ablo Picasso extracted his
inspiration for paintings,
sculptures and writings from
his life experiences, and expressed
them in countless creative forms. While
few professional speakers are also world-
renowned artists, your performance can
benefit from incorporating a wider palette
of visual presentations, speaking and audio
media, and theatrical delivery styles.
Like Picasso, speakers are influenced
by experiences and inspired by contemplating their meaning for speeches, stories
and artistic expression. First-hand life
experiences are the most effective means
of capturing raw material. Jotting ideas
in journals, dictating them into recorders, and briefly sketching images and other
shorthand notations will help you preserve experiences for future recall and
application.
Ideas are captured, cultivated and
relived in one’s imagination using both
sides of the brain: the left brain for
logic, structure and details, and the right
brain for imagery, spatial and non-verbal aspects. They work in combination to
create full, sensory experiences. The creative process depends on more than the
chosen words; it needs to evoke emotional
reactions in audience members when they
hear the words and identify with the presenter on the platform. Creating pictures
and images with words, acting out the
stories with emotions, and bringing the
audience into the stories create memorable experiences for them. Painting, music
and theatrical techniques can all play an
important role in this process.
THREE VIEWS ON HOW ARTISTIC
TECHNIQUES CAN CREATE EXCEPTIONAL
EXPERIENCES FOR AUDIENCES
BY BONNIE MATTICK, MAEd, MBA
Bring a sketch pad on your next road
trip, and set a goal to fill it with doodles.
You may be surprised at the money-making ideas that result!
Visual art in any form or medium communicates the artist’s visual interpretation
of experiences and images. Painting stimulates the creative right brain, and art
became a springboard for creative ideas
during my corporate career as well as in
my consulting and speaking engagements.
The visual arts—drawing, painting and
sculpture—engage the brain by helping
to resolve issues in a linear, left-brain
analysis and incorporate emotions from
the right brain.
I imagine people as artistic objects,
storing the image they create in my mind.
For example, Santa Claus, a favorite
subject, challenges my artistic endeavors.
I’ve painted Santa in watercolor, charcoal drawings, chalk pastels and acrylics,
each resulting in a different visual effect.
My left brain analyzes his features and
questions his experiences; my right brain
interprets the emotions and visual images,
all exercising my imagination. My artistic
training broadened my ability to look at
details and visually record the images—
demonstrating that left-brain analysis in
combination with right-brain emotion is
essential to thinking creatively.
Even if your artistic career peaked in
grade school, there are ways that you can
incorporate the visual arts into stimulating
your own thinking—and bring new per-
spectives to your audiences:
Take a painting, sculpture or photogra-
phy class at a local community college.
Dr. Michael Vandermark is a licensed
psychologist, speaker, and author of Life’s
Wake Up Call – the Content to Process
Shift. An expert on how creativity and
brain functions interrelate, Vandermark
has focused on human learning, involve-
ment and content retention. In his work
with groups in organizations, he created
“Messages with Music,” an approach that
blends music and parodies to enhance
learning and retention among his work-
shop participants. Vandermark presents
a slide show with a musical parody that
he recorded with a live band, which he
says “arouses high levels of audience
involvement and a substantial increase in
message retention.”
Vandermark uses the parodies to
entertain and educate simultaneously.
They deliver an important message,
whether it’s related to leadership, com-
munication, change management or life
at work. The message, embedded in the
music, pairs lyrics with common work-
place issues and creates a readiness for
discussion. He uses them effectively to
communicate with his audience and as a
basis for facilitated dialogue and problem
identification. (To see a sample parody,
visit www.tinyurl.com/musicparody.)
Dr. Vandemark notes that the sense of
smell and hearing music. Recalling past
experiences leads to greater attention to
the content as well as retention of what
is heard. For example, he uses the tune
“My Way” (a parody done to a Frank
