Mastery with Grayson Perry and Herminia Ibarra
Life Threads
In this episode of Life Threads, Lynda Gratton explores the evolving nature of mastery through conversations with artist Grayson Perry and p
Key takeaways
- Grayson Perry distinguishes between 'art' and 'craft,' arguing that true mastery involves constant development rather than reaching a static perfection.
- The rise of generative AI is viewed by Perry as a tool with high craft skill but lacking the essential human element of imagination and surprise.
Main topics
- Evolution of Mastery
- Impact of AI on Creativity
Notable quotes
The thing with mastery is it squeezes out exploration.
Conclusion
Mastery should be viewed as a dynamic process of continuous learning a
Transcript preview
Speaker 1 (0:00) It's a constant struggle and I'm still struggling with it now. You never know whether you're doing something good if that's a good sign. Speaker 2 (0:11) The thing with mastery is it squeezes out exploration. Speaker 3 (0:27) Welcome to Live Threads. I'm Linda Gratton, author of Living the Hundred Year Life. This podcast explores the eight threads that shape a long working life. This episode is about the thread of mastery, the thread that shapes how we develop our skills, contribute and become good. what we do. You know, we often think of mastery as getting better and better at the same thing. But over a long working life, it doesn't stand still. In this episode, we ask, what does it take to keep developing mastery over a long working life? I'm joined by artist, writer and broadcaster, Grayson Perry, whose career is a powerful example of how mastery evolves over time. And later by Herminia Ibarra, a professor at London Business School, who explores how our identities shift and what happens when Speaker 2 (1:34) what we do becomes who we are. Let's begin. Speaker 3 (1:39) Grayson, it's wonderful to see you. I wanted to just dive straight in. And I wanted to talk about mastery because for you, for me, you're one of the great masters of making stuff. And I wanted to ask you, you know, what does mastery mean to you after a whole lifetime of making stuff? Speaker 1 (1:59) I think, you know, I'm in the art business. I'm not in the craft business. And, you know, that's something that sort of dogged me my entire career was a fear of ending up in a craft shop. And so I've always held craft with reverence by arms, legs, because I think that the minute you start, that becomes the point of your work to show your mastery of a craft, then it becomes boring. And my job is to be at once sort of making beautiful things that are decorative and eye-catching and sensuous. But at the same time, I'm dealing with something that swims in the messy context of our culture. Speaker 2 (2:46) And Speaker 1 (2:47) I'm also a communicator. Speaker 2 (2:49) And Speaker 1 (2:49) so often, you know, the person with the best diction and the best vocabulary is not necessarily the best communicator. And so I'm always conscious of, I think the thing I'm a master of is faking authenticity. Speaker 3 (3:07) Well, we're going to come on later to generative AI because I know that's going to be a really interesting conversation we're going to have in terms of faking. But of course, you don't really fake at all. I mean, one thing that's so interesting about everything that you see that's made by you, and I'm thinking of that wonderful collection at the Wallace where you also narrated it. you know, to go around the Rollers and to see what you had made and then to hear the story, you know, one just really gets a sense of just how marvellous all of that is. Yeah, I mean, it Speaker 1 (3:41) is the sort of bedrock of what I do as an artist is the kind of physicality of it. But I think that there's no rules in that. I think that unlike... say, engineering, where there is a sort of benchmark for perfection that works and the utility of it. With art, there is no benchmark in terms of how well done things are, because it's sort of the poetry of the physical. And you're dealing constantly, the mastery is, are you pleased with it? Speaker 3 (4:22) Am I Speaker 1 (4:24) pleased with it when it comes out the kiln or when it comes back from the foundry or wherever? Does it make me gasp and go, wow? And, you know, 40 years into my career, that moment is often a moment of controlled disappointment. And so the idea of being a master of something is slightly something I'm not aiming at because. Speaker 1 (4:53) That implies a sort of dead end. Speaker 2 (4:55) Yeah. Speaker 1 (4:56) And to me, to be a master artist is to be constantly developing, constantly being fresh and vibrant, constantly surprising people, you know, and even the awkwardness of trying things out and failing a bit is part of the mastery because. That's what you're dealing with, a language that is very complex. And when we talk to each other as human beings, we pick up on the hesitations and the mispronunciations as much as we pick up on the exactitude of people's language. And so I think that as an artist, as someone who's making things for the public to look at, I'm dealing with communication. Speaker 1 (5:44) visual Speaker 1 (5:47) All of the references that we all love, I'm playing with them constantly. Speaker 3 (5:53) Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think more than almost any other artist at the moment, your identity is so much part of everything that we see. And I think mastery in the end, as you say, is about your identity. It's about how you feel about the thing, about how it pleases you or how it disappoints you. I feel that myself as a writer, you know, every book is a process of disappointment. But at the same time, You have to say, I don't know how you feel about this. I feel like saying it's the best I can do. It's good enough. Speaker 1 (6:22) It's good enough. It's good enough. Being good enough for. you know, someone at the top of their game is a lot better than people who say it's good enough, who aren't really trying very hard. Speaker 2 (6:37) Yeah. Speaker 1 (6:37) You know, that's the thing. It's like anybody in the creative business, they're good enough is bloody high. Speaker 3 (6:44) Yeah. And it's hard to be good enough. One of the things I say in the books, I talk a little bit about my kids, you know, Christian and Dominic. And I always, I say in the book, you know, I don't think of myself as a great mother, but I was good enough. I did the best I could, you know. And I think that's sort of how it is. You know, earlier, Grace, you were talking about doing this for 40 years. And of course, you and I have both been at this for a long time. And I wanted to take you right back because I know you've written quite a lot about where it all started. And for many people listening to this podcast, they'll be at the beginning of their lives. And they're also, well, the beginning of their working lives. And they're going to be asking themselves, you know, mastery is one of the threads, I think, which is absolutely crucial for a long life. And you're, of course. You and Hamina Ibarra are in this episode talking about mastery. And I wondered, you know, what stage did you begin to sort of realize and what was the discipline that you brought in those early days that helped you to, that put you on the track of who you are now? Speaker 1 (7:43) Well, there's very few universal values that, you know, that apply over generations because young people starting out now are starting out in a very different world. But, you know, basic ones like getting on with people and turning up on time and putting in the hours and not being the arsehole. These are the ones that kind of young people need to hear. They think it's going to be gifted to them on a plate or there's a recipe for getting it right. It's not. It's a constant struggle. And I'm still struggling with it now. You never know whether you're doing something good. That's a good sign. And this whole sort of fetishism of. Speaker 1 (8:19) imposter syndrome that goes on. I go, imposter syndrome is a good thing. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that, you know, this idea that there is a recipe. Speaker 1 (8:31) I'm in the creative business and my job, yeah, I write my own career structure. You know, all artists write their own career structure. There is no right way to do it. Yeah. And, you know, to say that I, you know, my identity is part of my work more than other people, I would say no, because other people just have different identities. You know, even the most aesthetic minimalist is telling us an awful lot about them, you know. Speaker 3 (8:56) Yeah, yeah. Actually, that's right. I went to the Whistler exhibition yesterday. And yeah, you're right. He said so much about himself, really, without even necessarily saying about himself. I want to come back to this idea of discipline, because one of the things that really strikes me about you, Grayson, and I was thinking last time I was in your studio, you had a music stand. And I said, why have you got a music stand? You said, oh, well, because I have a music teacher, because I'm doing a show and I need to learn to sing. And that just really reminded me of how many things, how many skills that you've got, how many things you've learned, how many disciplines you've created. Speaker 1 (9:37) Yeah, I think it's really important to keep learning. Learning is joy and it's, you know, a great passion. And singing was, you know, a very obvious thing. I just made a joke to my wife, you know, I'd been doing live comedy shows and I said, I should have ended on a song. And she said, well, we know Juliet. And so I rang Juliet the next day and started learning to sing about seven years ago. And it's been a great joy to me. And I, I do it a lot. And, and it kind of led into me working on a musical. So I'm learning, you know, we've got our musical opening in Walthamstow this summer. And. You know, I'm learning a lot about that business now. And I always enjoy going into different worlds. That was part of the fun of television. I mean, there's no school for telling you how to be a TV presenter. Speaker 3 (10:24) Yeah, that's Speaker 1 (10:24) interesting thing. That is really an exercise in can you be relaxed on camera, basically? Speaker 3 (10:31) Yeah, and you can look at you. And Speaker 1 (10:33) I sort of mastered that one. But it took a long time. It took a long time to feel confident enough to look down the barrel of a lens. and say exactly what I was thinking. Speaker 3 (10:45) And actually, I mean, I think we were all so appreciative of what you did during COVID when you basically brought us into your workshop and said, you can make things as well. And I know you were just amazed at how many people just got into it. Speaker 1 (11:01) Yeah, it was lovely because the people who get the most out of art are those that make it and doing it. Speaker 1 (11:09) You know, I think one thing that needs to be constantly reiterated is that any kind of hobby or interest or passion you have, the minute you think of it as your career, Speaker 2 (11:22) then Speaker 1 (11:23) it's a different thing. It's a different thing. You can enjoy doing pottery or painting or acting or singing as an amateur, but the minute you think, right, I'm going to be a singer or a potter or an artist or whatever, Speaker 1 (11:36) It changes it. Suddenly you're in competition with all your rivals. You've loaded it with the expectation that it's going to make you a living. The standards that you'll be compared to will be way higher. And so I see it time and time again, people who think that they can just segue effortlessly from a hobby into a career. And it's like, no, no, it takes a long time and you are not guaranteed success. Speaker 3 (12:05) So what is the difference? Because both of you, both of us do things that people have as hobbies. You make things. I write books. Those are both hobbies for people, but both of us have made that into a career. What's the difference between a hobby and a career? Speaker 1 (12:20) It's taking it seriously and having a cold eye on what you do. And suddenly you have to compare yourself to... Speaker 1 (12:33) and to your peers around you and what's going on in the culture now. It's not like you're not comparing yourself to the person sitting next to you at evening classes. Speaker 3 (12:43) Yeah. Speaker 1 (12:43) You're comparing yourself to people who are on the