"Everyone is a story" (Paula Zuccotti bonus episode)

0:00Radim Malinic:Hey, welcome to this bonus episode of the Daring Creativity Podcast. This is where I revisit the interview published earlier in the week, giving me an opportunity to zoom in on a few standout moments for extra value and meaning. Taking time to digest the goodness my guests share with me every single week. And this week I released a conversation with Paula Zuccotti, a multi-hyphenated creative known for her project Everything We Touch. And in this bonus episode, I'll pick out a few moments and talk about a project which is absolutely fascinating. So let's talk about a fact that what she describes is that everything we touch is like an x-ray of our life.

0:42So the idea is, can we tell, you know, can we tell someone's life by just looking at all the objects that they touch in one day? And what will that picture tell me about them and about us and about our society? and it is so revealing. And because in this world where we associate ourselves to a selfie or a curated side of our personality where you may say, oh, Paula, what are your favorite five things? And I will come with my best t-shirt, record player, my best book and my jewelry. I don't know. But everything we touch is like an x-ray of your life because it is everything you do in 24 hours. So while you may have your favorite t-shirt on, You also touch a Tupperware and cling film and house keys and medicine and a bottle of wine.

1:32And it's kind of like everything that you need in a day to live, survive, have fun, express yourself, cope, work out. It's just a really good unit, if I may say. I had to come up with a unit in order to tell these life experiences.

1:50Radim Malinic:I wanted to know through our conversations a lot more about this project because it's fascinating. Paula spent the last more than 10 years photographing people around the world with objects she collects from their one day. I really wanted to know, how does it work? And it's interesting that they select a day in life and then collect all the items that the person touches from the morning to the evening. And in a way, when we think about how we curate our social media presence or our digital presence our digital footprints our linkedin profile sometimes we actually curate conversations when you think about it because we want to come across in a certain way you don't always curate what you touch in every single day because we got our habits right we wake up we reach for our phone if you got the common phone addiction that potentially it's water it's breakfast it's coffee or a coffee grinder car keys these are not necessarily identity choices they are pure necessity pure habits pure life happenings so when someone asks you to describe yourself you might say is that you reader or an athlete but Paula captures the crumpled tissues the anxiety medications the third cup of coffee the Netflix remote used for four hours straight.

3:22Radim Malinic:She's found a way to photograph our actual lives instead of aspirational ones, and that's the x-ray of our lives. So, it's kind of revolutionary because the gap between who we think we are and who we actually are has never been wider. We present ourselves on the outside, but who we are is actually someone different. So there's no filters, it's just a human truth. In the second quote, Paula talks about dream object.

4:14Like when people say you are what you eat or you are what you do. So it brings, it projects a mirror back to you of what is it that you actually really do. So I think like by having that as a framework, if you are not a guitar player, it's rare that your guitar will be there. Unless you are the type of person that in the evening just, you know, rough the guitar and plays a little bit.

4:37Radim Malinic:i love how paula talks about new narratives finding the photos because yes she's right she calls it dream objects but i guess it still goes back to curated objects because yes we've got guitars at home but we not always play we've got books at home we've never read and we've got objects in home that we would love to have but they are not necessarily part of our identity because we buy the version of ourselves we want to become but we're not there yet we are living with artifacts that are best intentions you know that guitar is gathering dust those ambitious books are still on the shelf but what's beautiful about paula's observation she's not judging this she's recognizing that it's fundamentally human we need dream objects because they represent hope and possibility.

5:29Radim Malinic:And what's brilliant about her project is how it distinguishes between objects we want to be versus who we actually are. And that goes back to the previous quote about this is not curated life, it's a necessity. In her images, you can only include what you touch in one day and dream guitar doesn't often make the cut, but the coffee machine does. Paul is showing us that our relationship with objects is deeply emotional. We don't just use things. We project onto them. We hope for them. We tell our stories about who we might become. The third standout moment is about being shy and observant. When I came to England, I came to the master's degree.

6:10And again, I was like from another world. I've always felt, and I'm always like having a start at places where I'm like shy and observant and I try to figure out my voice in that new place and I don't walk into a new place loud if you know what I mean I'm kind of like trying to find how do I and my views and myself connect to that what's the best intersection between myself and that place.

6:39Radim Malinic:Me and Paul have in common the fact that we both came to England around the same time about 25 years ago and there is something really exciting to have that lens of an outsider looking in because you want to integrate you don't want to diminish your uniqueness your personality but you also don't want to stand out too much and I like that Paula says that she was shy and observant because that's a way of my personal experience because being shy and observant can also give you the power of actually observe the situation she's describing her secret superpower of genuinely curious people they don't rush to be heard let's think about it we live in a culture that rewards the loudest voice in a room if you follow my instagram stories i talked about a quote i had recently which is has the dumb got dumber as the dumb got louder and i think we can be safe to say there's a truth in both but the louder has been definitely projected through the social media channels from media and not needing to be allowed this voice in the room actually gives us time to listen in polo's moment she talks about the incredible power of being the quiet observer first she moved from argentina to london moved from industrial design to ethnography from being an employee to entrepreneur.

8:11Radim Malinic:Each time, instead of charging in to prove herself, she watched, listened and absorbed. And this isn't shyness as weakness. It's a strategic curiosity. Paula's entire career is built on observation. None of that would have been possible if she had been too busy talking to notice what was actually happening, if you're paying attention. And that leads us to the last standout moment. Talks about everyone being a story. I don't know if he's one thing but I it's everything it's just seeing how other people live and not in a nosy way in a kind of humble way that no life is better than others everyone is a story and just to see just to find stories in in the everyday in in people's lives and the what surprised me is like when I look at a photo and I find new narratives, new ways of looking at it.

9:08So I run filters in my head and I may find that objects connect or that there is a pattern or I get excited by those things. I get excited by playing, saying, oh, what happens if I remove the middle line? Will that person still be showing their story or not? I get fascinated by asking questions that I'm not allowed to ask in any other way.

9:31Radim Malinic:Paula's found something that makes us equal. We all live a life and every life is complete. It's a fascinating story. And the key word is humbly. Paula's not studying people like specimen. And let's be honest, she's studying their lives and stories. But she's approaching each person's life as a student would approach a teacher. The geisha, the cowboy, the two-year-old, they all know something about being human that paula didn't know about them before she met them they figured out their own way of moving through the world their own system of making meaning this perspective can be seen as radical because we're obsessed with optimization finding the right way to live but as paula's work suggests something different there are as many valid ways to live as there are people living and maybe that's exactly what we need to hear right now my conversation with paula was full of interesting insights and i think we managed to join a few dots that she didn't think about before i haven't thought in for a while but as she quite beautifully said in the stand that moment everyone is a story and i invite you to listen to my conversation with Paula because it's back to the brim with amazing insights about human stories and have a think what is it that everything you touch every day thanks for listening to this bonus episode and I'll see you next week on the next one cheers