetishistic interest in stories of brilliant startups colorful fashion gurus and idiosyncratic |
| 207s | Filmmakers we might like to think we're turning to them for inspiration |
| 211s | But it may be more the case that we are using them to compensate us for a painful gap in our own lives |
| 219s | Just as it was in the 19th century during mass migration to cities that novels and pictures about country life |
| 226s | achieved unprecedented popularity |
| 228s | among newly urban audiences |
| 231s | The many interviews and profiles of creative types in the media at the moment |
| 236s | mask the fact that for almost all of us it will prove almost impossible to compete against the forces of |
| 244s | |
| 245s | Far more than because of anything we may ourselves have done most of us are highly likely to find a considerable portion of our work |
| 253s | free of opportunities to carve our own gargoyles and |
| 258s | Therefore will find it distinctly boring |
| 262s | We are certainly richer now than we've ever been and then we ever were in a pre-industrial world |
| 268s | But our work is arguably a lot less filled with day to day |
| 273s | Opportunities to mark what we're making with a stamp of our own creative spark |
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