Creativity and Subject Matter

Yeah, I know...Dec 17th...whatever.

So, I think I'm going to start focussing this blog on the subject of creativity and originality, it would be a fun hobby to start reading and researching about.   

So, today I was watching a TED talk. 

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/mihaly_csikszentmihalyi_on_flow.html

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

He is a psychology professor at Claremont University and focuses on what makes people truly happy.  Well, during this talk I chanced upon, he discusses creativity. He said, it takes TEN years of technical immersion in a field before one can become truly creative.  He defines creative as: the ability to change something in a way that is than it was before.  

So, I guess the contingencies and variables can come pouring out from there. 

How large is the creation:  Think of revolutionary new theories in all sorts of fields.  Are we recreating an entire field of thought?  Or just one piece?  Is the level of immersion and experience the same for both?  

I remember Monty telling me in undergrad that philosophy students find themselves having what seem to be novel/original ideas only to find out with further reading someone has already thought that and written a book about it.  I had such an experience and I can tell you personally it's a frustrating and infuriating experience.  But as he said to settle my frustrations, when that happens it means the student is on the right track.  ( I would like to write about a universal logic following from this idea...as in, the entire field of philosophy is evolving together, answering questions and arguing with each other, moving forward together. but that's for a different time).  

So, one thing I've found frustrating with this painting experience is the lack of originality.  I have never been technically trained.  The last art class I took was ceramics, which I took in high school.  However, while living in Spain, and travelling Europe, I frequented just about any art museum/ gallery I could get in to.  So, I've done my own little personal art history course, but still this is just an absorbing of ideas and figures.  I didn't learn anything about DOING the art.  So...now what?  I guess what I'll have to start doing is, start at the beginning with technique, teach myself how to draw, how to manage space.  I'll have to try the styles of the classics and moderns, which will probably take about 10 years, then I'll get to begin creating.  That is where genius and greatness comes from, right? 

I am reluctant to agree with those ideas... I think of young prodigies, people who were not yet even ten years of age when they began creating.  It would be interesting to know if Mozart was considered to be a creator when he began composing at 7, or chess great Billy what's his face. My first task will be to reexamine THE CREATORS a long time favorite book by Daniel J. Boorstin.  The book is an extensively brief survey of various creators through out history.  Bach/ God/ Shakespeare/ etc... and canvasses a wide variety of topics, Stonehinge, the creation of the autobiography/ the change from the Egyptian formula of painting.  

Our "age" has some advantages as well as disadvantages.  IT would have been a little easier to create when nothing had been before.  Thing about all the culinary firsts, medical firsts, architectural firsts etc, some we know (penicillin) occurred from mistakes.  BUT...we are at an advantage because unlike the turmoil the Impressionists battled, we live in a time when creativity/ originality are embraced and encouraged.  Even Jackson Pollock and Andy Warhol faced extreme criticisms, maybe when you're eliciting fervor of criticism you've got it right.  

OK.  shit, this has lost it's point.  Although I guess not, since it is simply an introduction to the new direction of my blog, a discussion of creativity/ art.  I think Picasso is my favorite artist and maybe the perfect example of Mihaly's theory, b/c he was classically trained.  He was hailed as genius at a young age and immersed in technically training.  It was from that training he was then able to create new styles, new foci, new techniques, new perspectives.  He was a master creator.  I will never acquire such a status, but i would like to atleast create something, someday.