About Wrestling with Creativity
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Wrestling with Creativity is based on Toronto, Canada and was founded by Brad MacDonald, a life-long pro wrestling super fan. Wrestling with Creativity is an online marketplace for wrestling promotions, artists and creators to promote and sell pro wrestling items.
Whether or not you consider yourself creative, this online marketplace is for you. As a pro wrestling fan, there is an innate creative mindset that we all have. Ever imagined how an upcoming main event match will finish? Created an alternate storyline for ongoing feud that would get the crowd more invested? Drawn out what your wrestling gear would look like for your debut if you became a pro wrestler? Thought up a new name or match type for a specialty pay-per-view or premium live event? Recited a perfect promo to setup the next WrestleMania extravaganza? These are all examples of your creativity at play and working to get stronger.
Let me take you on a journey through my life, illustrating how the world of professional wrestling captured my imagination, energized my creativity and provided me the opportunity to discover my passion for art and design. I share all of this to simply inspire and encourage you. While I tend to avoid having any attention put on me, I understand the power that sharing your story can have on others.Over the years, professional wrestling has transitioned through generations and eras, and I have come to recognize how each period has stretched me and my creativity. Always willing to take risks and striving to continue learning, I have followed a creative path of discovery for myself through my love for professional wrestling.
It’s no coincidence that I was born in 1985, the same year as the inaugural Wrestlemania. At a very early age, I was introduced to and became absorbed in the spectacle of professional wrestling. I was a witness to the Golden Era of wrestling, watching weekend TV action and playing VHS copies of the first pay-per-view events of the 1980’s on repeat.Caught up in the colourful personalities, superhero characters and captivating action, my creativity was sparked and exploded onto the sketchpad. The unique traits and recognizable details of each superstar were what I used to translate the scenes from a paused TV freeze-frame to paper with pencil and crayon.
I was soon introduced to a New Generation of wrestling stars and a new set of design techniques. I was drawn to the design and composition of page layouts with imagery and content in monthly wrestling magazines. My sketchbook became a growing encyclopedia of historical events in professional wrestling in the form of magazine layouts, articles, posters and calendars.My viewing of weekly wrestling programming intrigued me to learn a new form of media – video. Using a television, camcorder, and two VCRs, I scripted, produced and recorded my own wrestling broadcasts. A decade before YouTube was founded, I was in front of the camera to recap TV shows, review video releases, and express my opinions on wrestling happenings.
As professional wrestling’s Attitude Era and the World Wide Web reached boom periods, my enthusiasm for design did as well, transitioning my canvas to a computer. Quickly learning and progressing from Publisher and Paint to Photoshop and Flash, my hobbies took new form and now had a platform to share with the world online.A connected world on the Internet opened my eyes to another side of professional wrestling, known as the Indy’s; small minor-league promotions running regular events, offering a stage for training wrestling performers to gain experience inside the squared circle. I was welcomed into the Indy community, splitting my design focus from just the major leagues to now also the local promotions.My web development and programming skills began to form using Angelfire and Geocities for personal sites, and soon expanded. Several local independent promotions and wrestling performers now relied on my creativity to promote their personalities and upcoming matches online. Promotion booking teams proved that the ‘card is subject to change’, resulting in my design and editing capabilities to become lightning fast in Photoshop and for web publishing.
With an increasingly polished skill set and my experience growing, I initiated a Brand Extension of my own and expanded my portfolio to include work for several companies, across several industries.Taking on projects outside of professional wrestling improved my ability to manage the project timelines, the development process, and client relations. In addition, my interaction design and development skills flourished, while pushing my creative thinking to another level. I became recognized as being able to bring business solutions from concept to production, building wireframes, prototypes, optimized code with database integration, and a user-friendly interface.During this time, I graduated from University in Toronto with a Bachelor of Commerce in Business Technology Management. I majored in Digital Media Solutions, bringing further clarity and understanding to the user experience and the user-centric design thinking that my freelance project work required.
As the Universe Era began, I became focused on long-term online strategies for businesses, limiting the number of companies I work with. However, I remain hands-on with front-end HTML development, following design trends and learning the latest innovative Internet technologies.As a design lead focusing on the user experience, I worked with financial institutions and government, designing and implementing solutions for their customer-facing platforms. While performing user research and analysis, I concept and design user interfaces that help customer complete their tasks and keep engaged with the company.My passion for professional wrestling continued as I returned to working with an independent wrestling company, refreshing their online identity. It was during this time, that my passion of pro wrestling encouraged me to travel, attending five WrestleMania events in a row and documenting them in my own printed magazine. All the while, sketching, painting, graphic design relating to the latest happenings in the pro wrestling worls continued to be my side passions to explore my creativity.
As an avid collector of wrestling memorabilia, from pro wrestling magazines to action figures, my passion of art and design brought these elements together. In 2019, Hasbars – the Wrestling Candy Store was launched. This creative outlet allowed me to work with design in an entirely new way. Taking inspiration from my wife's rapidly growing chocolate company, QUEST XO Chocolate, we began collaborating on professional wrestling related chocolate products. We launched the Toronto area, at comic conventions, toy & collectible shows and with pop-up stores. The next step has been to introduce Wrestling With Creativity, a platform that allows all creative passions to come together in one marketplace. We are excited for the future of Wrestling with Creativity. Thank you for reading our story and I truly hope this inspires you to reflect on your creativity and encourages you to discover what drives you and your passions. We are all creative in some way. What is your creative superpower?
We are always available to chat and would be happy to chat. Contact us and introduce yourself.
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