Tag: artist

Tool or Training

Is it the tool or the training?  So often in my years of teaching, I noticed how people were immediately ready to buy a pencil, paper, paint, and pen.   When students enrolled for an art program, the first question was “what should I buy for supplies?”

When they asked what was needed for the first class, my response was “Just bring your enthusiasm!”   I meant that.  My students could own a box loaded with supplies, yet nothing in that box was near as important as their true desire to learn.   They too often overlooked the importance of the training they were about to receive.   Their curiosity, their intrigue of the process – that was the most important element in learning art or creativity — mindset.

The training you receive is worth MORE than any tool you can purchase, still holds true today.  
I see many people clambering to purchase the latest, greatest computer software, program, and gadget.  However, without the foundation, training and breakthrough that occurs with their mind, no amount of technology will ever make them become an artist.  Some folks have become technicians with the tools.   But the ability to reach their audience with a transformational product or message only happens when the mind matches the material.

Fostering Creativity #2

Promoting intrinsic motivation and problem solving are two areas where educators can foster creativity in students. Students are more creative when they see a task as intrinsically motivating, valued for its own sake.

Creativity... #problemsolving #creativity

To promote creative thinking, educators need to identify what motivates their students and structure teaching around it. Providing students with a choice of activities to complete allows them to become more intrinsically motivated and therefore creative in completing activities or tasks.

Teaching students to solve problems that do not have well defined answers is another way to foster their creativity. This is accomplished by allowing students to explore problems and redefine them, possibly drawing on knowledge that at first may seem unrelated to the problem in order to solve it.

Fostering Creativity #1

The conventional system of schooling is sometimes seen as “stifling” of creativity. The pre-school, kindergarten and early school years are often the only ages where there is an attempt to provide a creativity-friendly, rich, imagination-fostering environment for young children.

Researchers see the importance of fostering creativity because technology is advancing our society at an unprecedented rate. Creative problem solving will be needed to cope with challenges as they arise. Creativity also helps students identify problems where others have failed to do so, in order to discover a solution.

aMUSE yourself

salvadore dali

Salvador Dali, the great surrealist, used to grab ideas for paintings from the very fertile semi-sleep state we call the hypnagogic state. He’d lie on a sofa and hold a spoon in one hand, balancing it on the edge of a glass placed on the floor. Just as he’d drift off to sleep, he’d release the spoon, and the sound of the spoon hitting the glass would awaken him. Immediately, he’d sketch the bizarre hypnagogic images he was seeing.

We all have bizarre perceptual experiences in those moments before we fall fully asleep. Dali simply developed a way to seize some of them. Capturing skills can be taught to people of all ages and in all occupations. Teachers, parents, and managers can boost the creative output of a group simply by providing some simple training and the right materials.

 

Creativity Myth #2

Our creative potential is nearly shut down by early schooling. Teachers are the first to admit this. In kindergarten, all the kids are artists and inventors. Starting in the first grade, the kids have to work all the time. There’s no more time for fun, because there’s so much they’ve got to learn. They’re rarely allowed to daydream any more. It’s a wonder that any of them ever grow up to be artists or inventors.

When it comes to creativity, myths keep most people firmly rooted. Only artists have creativity, and creativity is rare, we’re told. Creativity is mysterious and magical and divine, people say. Creativity, in short, is not something mystical; it’s an extension of what you already know. To be more specific, new behaviors (or “ideas”) emerge as old behaviors interact, and the process by which behaviors interact is orderly.