Craft Forward Symposium 2011 - The Rightly Timed Pause

"The right word may be effective, but no word was ever as effective as a rightly timed pause."                         Mark Twain

The Craft Forward Symposium is over. The exhibitions closed. The quiet moments for reflection have arrived and my brain has commenced digesting this outstanding series of lectures.

I intend to cover each and every lecture from the symposium on ASK Harriete (as promised in earlier posts). All lectures will be covered in the same order as they occurred during Craft Forward.

If you went to the Conference, I'd love to hear your opinion as well, whether you agree with me or not. If you would like to write a more extended opinion about the symposium, please contact me about writing a Guest Author post. Everyone is welcome to leave comments. 

To conclude this post, I'd like to appeal to the quote from Mark Twain. "The right word may be effective, but no word was ever as effective as a rightly timed pause."

I wish the speakers had applied this wisdom.  I wish they had slowed down.  It seems most of the speakers were given about 20-25 minutes. Instead of choosing their words and their content more carefully, they seemed compelled to squeeze a 45-minute lecture into half that time and talked as fast as they could. The pace seemed to increase as each day of the conference progressed.

Permitting a second or two for a profound thought to sink in would have made a more lasting impression. The enthusiasm and passion were fabulous.  The content deserved equal measure.

Harriete

This post was updated on February 1, 2022.