I’m going to dedicate today’s post to the art of subtlety. This very conversation has come up twice in the last two days. First in my class yesterday on storytelling and then again today when I discussed “good advertising” with my mentorship. The question is, Why add unnecessary complexity when you can go the route of elegant design?

Subtlety is about lecturing someone without letting them realize that you are lecturing them. It’s about selling them a car without causing them to realize that they were just sold. Good advertising ever so secretly plants a seed in the audience’s mind. Maybe you aren’t thirsty now but in an hour when you are you are going to buy a Coke. It’s like that kung fu move where you get tapped in the chest and you take three steps then your heart explodes.

I’ve seen this many times in design work. You come up with a brilliant idea and you spend all of your energy building a neon sign to broadcast the notion. In my opinion the best designs whether it’s architecture, writing, or illustration leaves much to the imagination. There’s something sexy about a photo of a woman’s back with the straps of her bra slowly draping down. It’s subtle, you fill in the gaps and I don’t have to tell you what to think - you think it.

Consider the difference between me telling you a joke and letting you get it vs me telling you a joke and then describing to you why it’s funny. Subtlety takes people right up to the door but doesn’t open it. That is their job.

With a masterful injection of subtlety it isn’t the material that you are discussing but the way that you are discussing it. An adept can talk to you about swiss cheese for an hour and you would love every second of it. Don’t believe me? Listen to the comedian Mitch Hedberg or Dimitri Martin.

Steve Martin in his book Born Standing Up writes about how the first decade of his career wasn’t noted because it was a flop. It wasn’t until the second decade that he became such a smashing success. Those early years were for experimentation and polish - learning how to address an audience. What may come as a surprise is that during his meteoric ascension to stardom he didn’t change his material he changed the way he delivered it.

The connection I am drawing between master orator and general design is that when a performer is on stage every subtle nuance of their movement is on display. Just as in design inferences are being drawn relentlessly as the user attempts to wrap their minds around your creation. You need to show people and not tell them. The difference is that if you show, people let their guards down. If you tell, they become skeptical and obtuse.

Extra Credit - Additional Shadow Illusions