Draw It Out

June 2, 2009 3 Comments

“The explosion of creativity in the Renaissance was intimately tied to the recording and conveying of a vast body of knowledge in a parallel language: a language of drawings, diagrams, and graphs-as, for instance in the renowned diagrams and sketches of Galileo.”

-Michael Michalko, Cracking Creativity

So I’m not Galileo, but there is something very powerful about the use of images in seeking a common language to work with complexity. Check out the set of drawings we used in a recent learning meeting. We are trying to understand the relationship between advocacy coalitions, local groups, the State, and investing in Network Building capacity. Can you put the story together?

mnaa-diagram

3 Comments

  • Curtis says:

    I love this, G! Love the problem-solving through images. This is such an inviting post. In another book by Michalko he talks about Leonardo Da Vinci’s practice of closing his eyes, totally relaxing, scribbling random lines and scrawls and then opening his eyes to look for emergent images and patterns. “Many of his inventions came forth unbeckoned from this random scribbling.”

  • Linda says:

    I have a totally made up concept of the story – about funding going to organizations and not to a network….. About open windows and interconnections. And I’m totally intrigued to hear what the “real” story is! And wonder what Dan Jumanan (our friend and wonderful graphic recorder) would think!

  • Gibran says:

    Thank CO – with an artistic brother, it has taken me a long time to start experimenting with images (I do words, he does pictures), but I realize my mind often sees things this way, I’m down with Da Vinci and the right-left brain integration!

    LG – you are scaring me by bringing up Mr. Jumanan! He is so awesome! It would be cool to use him to conceptualize/problem solve beyond just recording… the story is about how coalition orgs can get in good with the funders and the state but can lose the power of an organic network in the process

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