Don't Call It Art is out now!

10 ways to create like a kid again

Hey y’all,

Finally — finally! — after 7 years, there’s a new book of mine out in the world: Don’t Call It Art: 10 Ways to Create Like a Kid Again is now available wherever you buy books.

Don’t Call It Art is a creative liberation handbook of art lessons I learned while being a studio assistant to my two young boys. It will teach you to unlearn what you’ve learned, give yourself permission to be bad, and treat yourself with the care of a loving parent so the wild 4-year-old in you will come out and play.

Publisher’s Weekly said it’s “cheery,” “upbeat,” and “full of fun, wryly witty wisdom.”

If you haven’t yet, you can grab your copy today:

A good deal of the book’s existence is thanks to the support of subscribers to this newsletter — y’all get a special shout-out in the acknowledgements for buying me the time to experiment, fool around, and play like a kid.

As a little thank you, I wanted to give you the first look inside. Here’s the introduction:

---

I never went to art school, but being around my kids was more inspiring than any art school I can imagine. By the time my boys were toddlers, they drew like two pint-sized Picassos. They worked the way I dreamed of working: without fear or hesitation, just wild energy, raw passion, and a lightness of touch.

They schooled me, all right—­ you could even say they unschooled me. I had assumed, as their dad and the author of Steal Like an Artist and other books about creativity that have sold millions of copies around the world, that I would be their teacher and they would be my students. It soon became clear that the opposite was true: I had way more to learn from them than they had to learn from me.

So, I apprenticed myself to beginners. I was the studio assistant now, and things went smoothly as long as I knew my place. My job was to fetch art supplies, fix snacks, and soothe tantrums. Anytime I tried to give them pointers or tell them what to do, it backfired on me. I learned to keep my mouth shut and my eyes open. Occasionally, they let me join the fun, but they certainly didn’t need anybody to teach them how to be creative. What they needed was for me to be there when called upon but otherwise stay out of their way.

Whenever I shared the stuff they made online, readers kept asking me when I was going to write a book about creativity for kids.

“Kids don’t need a book!” I’d protest. “We need a book so we can be more like them!”

This is that book.

As I was learning to love and care for these little artists in my life, I started wondering why I didn’t show myself the same love and care. It was the thought I had when I read parenting books: Why are we doing all this stuff for our kids but not ourselves? Why aren’t we all taking time to play? Why aren’t we all letting ourselves get bored? Why aren’t we all limiting our screen time and going outside?

One day I was listening to an interview with the musician Fiona Apple, and she admitted that she reads a lot of parenting books, not because she plans on having kids but because she wants to learn how to parent herself.

“So, you’re the parent and the child?” the interviewer asked.

“Well, I mean, you always have to be,” Apple said. “Everybody has to be for themselves, I think.”

In this book, I’m going to help you learn how to treat yourself with the care of a loving parent so that the wild, creative kid who still lives in you can come out and play.

I want to emphasize here that you do not need to have kids or want to have kids or even like kids to read this book! But if you do have kids in your life, you can think of this book as a parenting book in disguise. All of the lessons here can be used as strategies to help support a kid’s creativity. (I hope you’ll learn them for yourself first, so you can set a good example.)

At some point in your creative life, you might discover that, in the words of Murray Stein, you are your “own worst enemy, harshest critic, and severest taskmaster.” You can lose touch with all that energy, joy, and freedom you felt when you were just starting out. Whether you’ve failed to achieve your goals or had success beyond your wildest dreams, it’s easy to get bored, stuck, or find yourself just going through the motions. You feel washed-up. Burned-­out. Like you’ll never make anything good again.

Being around my kids liberated me from so many of these feelings. These are the lessons I learned. I hope they will help you.

---

I really can’t wait for y’all to hold this book in your hands. It’s the most beautiful object I’ve ever published. Here are a few more looks inside:

Hope y’all love it. (If you do, a 5-star review on Amazon or Goodreads goes a long way!)

xoxo,

Austin

PS. Here’s what I look like after signing 400 books: