Moonlander One is a sole proprietorship, operated by myself, Dr Stephan Cloete. I established this business to address a growing problem that I’ve encountered in my students and in the various organizations that have hired me as a consultant over the years. The problem: a lack of creativity in all walks of life. A problem that is going to reach dangerous levels due to the advent of AI.
I have always been fascinated by creativity. As an eight-year-old boy, I loved coffee table books filled with paintings of dinosaurs, barbarians, and impossible landscapes. As I became a teenager, I started to notice the names of artists, and soon thereafter, authors, and film directors. I became obsessed with creators like Mark Rothko, Terry Pratchett, and David Lynch, and would read every article and book about my favourite creators, in the hope that some of their creativity would rub off on me.
By the time I had to go to university, my mind was set on a career in graphic and multimedia design. My father, a stern accountant and military man, did not agree with my chosen field and told me to pick something “more sensible”. I opted for psychology, since I could then learn to understand creativity on a deeper level, while also gaining an understanding of the consumer.
In my final year of pursuing my psychology degree, I was accepted into the best design school in the country at the time. My dad finally conceded and allowed me to follow my passion. He was also quite relieved when I received annual scholarships for being in the top five of my class every year.
After completing my studies, I had a unique set of skills locked, loaded, and ready for action. But how do you sensibly combine psychology, industrial psychology, graphic design, web design, illustration, art history, and statistics? I started thinking about my skills as bullets that I could shoot cowboy-style from a six-shooter. But bullets pack too small a punch. I needed a rocket, or even better, a rocket ship. And the only way to build a rocket ship was to complete a postgraduate degree.
I ended up completing both a master’s and a PhD, where I studied the intersections between psychology, the sociocultural, and the visual narratives we produce. I was also lucky enough to have found employment as a full-time lecturer and researcher two years before starting my postgraduate journey. For 15 years, I taught everything from design, art history, and fine art illustration to UX/UI, 3D modelling, storyboarding, desktop publishing, and media ethics and law. I also undertook some other advanced responsibilities, such as postgraduate supervision, serving on the academic board, and serving on the ethics committee, as well as being a subject chair for two years (to name just a few of the things I did). I’ve always been a good and empathetic leader, making me well-suited for leadership roles in academia.
At some point, though, I realized that I had lost sight of my initial plan, and I started weaving some of my ideas into two of the exit-level modules I was teaching. The results were astounding, and my student pass-rates went up to 90% for the one module and 95-100% for the other. Something was working, but better yet, my students were leaving the university with their own small business in the bag and seriously advanced creative skills in tow.
After the birth of our daughter, my wife and I decided we needed a change, so we quit our academic jobs, moved to Europe, and started pursuing our passion projects while raising an amazing little girl. Moonlander One is my passion project. I want to help you unlock your hidden creative talents.
Every person on earth has enormous creative potential. You do not have to be a painter or a designer to be creative, but if you want to reduce stress or find success in your chosen vocation, you need creativity. Imagine a world with unencumbered imagination where every person is pursuing their full creative potential. There would be no wars, no disease, and no depression. I’m not kidding. Let me show you how.
Dr Stephan Cloete
