Frieder Weiss

"Watch fewer Youtube videos or web links!" That's what I usually advise my students. The reason: external stimulation or inspiration often obscures one's own ideas, the result then looks like a copy of the original!

Ideas need to be written down because they are fleeting. But this also allows you to have them repeated. My best works emerged from the process of their implementation - not from the aspect of whether something is good or relevant; you judge that yourself differently anyway than external success sometimes suggests. And sometimes you only find out many years later whether it had any relevance at all. I am sceptical about the assumption that it can be felt when an idea has the substance for something big. After all, the important milestones of my work have come rather surprisingly or with great uncertainty about their value!

To stimulate my creativity, I have a ritual: I get myself into a 'flow' state when programming. To do this, I prefer to sit in front of my laptop in a quiet and familiar place with soundproof headphones on my ears. This is calming because I am in a familiar environment that is free from 'threatening' human interactions. Strictly speaking, every major project starts with designing new features, technical ideas. These are evaluated and refined as they progress. In this process, the software I have developed over many years is very much part of my work. This takes place on two levels - that of 'core' programming, i.e. working as a programmer, and that of the arrangement area. In the latter, the possibilities created in the 'core' can be varied, combined and arranged live.

The transformation from theory to practice takes place with enough room for a bit of chaos. I am actually an engineer, and as such one would like to believe in order and structure, but I need the variation and evaluation of the result as much as it is necessary in the cultivation of plants. Rather a loner by nature, I nevertheless need important counterparts as a corrective. After all, I myself cannot assess or even assert enough what is valuable!

If a deadline is looming, but the necessary inspiration is lacking, my advice is to fall back on the tried and tested and experiment with the combination of the existing. This often results in new aspects. It may sound paradoxical, but it really works: in such a situation I can feel calm and relaxed despite the pressure of deadlines.

Creativity is not a question of age per se. What I find best is a mixture of experience, curiosity and 'bite'. After about ten years in the job, you have passed your zenith anyway and should look for something new that fascinates you! Of course, this is not exactly easy biographically. My way out of the misery: Take evolutionary steps! For me, this initially meant going from being an 'engineer in technology' to being an 'engineer in the arts', then later switching from 'sound' to 'image'. Throughout this process, however, there has always been and still is one eminently important constant for me: to develop and maintain stylistic recognisability! Nevertheless, I have also produced mediocre works that I was dissatisfied with, but which were nevertheless successful.

Regarding the question 'How should one deal with failure and is it important to persevere because success may come later?' I‘d like to make the following comment before answering: The wording implies an overly sporting perspective, perhaps more appropriate to football. As I see it, however, this point deserves a more sweeping approach, more concrete: If you do what you want to do with conviction and perseverance, there will always be periods of attention and criticism - but these do not necessarily equate to success! I myself, for example, have been doing what I do for much longer than I ever thought I would. And perseverance has been very important!

The creative market is very referential. Those who land a hit usually profit from it in the long run. With a little humility and a sense of reality, however, one knows that these 'hits' are as rare as great love; such things happen once or a few times in a lifetime - with luck!"

My Favorite Work

"One of the most important milestones in my career so far was the collaboration with the internationally renowned Australian dance company 'Chunky Move'. I had already been working in the sector of interactive real-time visual programming and dance for two years - initially out of pure interest in the technical possibilities. The personal encounter with choreographer Gideon Obarzanek was characterised by spontaneous friendship, respect for each other's work, professionalism and the courage to experiment freely. This raised the work to a new level. In terms of content, it was evolution instead of revolution - including some crucial performative paradigm shifts in terms of interactive design. One important aspect, among others, has been that in the joint productions the performers on stage make no reference to the projections. In the context of 'interactivity' this seems paradoxical, but for the audience it creates a new, surprising insight!"