You either have it or you don't - the eye

[The_Traveler]

There is an almost parallel discussion about the influence of technical knowledge on great photographers going onhere.

It is my opinion that technology is, like protein, necessary for growth in some degree but almost poisonous if taken in too large a dose.

There is this lure of technique and technical knowledge because, although it may be difficult, it can be conquered and from then on, one is in charge and fully competent.
Whereas, creativity can never be conquered, someone trying to create must always work hard at it, and the more you do, the steeper the creative hill to climb.
It is so tempting to fall back on the comfort of what one has already done, to produce what seems like new work but what is really the same old stuff.

Great photographers - and those who wish to be great but will settle for good - take technology only in doses prn (as needed) and push the rest away in favor of creative work.

 

[amolitor]

Derrel makes some fine points. I do not think that he's put a nail in it, though.

Talent and creativity always exist in a current milieux. There are contemporary standards and ideas for how art can be and should be made. Mozart composed within the idiom available to him, he wrote tonal music, he wrote in sonata form.

Creativity, whatever it is, is as much about working within strictures as it is about working past them. It's about expressing things in new ways within the current artistic idiom, as much or more than about changing and expanding the current idiom. If the current idiom is crude cartoon drawings, that's what creativity will work within.

Trying to parse out what's innate and what's trained is arguably impossible. If you can figure out what it is that's innate, if you could really nail it down and define it, then you could probably teach it. Since people are in fact working away at just that task, the boundaries of what is teachable are always on the move. Mozart, in a burst of creativity, shows us a new approach to modulation, and the next thing you know it's in all the textbooks and all the kids are doing it. Walker Evans shows us America as we never imagined it, and pretty soon every idiot is out there with a view camera taking pictures of tin shacks.

Did Mozart and Evans have something indefinable and great? I think so. What it is is pretty hard to pin down, though, since it's manifestations are art, and we can always deconstruct the art to see what makes it tick. And then we've just got a pile of watch parts on the table, the mystery is revealed, and we say "Oh, it's just a mechanical contrivance after all." Except it wasn't, and it isn't.

 

[manaheim]

You're assuming that it can be explained in that way, creativity isn't a commodity that can be quantifed or switched on or off or put in a little box labelled 'creativity, grade A, 1 unit of'. Somethings are 'just there' or not. Creativity is a word that describes a quality that people have that's pretty damn mysterious. You might as well try to reason out love or fear or curiosity.

This is the same argument used for a lot of things over the course of history that man could not explain with the science available to them at the time, and - again no offense intended- but it's a pretty weak argument, and has been shown to fall apart quickly as we learn more.

There was a computerized painting machine created done years back. I stood and watched the thing operate for hours. I have to tell you the thing showed way more "creativity" than I've witnessed in many people... Or at least mimicked whatever this mysterious "quality" is enough so I couldn't tell the difference.

 

[manaheim]

There is an almost parallel discussion about the influence of technical knowledge on great photographers going on here.

It is my opinion that technology is, like protein, necessary for growth in some degree but almost poisonous if taken in too large a dose.

There is this lure of technique and technical knowledge because, although it may be difficult, it can be conquered and from then on, one is in charge and fully competent.
Whereas, creativity can never be conquered, someone trying to create must always work hard at it, and the more you do, the steeper the creative hill to climb.
It is so tempting to fall back of the comfort of what one has already done, to produce what seems like new work but what is really the same old stuff.

Great photographers - and those who wish to be great but will settle for good - take technology only in doses prn (as needed) and push the rest away in favor of creative work.

I'm not suggesting however, that one begets the other... Nor am I suggesting that they are the same,

What I'm saying us that creativity and technical know how are two completely separate elements. The latter enables the execution of the former, but that's about it. We certainly had extremely creative people pre-renaissance (to use Derrels example), but they just lacked technical know how that the culture had in later years.

The point here is that someone creative can be trained to have the technical know how to render that creativity in a meaningful way.

But if course, my other point is someone with technical knowledge only can be taught to think and see creatively.

By the way, I'm NOT suggesting that everyone has equal potential. Like any SKILL creativity can be something that comes naturally to someone or something that is so against their grain as to be nearly impossible, but I do genuinely believe it's a base enough skill that the rudiments of it can be picked up by pretty nearly everyone.

Derrel makes some fine points. I do not think that he's put a nail in it, though.

Talent and creativity always exist in a current milieux. There are contemporary standards and ideas for how art can be and should be made. Mozart composed within the idiom available to him, he wrote tonal music, he wrote in sonata form.

Creativity, whatever it is, is as much about working within strictures as it is about working past them. It's about expressing things in new ways within the current artistic idiom, as much or more than about changing and expanding the current idiom. If the current idiom is crude cartoon drawings, that's what creativity will work within.

Trying to parse out what's innate and what's trained is arguably impossible. If you can figure out what it is that's innate, if you could really nail it down and define it, then you could probably teach it. Since people are in fact working away at just that task, the boundaries of what is teachable are always on the move. Mozart, in a burst of creativity, shows us a new approach to modulation, and the next thing you know it's in all the textbooks and all the kids are doing it. Walker Evans shows us America as we never imagined it, and pretty soon every idiot is out there with a view camera taking pictures of tin shacks.

Did Mozart and Evans have something indefinable and great? I think so. What it is is pretty hard to pin down, though, since it's manifestations are art, and we can always deconstruct the art to see what makes it tick. And then we've just got a pile of watch parts on the table, the mystery is revealed, and we say "Oh, it's just a mechanical contrivance after all." Except it wasn't, and it isn't.

Nice. (!)

 

[Josh66]

I guess what I'm saying is that creativity is just part of what makes us human.

You can't prove that you have a soul, yet millions of people believe that they do.