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Author Topic: Can you Teach Creativity?  (Read 31847 times)

kencameron

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Re: Can you Teach Creativity?
« Reply #40 on: February 12, 2016, 08:19:42 pm »


Teaching, or encouraging certain people to be less creative might be considered necessary in the interests of economic development. Lots of jobs require a strict adherence to existing rules, procedures which can be very unsatisfying for those of us who are creative.  ;)


The relationship between creativity and rule-breaking is certainly interesting and not one of identity. Keeping to rules can surely be a creative choice - lots of great artists choose to work within conventions - but maybe not because they don't know any other way or because they regard breaking the rules as forbidden. And I suspect that even in jobs that require a strict adherence to rules, it is best to do it consciously and with awareness that the rules aren't being kept for their own sake.
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Ken Cameron

Alan Klein

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Re: Can you Teach Creativity?
« Reply #41 on: February 12, 2016, 09:50:38 pm »

Some thoughts that ran threw my head.  What's the difference between creativity and art? 

A business who creatively adapts a new marketing technique to sell his product is being creative.  We all are creative in that sense.  Everyone who does things creates new and different methods or adapts existing methods.  My wife does that all the time with cooking recipes.

How is that different from the painting artist who naturally can draw?  Is that creative or just artistic?  Where does one end and other begin?  IS their overlap?  Are they the same or really different?   Are we confusing the two?

Rob C

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Re: Can you Teach Creativity?
« Reply #42 on: February 13, 2016, 04:59:12 am »

Some thoughts that ran threw my head.  What's the difference between creativity and art? 

A business who creatively adapts a new marketing technique to sell his product is being creative.  We all are creative in that sense.  Everyone who does things creates new and different methods or adapts existing methods.  My wife does that all the time with cooking recipes.

How is that different from the painting artist who naturally can draw?  Is that creative or just artistic?  Where does one end and other begin?  IS their overlap?  Are they the same or really different?   Are we confusing the two?


And there you have very well defined some of the problems associated with the word creative.

I accept that the word can be used widely, far more widely than I'd like it to be used for it to have an easily understood or defined meaning. As it is, it provides fodder for the argumentives amongst us and little more.

As I see it, the word creativity is (should be?) limited to the creative arts such as music, painting, photography, literature, architecture; I do not apply it to the other uses such as 'creative' marketing, accountancy etc. etc. where it becomes a substitute for the word intelligent or clever, cerebral, then. I think creativity has nothing to do with intelligence - in fact, I see it as often being almost diametrically opposed to that. Some of the most dumb people that I know are very creative but fall on their faces when it comes to turning creativity into success. Creativity is of the spirit; intelligence is of the mind. Rarely the twain shall meet.

Rob C

kencameron

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Re: Can you Teach Creativity?
« Reply #43 on: February 13, 2016, 05:15:47 am »


As I see it, the word creativity is (should be?) limited to the creative arts such as music, painting, photography, literature, architecture;
So you don't think scientists or mathematicians can be creative (as something quite other than a synonym for intelligence)?
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Ken Cameron

Ray

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Re: Can you Teach Creativity?
« Reply #44 on: February 13, 2016, 07:51:41 am »


The relationship between creativity and rule-breaking is certainly interesting and not one of identity. Keeping to rules can surely be a creative choice - lots of great artists choose to work within conventions - but maybe not because they don't know any other way or because they regard breaking the rules as forbidden. And I suspect that even in jobs that require a strict adherence to rules, it is best to do it consciously and with awareness that the rules aren't being kept for their own sake.

Keeping to certain rules because you find them useful and because you like the results, or because your audience likes the results, is what many artists do. Such artists can be creative within the rules they have accepted.

If the situation changes, regarding the economy, or the artist's own satisfaction with the rules, which he might begin to find restrictive or boring or purposeless, then the creative person will change the rules. The less creative person will tend to cling on to the old rules.

Perhaps the Impressionistic and Symbolic painters, and Picasso in particular, are good examples here. As I understand, Picasso's early works were representational and photorealistic. The realisation that photography could do the job much more efficiently was a motivation for him to change his style in a creative manner.

It's interesting to speculate, if the camera with recording capabilities had not evolved, would Picasso have continued to paint in the representational style?
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Rob C

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Re: Can you Teach Creativity?
« Reply #45 on: February 13, 2016, 08:35:01 am »

So you don't think scientists or mathematicians can be creative (as something quite other than a synonym for intelligence)?


If you mean outwith their 'day job' then yes, of course they can; they can be players in any of the aesthetically based 'arts' as well - if they have 'it'! If not, then they dabble, no matter how much money their 'day job' allows them to bring to the game. However, FWIW, they'd be better off hunting in Africa; could garner themselves lots of international publicity and raise their profile no end. As the man said, there's no such thing as bad publicity: you just need to know how to handle it to your advantage.

There's no exclusivity as to were and with whom talent/creativity lives; that's something quite else from buying it.

Catch 22 inversion.

Rob C

Rob C

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Re: Can you Teach Creativity?
« Reply #46 on: February 13, 2016, 09:11:35 am »

Keeping to certain rules because you find them useful and because you like the results, or because your audience likes the results, is what many artists do. Such artists can be creative within the rules they have accepted.

If the situation changes, regarding the economy, or the artist's own satisfaction with the rules, which he might begin to find restrictive or boring or purposeless, then the creative person will change the rules. The less creative person will tend to cling on to the old rules.

Perhaps the Impressionistic and Symbolic painters, and Picasso in particular, are good examples here. As I understand, Picasso's early works were representational and photorealistic. The realisation that photography could do the job much more efficiently was a motivation for him to change his style in a creative manner.

It's interesting to speculate, if the camera with recording capabilities had not evolved, would Picasso have continued to paint in the representational style?


He did all sorts of things during his gig, including ceramics which, apparently, was his gesture to open possession of a 'Picasso' to a general public that he knew would never be able to afford one of his paintings. I suppose it's like a 'thank you', a paying back as it were, to the people whose adoration was beyond their means but, nevertheless, important in creating the mystique. All artists need some of that magica publica if they are to get their heads above the waters of life, never mind above the bleedin' parapet!

As to changing style: why couldn't he just have become bored? If you, as a photographer, spend days a week looking at somebody surrounded by a roll of white Colorama you soon realise that all the troubles and tribulations of the outside 'location' world are worth braving if only to save your sanity. A change is as a good as a holiday, I'm told. And living a successful life in the South of France was not something to knock. Living a poor one would be devastating, if only by the constant under-your-nose presence of the goodies outwith your reach but not of your gaze. A bit like living here, come to think of it, and I have to confess to having had bad moments in my early years on the island looking at those Sunseekers and Rivas I could never own. But you get over it, mainly by realising they don't bring happiness, just more problems in the shape of costs and obligatory crew - it the boat's big enough to make the bother worthwhile in the first place. Truth is, any boat I could afford was always going to be too small to serve its purpose if in my ownership. And considering the scary effects ultraviolet's already had on my skin, maybe just as well I was relatively skint and didn't buy myself more daily exposure. A ski boat is not funny in Med summers, unless in motion (rapid) that fools one into thinking it's cool- UV laughs with you all the way to the clinic.

But anyway, whether Provence or Mallorca, those were different days with diffent people and types; today you get drug barons and the nouveau riche, not writers, poets, artists of worth and the beau monde of yesteryear... all lost with that bloody dirty baby in the tub. Damn the Great Depression!

Rob

kencameron

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Re: Can you Teach Creativity?
« Reply #47 on: February 13, 2016, 03:29:50 pm »


If you mean outwith their 'day job' then yes, of course they can;

Rob C
No. I mean in their day jobs. I guess your answer would be clear, as you would confine creativity to the arts. I think that misses a characteristic of good work that other fields have in common with the arts. If you have a look at the history of mathematics, for example, you will find that the idea of creativity plays a significant part, and I think that those who deploy it to assess the work of mathematicians are pointing to something real.
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Ken Cameron

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Re: Can you Teach Creativity?
« Reply #48 on: February 13, 2016, 05:18:07 pm »

You might not be able to teach creativity, but you can probably teach a pretty decent facsimile of it, and like sincerity, if you can fake it well enough, you're made.

Ray

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Re: Can you Teach Creativity?
« Reply #49 on: February 13, 2016, 06:29:51 pm »

You might not be able to teach creativity, but you can probably teach a pretty decent facsimile of it, and like sincerity, if you can fake it well enough, you're made.

I think there's an important concept here that needs clarification. Teaching is a process that has to involve learning, by definition. If nothing is learned, then nothing has been taught.

For example, if a teacher were to walk into the wrong class and spend half an hour attempting to teach a subject in English to a class of non-English-speaking Spaniards who sat in their seats silently during the entire period, then nothing has been taught and nothing has been learned, except perhaps the teacher has taught himself to be more careful and observant next time he enters the classroom.  ;)

The question, can creativity (or how to be creative) be taught, is essentially the same as the question, 'Can one learn how to be creative?'

I think the answer must be 'yes', to varying degrees depending on the motivation of the student.

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kencameron

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Re: Can you Teach Creativity?
« Reply #50 on: February 13, 2016, 07:01:30 pm »

I think there's an important concept here that needs clarification. Teaching is a process that has to involve learning, by definition. If nothing is learned, then nothing has been taught.
....

The question, can creativity (or how to be creative) be taught, is essentially the same as the question, 'Can one learn how to be creative?'

I think the answer must be 'yes', to varying degrees depending on the motivation of the student.


I think that is exactly right and I would go further to say that learning is fundamental and the student needs to be ultimately in charge, using the services of the teacher to develop something in and for themselves, and that this applies whatever the subject. That of course doesn't mean that teachers don't need to have authority in their classrooms. But the model in which we think of teachers handing something out to passive students is misleading.


It also occurs to me that creativity often isn't taught on its own. What is taught is "creative writing", or (creative) art, or (creative) photography, with "creativity" as one dimension of the overall approach. To my knowledge the most interesting information about this emerges from creative writing schools, no doubt because writers write, often about themselves. There does seem reason to think that in all these areas, talent can be nurtured and developed and that the concept of "creativity" captures something important about the process.
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Ken Cameron

Rob C

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Re: Can you Teach Creativity?
« Reply #51 on: February 14, 2016, 05:22:20 am »





It also occurs to me that creativity often isn't taught on its own. What is taught is "creative writing", or (creative) art, or (creative) photography, with "creativity" as one dimension of the overall approach. To my knowledge the most interesting information about this emerges from creative writing schools, no doubt because writers write, often about themselves. There does seem reason to think that in all these areas, talent can be nurtured and developed and that the concept of "creativity" captures something important about the process.


Now you are talking: having accepted the idea of existing talent within the subject - the 'student' - then of course you can nurture that by teaching techniques and the use of tools. That's something absolutely different to the claim of being able simply to 'teach' any old Tom, Dick and Harry straight off the boardwalk how to be creative, which is where I differ in my views from those who prefer to think everyone can do anything that they decide, one day, that they want to do or be.

In fact, that sort of technical teaching is something I advocated long ago, when thinking aloud that all photographers would gain more from concentrated instruction in the use of Photoshop than from any number of 'artistic' lectures on the abstracts of photographic life, a life/identity which has to come from within, not from without. In my own time at an institute of photographic learning (!) I actually learned very little of value - assuming learning how to sepia tone has value; the place where I learned the basics of almost everything that I ever needed to learn was within employment in an industrial studio. Sure, I didn't learn anything about working with models, but then you don't learn that anyway: it's part of your makeup or it isn't, in which case it probably doesn't really appeal to you anyway - but the purely photographic techniques of printing and processing were picked up on the job, the learning based on the case reality of what worked very well every day.

I think that those great photographers of the past were probably very much left to their own devices, their training consisting of working at it.

Rob C

Rob C

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Re: Can you Teach Creativity?
« Reply #52 on: February 14, 2016, 01:00:06 pm »

I have purposely waited to enter this thread...I'm glad that I did. To talk about creativity is not what Artist's talk about. It's a Huge wast of time and is irrelevant to the creative process.

Peter


You are quite right, but you have to be an artist to know that. Yet another Catch 22 within this little group of interrelated debates.

Never did get to art school: despite the desire I was precluded from doing art classes during my final couple of years in school because those who 'knew best' knew that the art life wasn't a viable one. Consequently, without any school result in art I couldn't apply... so I missed out on that one. However, pretty much all the art school people I know anything about seem to have spent most of their art school days living music at least as much as the graphics. So maybe artists can migrate where others can't. (Better not write that though!)

But, every man Jack of them was already deeply in love with at least one of the arts. As a kid. That's another of those pesky Catch 22s...

Rob

kencameron

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Re: Can you Teach Creativity?
« Reply #53 on: February 14, 2016, 04:17:03 pm »

To talk about creativity is not what Artist's talk about.

Peter
Are you sure about that? Googling "artists on creativity" provides a long list of counter examples. And I know at least one successful practicing painter (sales, independent gallery representation etc) who works with some of her peers teaching art therapy courses which focus on unlocking creativity.
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Ken Cameron

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Re: Can you Teach Creativity?
« Reply #54 on: February 14, 2016, 04:31:32 pm »

But, every man Jack of them was already deeply in love with at least one of the arts. As a kid. That's another of those pesky Catch 22s...
Rob

And to add to what Rob said, the reason they were in love with one of them is that they were creative people. They were born that way. The idea that you can "teach" creativity is absurd on the face of it. And I agree with Peter. Ken's point that there are plenty of "artists" who talk about creativity doesn't refute Peter's point. If you want to ROTFL, go into any museum and read the artists statements associated with their art. They'll always tell you how creative they are.
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kencameron

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Re: Can you Teach Creativity?
« Reply #55 on: February 14, 2016, 07:28:07 pm »

Ken's point that there are plenty of "artists" who talk about creativity doesn't refute Peter's point.
I believe it does. Peter made the sweeping claim that artists don't talk or think about creativity and that doing so plays no part in their creative process. He now seems to be saying that artists in his circle don't, and I have no argument with that, although I am a bit concerned about his view that everything said outside his circle is noise. My observation was that many recognised artists have written and thought about creativity. It would surely be surprising if they hadn't, as doing so simply amounts to reflecting on the essential nature of their distinctive abilities. Your observation (with which I entirely agree) about the fatuity of many artist's statements in galleries simply shows that not everything written by people describing themselves as artists is of value. No inconsistency between that and what I am arguing. Isn't there an on line generator of artist's statements somewhere? I believe I saw one, but have lost the link and would love to find it again.
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Ken Cameron

kencameron

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Re: Can you Teach Creativity?
« Reply #56 on: February 14, 2016, 07:38:09 pm »

And of course these classes are free? If not, thats a teaching business.
Peter
I don't understand the point you are making there. The classes aren't free. Why should they be? The artists in question have found another way of making a dollar which is based on understanding of the creative process they have developed through their work as artists and which probably could not have been developed in any other way. Seems fair enough to me, and if I wanted to do any such course myself, I would need  persuading before I chose a teacher whose work as a practicing artist I didn't respect.
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Ken Cameron

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Re: Can you Teach Creativity?
« Reply #57 on: February 15, 2016, 12:08:50 am »

The idea that you can "teach" creativity is absurd on the face of it.

And you saying that is not proof...it's simply your opinion and one that kinda shows your baggage. Are you creative? Do you want to be more creative or are you satisfied that there's nothing you can do to become creative? I already know you are wrong...

Edit to fix a typo
« Last Edit: February 15, 2016, 01:36:44 am by Schewe »
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kencameron

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Re: Can you Teach Creativity?
« Reply #58 on: February 15, 2016, 01:02:08 am »

It is going to be challenging to discuss whether something can be taught without a common understanding of what that thing is. RSL has in mind something, which, to him, obviously can't be taught. Schewe has in mind something which he thinks can be taught and which he has taught. Could it be that they aren't thinking about exactly the same thing? Surely a point to be clarified before attacks are launched. Creativity is a slippery concept, not least because we all think we know what it is.
« Last Edit: February 15, 2016, 04:02:18 am by kencameron »
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Ken Cameron

Ray

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Re: Can you Teach Creativity?
« Reply #59 on: February 15, 2016, 01:33:50 am »

If one thinks one isn't creative and one believes that creativity cannot be taught, then one cannot possibly ever know what creativity is, and one cannot therefore even know whether or not one is creative.

If a person is creative (or believes he is creative) but also believes that creativity cannot be taught, one has to wonder why that person would come to such a belief. Is it because such a person has spent a lot of time trying to teach creativity, but to no avail? If so, does that mean perhaps the person was a bad teacher?

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