Jul 18, 2026 · 37 min · 9 segments
I have been asked about my ideas and where they come from more than anything else in my 21 year career (although "How long did it take to make?" must be a close second). It's really hard for me to…
Ruth SingerHost
That question is, where do you get your ideas from? And that might sound like a really simple question, but it's actually a hugely complex question.
And I have spent several years trying to put some answers to that question together into a book.
I have written several books in my life and in my practice and Creating books about my own work is something that I find really rewarding.
And that book, which has taken me in a total six years, that book really tries to answer that question of where do you get your ideas from? Not in a straightforward, here are some tips, you know, it's not step by step of how I develop my ideas, but...
The book explores all of the background to my practice, how I've got to where I am creatively and what it is that I do in my practice to develop my ideas.
I'm going to talk a little bit about that today and then you can explore in more detail in the book.
I hope you've come across it on my website and social media and all of that kind of thing.
And that's the majority of what I've been doing for the last 10 or so years of being very focused on making work that shares stories, tells stories, explores... an element of something I'm really fascinated and drawn into that might be historical research.
It might be landscape history, all kinds of different stories that I explore through my work.
They all come under the umbrella of care and connection in various different ways.
But the book explores a number of themes that have come up again and again in my practice over the last 10, 12 years.
And that hopefully explains where I get some of my ideas from or where I get most of my ideas from.
But it's really complicated to explain what it is or how it is that I come up with my ideas because they come from my life, my life experience, my way of thinking, my way of seeing the world and everything around me that I have gathered over the years.
So when people say, how do I get to where you're at? And I said, well, you need to go back and have my childhood and then go to university and do what I did.
That question is, where do you get your ideas from? And that might sound like a really simple question, but it's actually a hugely complex question.
And I have spent several years trying to put some answers to that question together into a book.
I have written several books in my life and in my practice and Creating books about my own work is something that I find really rewarding.
And that book, which has taken me in a total six years, that book really tries to answer that question of where do you get your ideas from? Not in a straightforward, here are some tips, you know, it's not step by step of how I develop my ideas, but...
The book explores all of the background to my practice, how I've got to where I am creatively and what it is that I do in my practice to develop my ideas.
I'm going to talk a little bit about that today and then you can explore in more detail in the book.
I hope you've come across it on my website and social media and all of that kind of thing.
And that's the majority of what I've been doing for the last 10 or so years of being very focused on making work that shares stories, tells stories, explores... an element of something I'm really fascinated and drawn into that might be historical research.
It might be landscape history, all kinds of different stories that I explore through my work.
They all come under the umbrella of care and connection in various different ways.
But the book explores a number of themes that have come up again and again in my practice over the last 10, 12 years.
And that hopefully explains where I get some of my ideas from or where I get most of my ideas from.
But it's really complicated to explain what it is or how it is that I come up with my ideas because they come from my life, my life experience, my way of thinking, my way of seeing the world and everything around me that I have gathered over the years.
So when people say, how do I get to where you're at? And I said, well, you need to go back and have my childhood and then go to university and do what I did.
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