We recently connected with Rán Flygenring and have shared our conversation below.
Rán, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Are you happier as a creative? Do you sometimes think about what it would be like to just have a regular job? Can you talk to us about how you think through these emotions?
As I grew up, my parents ran a tiny architecture studio from home. To a seven year old me, their job seemed rather tedious: hunched over black-and-white line drawings while drinking excessive amounts of coffee, having lengthy discussions on window frames and their proportions, alternatively hosting work meetings or going on field trips waving their measuring tapes like magic sticks. Despite knowing other adults working various different jobs generally considered more “normal”, this must still have formed my idea of “a regular job”. Today, as I walk to my small studio where I draw and drink coffee, host meetings and plan field trips with my magic sticks, I think of my parents. They set the scene, and I am grateful for that blueprint every single day. I would not want it any other way.
Working as a creative is essentially and at its best, playing. It allows for the opportunity to continue to explore and get to know the world through play as if you never had to grow up into that grey suit that you might have imagined as a child. To some, playing is somehow synonymous with being childish, and perhaps it is so, but I’d argue that playing represents an openness and sincere interest in the world, an exploration not limited by pre-conceived rules and guidelines. This, on top of being the boss of one’s own schedule, is the big perk of working as an independent artist. But as with everything, it has its pitfalls, too. In an over-productive world full of emails and deadlines, it can be hard to separate work from other areas of life, resulting in one continuous decade-long work day. Sometimes that’s not alright, but most often, it’s worth it.
Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
I work as an author, illustrator and artist, basing my practice primarily on storytelling through visual language. Broadly speaking my projects revolve around nature and environmental issues, presented in picture books for adults and/or children, visual reports and shorter comics. I also work on art projects where illustration and critical thinking meet performance art, creating quirky, playful scenes where the rules of the world can be bent.
It is sometimes said that in a small country, you have to be a potato – versatile and adaptable. Perhaps this is the reason I work in many different mediums, or it may be due to my background in design, where the main focus is always on how to best communicate an idea before finding the fitting medium. In any case, this comes with an immense artistic freedom to explore new ways of thinking creatively.
Initially not knowing what creative field I wanted to enter, I graduated as a graphic designer in 2009. Shortly after graduation, I got a job as a designer at a small studio in Reykjavík. After a successful year at the studio, I remember thinking to myself: “I’m 23 years old, I have no commitments, no partner, no house, no children, no dog. Why should I sit at a desk for eight hours per day? I have my whole adult life to do so!” It was a privileged position to be in, and perhaps somewhat naive, but I had some savings, so I quit my job and bought a one-way ticket to Japan. I left soon after with a backpack, laptop and a couple of small illustration projects, thinking I could see how long I could keep going by working from abroad. Long story short, eight years went by. I travelled the world, made friends, worked on projects, attended art residencies and workshops, and regularly came back to Iceland to reconnect with colleagues and clients. It was a time that shaped me as a person and a creative.
Today I am based in Reykjavík, Iceland, I have a family and a few more commitments than a decade ago. I work from a small studio close to my home, and along my work I study philosophy at the university. I’ve now published over twenty books, both here in Iceland and in Germany, many of them translated to foreign languages. Most of those books I’ve worked on in collaboration with other authors, some I have written and illustrated myself. For the most part, those are non-fiction and fiction picture books for adults and/or children taking on topics like birds, horses, elves and volcanic eruptions. My latest book, made in collaboration with Hjörleifur Hjartarson, tries to crack the mystery of elves in Iceland, exploring old and new stories of encounters with elves in order to understand what lies beneath it all. All the elves in this book are drawn in invisible ink, requiring the reader to go on a bit of an exploration themselves.
It may sound like a cliché, drawing volcanos and elves as an Icelander. But living here, close to the rough and wild natural elements where the ground will shake and crack open, and the winters feel like one long, dark night, it inescapably shapes one life and interest. Having been all around the world, I see these natural forces as a great gift of inspiration.
Have you ever had to pivot?
Starting out, I said yes to every project that came my way. I did my best to find interest and joy in the process, shaping sometimes very boring tasks so that I could have fun with them. This fun seemed to shine through, please my clients and shape the kind of work I would later be offered. This policy has served me well, and as long as there are some ground rules regarding unpaid work and the integrity of clients and collaborators, I would always recommend it to creatives in the early years of their careers.
But sometimes, when we think we’ve figured it all out, life shows us otherwise. This yes-man policy may hit a dead end at some point – or it did for me. You see, I never really figured out how to leave work. Saying no and taking time off is tricky when your job is your main interest and passion. Surely, one could call it a luxury problem, but those also have their consequences. A few years ago, on a seemingly normal day in September, I hit a wall. I had taken on too many projects for too long, and without realising it, my work had become increasingly less enjoyable. I had lost patience and passion for many things, not in only my job but also when it came to spending time with my family and friends. One day, I found myself looking up my address online – I was so mentally exhausted that simply could not remember where I lived. This moment led to a realisation that turned everything around: If I lose my creative energy and playfulness, I not only lose my ability to earn an income, but I don’t know who I am anymore. This understanding set off a long recovery process that eventually has led me back to patience and joy.
I am not so naive to think that a story like this will prevent anyone from hitting a wall. In a society where productivity is the highest virtue, and there seems to be little interest in having artificial intelligence and automated processes enable the workforce to enjoy some time off, each and every one of us has to try to figure out how to balance our work/life situation on our own (if we are so fortunate to be able to impact it at all). But my journey from fun to not-so-fun and fun again makes me think of the generation that now, in large, aspires to work independently online as content creators and influencers. Those are creative paths that are built on seemingly no boundaries between life and work, something that may work out in the short term, but not in the long. I wonder what conversations and solutions we’ll be seeing arising from this situation.
Is there something you think non-creatives will struggle to understand about your journey as a creative?
Working visually requires seeing as much as it requires drawing. Working every day on forming images to convey stories, share ideas, explain complex concepts or illustrate situations – this inextricably shapes the way one sees the world.
Have you ever heard about the red Toyota syndrome? I believe it goes like this: Purchase a red Toyota, and suddenly, you’ll be hit with a strange sight: There are suddenly so many red Toyotas in the world! It will seem as if all the streets you cross will be filled with red Toyotas, all the parking lots and the highways, red Toyotas everywhere. But as you may have already guessed, it is not because of an influx in the market. It is simply because your attention wasn’t tuned in on it until you had one yourself. The red Toyotas were hidden in plain sight!
In this very same way, a creative focusing on making images will fine-tune their vision to notice stories, interesting details or abnormalities in the environment in a way that non-creatives may not. And as much as this can be an energy-draining process when one wants to simply tune out and relax, it is nothing less of a superpower. It promotes a certain level of awareness and alertness to life that makes food taste better and the good moments feel longer. But the fact that artists tend to practise this kind of awareness doesn’t mean you need to change careers to feel it. The fantastic thing is that anyone can do it, as every child is born with this ability. It is only later in life that people stop feeling the world in this way, for all kinds of reasons. But changing it only really requires a bit of determination, and practice.
Contact Info:
- Website: ranflygenring.com
- Instagram: @ranflygenring
- Facebook: facebook.com/ranflygenring
- Other: substack.com/ranflygenring
Image Credits
Sebastian Ziegler