Muse.DrewWilson.com - Delving into Inspiration

Designers, as a rule, must always be on the ball when it comes to creativity; stale, kitschy work often comes off as insipid and therefore, unwanted. Inspiration however, can be fleeting. Sometimes you hit a rut. Barraged by thousands of images and both good and bad designs, designers can become overwhelmed. Enter Muse. Its tagline reads ‘a collection of inspiration’. The site compiles artistic works (web sites, graphic designs, posters, etc) and showcases them on the homepage. Muse doesn’t stop there however; it delves into the means and motives of the piece by way of an interview with the artist. In fact, each showcase piece is divided into four separate sections: the review, the interview, the inspiration and comments. Under Inspiration you’ll find photos of works that have actually had an influence on the showcase item. There are also links to the artists’ homepages as well as informative blurbs about each artist’s life and work. New pieces are added often; there’s also an inspiration feed which the site’s creator uses to pull in fresh items on a daily basis (sans interview).

“Muse is a project designed and developed by Drew Wilson. My reason for developing Muse was to create a gallery where the focus is on the Artist, rather than simply the Art.
I have often wondered what inspires great artisits/creators, and that is where Muse came from. Muse will not only showcase great art, but it will also attempt to showcase the inspiration behind the art. And ultimaely the inspiration of great artists/creators.”

Muse is an exquisitely designed site—it’s elegant and simple. It’s also a well thought out piece of work. Each section throws light on what inspires artists to do the work they do, so not only do we get a showcase of new and original work, we also get to see how it came about, and what influenced it. Designers should bookmark this one.

This is a really great site, but how will it attract new users? How responsive are designers to interview requests?