Iain Thomas
"Iain S. Thomas is the #1 bestselling author of I Wrote This For You and Intentional Dissonance. He wrote his first book, Ignite, at the age of 23 for the Markham clothing store. It won the Grand Prix at the First Paper House Art Of Design Awards and the only craft prize awarded that year, in the design category, at the national design/advertising awards (The Loeries).
As a creative director, he’s a champion for innovative design and communication for his clients which have included Nike, Levi’s, Johnny Walker, The Design Indaba, MTN, apple and many more, from Los Angeles, to Amsterdam, to Johannesburg, to Cape Town. His work has spanned everything from monuments to biodegradable posters.
In 2009, for his work as the author of the art/photography project “I Wrote This For You”, he was voted one of the top 5 finalists in the world in the “Best Blogger To Follow” category on mashable.com under his online pseudonym, pleasefindthis.
The project, which has proven incredibly popular across the world and gone on to become a best selling book, has also afforded him numerous exciting opportunities, including an invitation to dinner with the US Ambassador to South Africa, Donald Gipps as a consultant on digital development within South Africa, and a speaking spot at TEDx Johannesburg.
Through the project, he was also able to have skateboards delivered to The Uganda Skateboard Union on behalf of Stacy Peralta, director of Dogtown And Z-Boys and Riding Giants and he’s previously acted as a creative consultant to Brian Wayne Transeau or “BT” (whose previous collaborators include Peter Gabriel, Britney Spears, Justin Timberlake and David Bowie, amongst others) on his last album, If The Stars Are Eternal, So Are You And I.
His work has won numerous local and international awards and can be found in Communication Arts, Design Indaba Magazine, Ad Vantage Magazine, bestadsontv.com, Contagious Magazine, Archive, The University of Pretoria’s Permanent Design Collection, X-ings: Shaping Culture Through Design Exhibition, The United Nations Gallery of Sustainable Communication, TEDx, Heso Magazine (Japan) and http://www.inpursuitofelegance.com
Iain’s work focuses on non-traditional media in all its forms. He has never once really and truly enjoyed a long walk on a beach." - source
“Stop telling me to follow my heart. It once led me to you.”
“I have a list in my head of all the feelings I still want to feel before I die. And you have ticked so many things off that list.”
“Joan of Arc came back as a little girl in Japan, and her father told her to stop listening to her imaginary friends.Elvis was born again in a small village in Sudan, he died hungry, age 9, never knowing what a guitar was.Michelangelo was drafted into the military at age 18 in Korea, he painted his face black with shoe polish and learned to kill.Jackson Pollock got told to stop making a mess, somewhere in Russia.Hemingway, to this day, writes DVD instruction manuals somewhere in China. He’s an old man on a factory line. You wouldn’t recognise him.Gandhi was born to a wealthy stockbroker in New York. He never forgave the world after his father threw himself from his office window, on the 21st floor.And everyone, somewhere, is someone, if we only give them a chance.”
“And when I asked you how you’d been, I meant I missed you more than I’ve ever missed anything before.”
“But life isn't something that should be edited. Life shouldn't be cut. The only way you'll ever discover what it truly means to be alive and human is by sharing the full experience of what it means to be human and each blemish and freckle that comes with it.”
“Yet you still value the things you’ve lost the most. Because the things you’ve lost are still perfect in your head. They never rusted. They never broke. They are made of the memories you once had, which only grow rosier and brighter, day by day. They are made of the dreams of how wonderful things could have been and must never suffer the indignity of actually still existing. Of being real. Of having flaws. Of breaking and deteriorating. Only the things you no longer have will always be perfect.”
“Sometimes I touch the things you used to touch, looking for echoes of your fingers.”
“I keep thinking you already know. I keep thinking I’ve sent you letters that were only ever written in my mind.”
“The conversation between your fingers and someone else’s skin. This is the most important discussion you can ever have.”
“If nothing else, one day you can look someone straight in the eyes and say “But I lived through it. And it made me who I am today.”