Think Like a Kid Again, with Austin Kleon

For a hundred years, parents attempting to undertake creative endeavors have had a ready-made excuse, courtesy of Cyril Connolly: "the enemy of art is the pram in the hall." Kids, the thinking goes, are where creativity goes to die. Austin Kleon thinks Connolly got it exactly backwards. This month on the podcast, I sat down with Austin—author of the New York Times bestselling trilogy Steal Like an Artist, Show Your Work and Keep Going—to talk about his new book, Don't Call It Art: 10 Ways to Create Like a Kid Again. This book is a love letter to his two sons, and a collection of everything they taught him about creativity. Austin spent his career helping people tap into their creative potential. Then his kids arrived, and he realised he wasn't the teacher anymore. He was, in his words, "the apprentice to the beginners," the studio assistant in his own home, saving the drawings, keeping the paper trail, and watching two small artists figure out how to “let it rip.” We talk about why children aren't an obstacle to your creative life but an opportunity for it to grow, the gentle art of benevolent neglect, and how watching your kids create might be the best way to quiet your own inner critic—and re-parent the artist you used to be. ⏱️ TIMESTAMPS 03:10 — Pre-publication anxiety and "the gulp": Austin's advice for a first-time author 05:03 — Why a second book is like a second child 06:04 — Austin's family: Megan, two boys, and a houseful of weirdos in Austin, Texas 07:12 — A love letter to his kids: bottling the energy of two "cavemen Picassos" 09:55 — Growing up in rural Ohio: pigs, county fairs, and a broad definition of creative work 12:10 — Ken Robinson's "I'm drawing a picture of God" story 13:29 — Puberty and the arrival of the inner critic 14:31 — Milton Glaser's perfect combination: a mother who says "you can do anything," a father who says "prove it" 16:11 — Parenting tension as a guitar string: freedom, constraint, and Bringing Up Bébé 18:50 — The story of how Owen held his pen—and the magic line that disappeared 22:31 — Benevolent neglect: D.H. Lawrence, The Idle Parent, and butting out 25:25 — "I was the apprentice to the beginners": becoming the studio assistant in his own home 25:59 — Where Don't Call It Art comes from: John Baldessari and why the title disarms the critics 27:40 — Capture mode: diaries, one-liners, and drawing comics of your kids 30:57 — Save the drawings: Heidi's Horse, Dahlov Ipcar at MoMA, and keeping a paper trail 39:03 — What Owen's music taught Austin: Brian Eno and "what do I actually like?" 41:41 — Unrepeatable experiments: Montaigne's Latin, Kraftwerk over The Beatles, and Andy Baio's video game history 44:37 — Scarcity vs. abundance fatherhood: Kevin learns piano alongside his daughter 45:58 — The pram in the hall is wrong: what mother-artist memoirs taught Austin about integration 52:09 — "Go to therapy before you have kids": what children reflect back at you, and re-parenting yourself with Fiona Apple 🎙️ SUBSCRIBE TO THE PODCAST Spotify https://open.spotify.com/show/27xa2tW... Apple Podcasts https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast... Pocket Casts https://pca.st/xm2gq02m YouTube • The New Fatherhood 🪄 CREDITS Host: Kevin Maguire Managing Producer: Elizabeth Van Brocklin Sound Editor: Sam Williams Theme Music: Sohn