Thinking Outside Of The Box

In September of 2008 I was looking through "want ads," well, we don't really call them that anymore we call them, "job postings." Anyway, there seemed to be some frequency in people looking for "outside of the box" thinkers, doers, sages and seers... people, I guess. It's one of those terms that makes me think, "look for some talent" in your human resources department. That and the requirement for "multitasking." We all know now that multitasking is a myth, right? If you highlight "multitasking is a myth, " right mouse click, Search Google for "multitasking is a myth," as I just did, lo and behold there's a link to an article in Scientific American entitled, The Myth of Multitasking. The first thing it states is we have not gotten better at multitasking but have rather gotten better at switching back and forth between tasks. That's as far as I read. I might add, it appears to me that we've gotten better moving from task A to task B, C or maybe even D and in the meantime everyone's politely forgotten about task A. Fact is, computers have a hard enough time multitasking why should we be expected to?

Back to the box. Thinking outside the box elicited an image in my head that day and I decided I needed to see it more clearly, so I made this image.

In fact in looking back it appears I made 26 variations of this image between September 15 & 16, 2008. Apparently I liked this one best because it ended up on my business card with the proud caption, "Thinking Outside Of The Box." Just like a movie title. Fact is, as I have already alluded to, I think it's a stupid saying and the whole point was to make sarcastic mockery of its stupidity. A lot of people really like my card though and actually so do I but then I think outside of the box.

About 1 year and 11 months later I decided to show people just how big the box really was. After working on a CG elephant for something entirely different I created, "seeking thinking outside of the box." Perhaps my elephant was a subconscious interpretation of certain HR departments. Or not.