Our Creative Voice – Creative Scotland

creative

Our Creative Voice – Creative Scotland

Creativity makes the world turn (and gets your hair wet)

We’re immersed in creativity from the moment we wake up - from the design of our alarm clocks to the composition of its alert tone, the branding of our shampoo bottle to the elevated water sprinkler we wash under (yep, the shower started as a creative thought). That’s four instances of creativity before we’ve even dried ourselves off for the day. Then there’s the combination of clothes we choose to form an outfit, the music we listen to on the bus, the new route we take to work, the graffiti and street art we pass, even the make-up of our sandwich at lunch... We don’t have to be artists to appreciate or participate in it. Creativity is everywhere and for us all.

I'm not a creative person...

But creativity can feel daunting and inaccessible.

For example, to some, art galleries are places of refuge, whereas to others they feel out of reach and ‘not for them’.

To combat this, Creative Scotland launched ‘Our Creative Voice’, an initiative with a mission to break down those boundaries in a bid to increase interest and participation in artistic and creative activity across society.

Their message is clear; Creativity is for everyone. Creativity brings us together. Creativity makes our world better.

Visualising data

Armed with reams of research on how creativity and the arts make our lives better, Creative Scotland was looking for a way to bring these statistics to life.

But after a year of tuning in to daily briefings and news reports, overwhelmed by numbers and percentages, we needed to be careful and considered how we used the information we had.

Numbed by statistics, there had to be another way to show the impact of creativity had on the people of Scotland.

Real voices

If we were to celebrate ‘Our Creative Voice’, then we needed to hear from the people.

Different stories, voices, and narratives, spanning generations, societal groups, and geographies. Its voices outwith the norm that teach us, inspire us, excite us. And it’s the voices that are familiar to our own that make us feel represented and comfortable to get involved ourselves. So we’d use our data and statistics as a jumping-off point to ask bigger questions on broader topics, and use the answers to bring the narrative back to the facts.

Animated answers

Once we had our voices, it was time to bring them to life. But how could we show our broadcast in a way that was engaging, inclusive, and representative of who we are targeting?

Enter BAFTA-winning animator, Will Anderson. Taking each voice and the personality attached, Will created a gaggle of vibrant, loveable 3D characters, who would deliver their thoughts on Creativity in Scotland.

Across a suite of 3 films we heard about what art and creativity means to the people of Scotland, what makes Scotland a creative place, and how it would feel if creativity and the arts were taken away. Beyond the films the characters were used in static graphics on the Our Creative Voice site and socials to bring a little dose of the warm and fuzzies to the cold hard facts.

Feeling creative?

Our Creative Voice is an ongoing initiative, find out more here

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