How to create a supportive group of creative friends

Post 32 of Dream, create and make money in the arts

Following on from my previous post on networking and collaboration, I know many creatives gather in teams, so a director has their favourite DOP, Choreographer, title editor etc all working in parallel fields but groups of actors or comics can also get together, make art and get it out the door, all sharing the workload, cost, marketing & credit whilst widening their network, gathering press, credits and experience.
Musicians are famous for working together & achieving great success in new fields such as the Robert Plant & Alison Krauss wonderful award winning ‘Raising Sands ‘ album

In my podcast interview (full transcript posted there as well) novelist Jason Hewitt talks about the writing group he is with that started meeting after they all did a writing course at Bath together.  He is now the sixth of the seven member group to get a publishing deal and the last member to yet published is very near and they are all inspiring, motivating him on.
Maybe set up or find  a weekly meeting of actors, writers, painters or/and photographers in your local community – this can generate hope, motivation & projects. If such a thing doesn’t exist then make one!

You can either

– Mix the creatives -so members could be actors, writers, directors, sculptors.  the advantages are the more open the network the more broad skills in the room,  and a lot of learning from each other strengths eg the dancers work ethic, the jazz musician’s freedom.

– Or you can just focus on your speciality – I used to be part of an actors group that  Richard Evans the casting director set up. We would discuss what auditions, projects & CV’s we had sent out in the previous period. Each of us determined to do various things by the next time we met & we would report back. He has written a great book about auditions and focus.

We were fairly mixed group, if there are too many similar characters going for the same roles eg 24 year old tall blondes then there may be issues with competition, it very much depends on the group. Even now if I see castings or jobs that I think are perfect for friends of mine, I always fire off a quick email saying ‘look at this casting or competition”

A supportive group who you can also be publicly compliant to, so if you haven’t done what you said you would in terms of goals, then that always increases the pressure for you to win over the TV  or romantic drama you may be indulging in & at least work a little bit on your goals. Peer pressure is a wonderful thing!

Image courtesy of Cool Design/ FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Part 2 of setting up a creative group

About this series – Becoming a Successful Creative – The Business of Creativity covering all the angles and issues of putting on a show, exhibition or event to showcase your art
This is a series of daily blogs for you on how to dream up, build, market and sell a creative event, gig, festival, book launch, cabaret night, exhibition of rude plastic cupcakes or whatever creatively inspires you. It is time to create and put on that play about your family, a series of drawings about hedgehogs, the album you have talked about making or the short film you always wanted to write and make. You can read the series in order  Part One or just pick and choose a topic that interests you.