Interview with:Floris Koot [floriskoot]
CREATIVITY
 | How and why did you begin to be creative? How can one be not!? Everyone is! I kept it alive though from a very young age. Stuff wants to express itself through me. Sometimes it feels like my idea, sometimes it's inspiration on the spot. |
| Your mind is your work tool. How do you take care of it? Stay curious! Ask naive questions. Challenge the status quo. Playfully explore possibilities and what if questions. |
| How do you avoid repeating yourself, or falling into formula? How do you stay fresh? see former answer. And let myself be challenged by others. |
| Do you have a ritual like retiring to a lonely place from time to time to cleanse your mind? no. But I do take care if I have enough rest or sometimes stay in bed to read a book. |
| What cultural sources do you draw from the most? spiritual traditions (taoism, sufism, buddhism) anthropology, history, stories, novels, movies, music (world and cross over) and my friends and our discussions. |
| Who have your teachers been? anyone showing me a new door or the handing me the keys for one. |
| When you accept a job, how much value do you place on each of the following? Money, creative liberty, visibility, and to work with the best. 1. How it contributes to the world.
2. That I can play a role that makes me shine and flourish in my contribution.
3. Creative liberty.
4. People to work with.
5. income and or value trade off. |
| Must someone be the leader or boss in order for a creative team to function well? Depends. It all comes to to the purpose the the team, to the chemistry among the members and the context they are working in. |
| The armchair psychologist: Is creativity an act of rebellion for you? No, not for me. But for others my creativity is or may be rebellion, out of the box, strange, weird stuff. |
| Do you work well under pressure? I don't know. I hardly experience pressure. I love working in the moment and trust ideas will come. Pressure doesn't help ideas to come. It may help to focus though on the job at hand ;-) |
| What city in the world currently attracts you due to its creative environment? Amsterdam. I live where its happening for me. |
| What do you feel when, after two or three years, you see an idea of yours again? Depends. Some ideas have become dated and better let go. Others I am still proud of and would love them to stay alive. |
| You are as good as your last idea. Wouldn't you like to have a more secure type of work? I like the adventure of my kind of work. I am not as good as my last idea. I am as good as the trust in me and my relationships with those I work with. |
ACTING
| Please list the most important or defining jobs of your career. I am mainly an improvisor.
I played mad emperor Caligula in a roleplay with managers and CEO's of a big corporation. I was both amusing, dangerously mad and a very good process facilitator until I got 'murdered' ;-)
I played nasty people in trainings, to such grit, that one day I thought I went way too far, until the participants said: " that is exactly how our patients behave." I had never ever played aggressive patients on methadon before or even met.
I played a trailer park father who was losing everything, in a both funny and painful way. |
| What type of psychological, physical, and emotional preparation do you do before a performance? I prefer to play from context, and only add character or specific traits when necessary. |
| What is the archetypal character in which you tend to be typecast? The underdog, the professor, the civil servant (from silly to nasty), anti hero, ordinary civilian, ambitious CEO, nazi, innocent. |
PERSONALITY
| A simple pleasure that for you is quite big or important. Strawberries with whipped cream. Having the time to sometimes spend a day in bed reading a book. Meet inspiring people. |
| Something in which you are completely incompetent. Don't ever let me organise a project that includes doing the finance, making more than 20 calls, persuade others through influencing techniques and sell the results to the masses. I can come up with great ideas for such projects. I can host large groups at the end. But the complex production work in between is NOT my thing. |
| Please list something you have not yet done, but that you would definitely like to do someday. I want to train an orchestra to improvise a symphony from scratch, without a conductor. I think it's possible, I know it can be done. I developed much of the knowledge and techniques necessary. And I want to try it for real. |
PHILOSOPHY
| What is the secret to happiness? Happiness is overrated. They key is to contribute to the 'bigger whole'. That can be very fulfilling. It gives meaning. Besides many people experience the moments they gave as the best of their lives. Seeking happiness is often too self indulgent and often includes self blinding to reality or less wanted emotions. |
| Does the soul exist? Who cares. Live as if it does. Have soul in what you do and you may create it. |
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200 visits Whohub
Floris Koot
Amsterdam
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