Catch attention and have a ridiculously good time
TEDx speaker, artist and corporate coach, Gary Hirsch, at AM:PM PR’s Speakeasy on involving your audience in what you do and make
For the past 16 years Gary Hirsch has worked with some of the world’s most innovative organizations exploring how improv impacts communication, leadership, idea generation, brand building, organizational development, and collaboration. OYF’s global clients include Intel, Disney, Nike, Apple, P&G, Daimler, The British Ministry of Defense, a small band of Northern Californian Buddhist monks (really) and many more.
He talked about his work and the inspiration behind it at a very popular TEDx talk last April.
The OYF network includes improvisers, filmmakers, anthropologists, advertising, marketing and research folks, and the former snow cone king of Portland, Oregon. Core beliefs listed on the website include:
- You can only get so far sitting down.
- Learning is often emotional and experiential before it is intellectual.
- You shouldn’t have to pay extra for the emergency-exit row.
- More heads are better than one (under the right conditions).
- Actions speak louder than mission statements.
- Giant Post-It sticky-backed notes are the greatest invention in world.
Gary has created his own pet project and creative outlet – Bot Joy. What started as hand painted bots on the backs of dominos to inspire his clients at Pixar and others has grown to an army of more than 23,000 little robots and several bots as big as the side of a building inspiring bravery of patients at children’s hospitals, cities that need encouragement and beneficiaries of gifts from friends or family who want to offer support in a lasting way.
OPB’s Oregon Art Beat featured Gary’s work when they joined him at Randall Children’s Hospital last year and his work has been exhibited at The Cleveland Museum of Art, The Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, and in galleries in Portland, Seattle and Las Vegas.
His Bot Joy project has inspired others to “steal his idea”, with hundreds of students and artists making their own bots around the world.
