It is fascinating that such deep stories can be told in a picture and 20 words. I feel like the round robin gives us an opportunity to have these collective, small bursts of creativity, that can turn out to be quite beautiful. It was interesting to see how the stories progressed as they went through each set of hands. I didn’t imagine where the story would end up, when the idea originated. The first idea seemed the most difficult, and the later rounds became easier to write. It was as if the first Idea was a little spark and once it caught, it was easy to put wood on the fire. The beauty of collaboration is that you have to give up control. Most of the best art is produced when it is created with restrictions because it causes the artist to think outside of the box. When several artists work together that's that much more box to think outside of.

One interesting result of this project was that upon sending off the latest story to the next person, it was rare that the next story would convey what the original author believed to be the important or interesting aspect of the story. Some stories meant to be taken literally were read by the next person as containing a deeper meaning. Other times, the story was meant to be deep, but the next author took the story at its surface. Regardless of the author’s original intent, the next story was often surprising and enjoyable. Each string of stories goes off in a direction the original author most likely did not imagine. These results exemplify the idea that stories are more creative when working as a team.

In the article about the Exquisite Corpse by DJ Spooky, he talks about how fragmented, varied puzzles reflect more accurately the collective memory of our culture and how we as a whole progress. Perhaps this idea could stand a few more test runs from us, but the point is valid. It is simply a silly thing to assume complete control over anything, let alone a creative process, and indeed when a person freely gives up what control they have they not only have an opportunity to be presented with new, interesting points of view, but also insight into other people.

Spooky compared the exquisite corpse and other similar methods of creation with Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein—as accurate as any comparison could be in two senses. Firstly, in the literal sense, it really is sort of a mismatched and vague representation of a story-isn thing, which is beautiful in its own right. It is also a figurative compilation of numerous consciousnesses, opinions, experiences, and interpretations. A “living” thing,” according to Spooky, as “‘text’ is never inanimate”—an entity of sorts built up from the minds of five independently thinking people.

While writing these blurbs, I felt that I was building up part of a community.  As a collective we have our own personal beliefs and experiences, but then putting it together is like a realization of how we fit together as people.  In a community, when new people come in contact, lives are changed and a person has a choice to take different paths in their life.  This process is similar to when a character beat is formed within story.  Now within this exercise, it as if we are introducing the characters developed in the stories to a new person, who has their own perspective and experience to change the life of this character forever.  Mimicking this natural process allows the story and characters develop more naturally.  Just as we do, the characters have the opportunity to be influenced by the introduction of new ideas.   Then the community grows the with the development of new characters and the introduction to new ideas to each of us as creators.