Why Stories Matter.

After Austin Kleon – Show your work.

Imagine you are looking at two identical paintings on the white walls of a small gallery. They are both classical, both beautifully executed and both with strong narrative content. Even their frames are identical. You could imagine the painting hanging in your home in pride of place in your lounge. You approach each painting individually and inspect and compare them carefully observing the technique, the materials, and the quality. You can’t see any difference between them and there is no signature on either. A pair of classical masterpieces, identical in every detail.

At that moment the gallery owner and you approach him and enquire, “what is the origin of these paintings?” to which he replies as follows:

“The painting on the left is by a Florentine master and was owned by the Ludovico Sforza, the Duke of Milan. In 1499 he invited the French to protect Milan from its enemies, Venice and Naples and this painting was taken back to France in 1504, where it has been since then. The painting on the right is a copy and was completed a month ago by a student. Both are for sale.”

Do we still see the painting on the left in the same way? More importantly, do we value them the same?

One has a story, it has provenance. The other is “fake”. Whilst we would all love to believe that we see art for its beauty and ability to move us, the truth is that the back-story adds hugely to our interest, our appreciation, and the value we place on something. Stories matter and give meaning.

It shouldn’t matter if it’s a fake or an original, but it does. It makes all the difference in the world. We are deeply affected by the stories and the meanings that are carried with the stories and what they tell us. Stories have a powerful effect on the subjective emotional value we place on the objective value of an object.

In an experiment quoted in Kleon’s book “Show you work” Joshua Glenn and Rob Walker tested this hypothesis. Glenn and Walker went to thrift stores, flea markets and bought some insignificant objects with an average value of $1.25. Then they asked some writers to invent significant back-stories to each of the objects. Then they listed the objects on eBay, with their new-found back-stories, the prices they had originally paid, and their descriptions.

By the end of the experiment, they had sold insignificant objects worth $128.74 for $3,612.51.

Stories matter! We want to know where things come from and what stories they carry with them. Our cultures are built on these stories (some of them fake stories too). People want to connect with stories.

Many years ago, whilst working on the designs for a large hotel refurbishment and restoration, my colleague Jon and I decided that it might be fun to create artworks that were “found” during the restoration of the hotel. So, we invented George and Mable who had met when they were small children 100 years previously at the original opening of the hotel. To enable a correspondence between them George was a struggling artist and Mable was a botanist. Both of them traveled the world and corresponded using the hotel as a poste restante. This enabled us to follow some of the key events of the 20th century through their eyes and their letters.

We cataloged and stamped every letter we had written on their behalf. We invented additional characters too, like the Bell Boys Sketch club and Harry the concierge. All became part of the fiction we created for the framed pictures which were on display in the hotel corridors.

These images became part of the legacy of the hotel and the staff would give guided tours of the correspondence (it’s still there) and explain still more elaborate stories around the characters and they have now passed into received legend. (The owners have sold the hotel and I’ve never had the heart to tell them that they are fake).

Stories matter, they give meaning to otherwise inert objects.

Whilst speaking at a conference once I tried an experiment I had read about. I showed the audience a small, slightly used teddy bear, and asked if they thought it was cute. When they answered that it was, I asked one person to hold onto it for me, which they did willingly and even gave it a little cuddle. However, when I told them that this was the teddy bear that belonged to Jeffrey Dahmer (the Milwaukie cannibal), they instantly threw the teddy bear on the ground in disgust. Why? Because once its provenance and history were known (although it wasn’t true) its meaning changed and disgust followed.

Many of the brands we buy use a similar technique. They will make stories about aspirational lifestyles we want to identify with so we buy their product. These stories become the values we want to associate with and by buying their products, these values are transferred to us. They may represent the status we think we deserve or are entitled to. Consequently, their perceived value rises and we pay a premium for the privilege of being associated with their story and the perceived status they confer on us. Bigger watch, faster car (for driving in city traffic jams??), owning expensive art…

I’m a designer and I would like to think that elegance and beauty play just as important a role as a story, but I know that that is just not the case. Take Phillipe Stark’s juicer, the Juicy Salif (which doesn’t function very well by the way!), It makes reference to a squid or perhaps a 1950’s comic book space ship and rethinks how a juice extractor could work. There is a back-story too. Apparently, Phillipe Stark was enjoying some calamari in a pizzeria and noticed that there was nothing to juice a lemon so he started sketching.

The stories are evident in the references and associations, they help me to connect with the object. It is also very elegant and beautiful. The combination of story and elegance makes for an emotional connection.

Stories are fundamental to how we communicate and how we build our cultures. Stories give meaning to random events and are a reflection of how we see the world and how we communicate our perception to others and how we share ideas. Ideas, wrapped in good stories change the world.

“the cat sat on the mat” is not a story. “the cat sat on the dog’s mat” is a story.

John le Carré