Rationality versus Creativity

<p>From the previous thread on truth and lies, some of the remarks made bumped on a question that's been playing in my mind for a long time now.<br>

I hope Arthur Plumpton does not mind me quoting him:</p>

<blockquote>

<p>Art cannot have the same truths as science, in the sense that it is not dealing with the more measurable physical reality as is science</p>

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<p>Not so much the differences and tensions between art and science (though an interesting subject), but rather how those 'different angles' work on a personal level.<br>

Myself, I'm mainly a beta-type; better at physics than at literature in school. Trained in logical processes, straight causal effects. Even in scientific fields that usually do not employ these rather strict definitions of scientific research, I found this way of approaching problems working better for me. Break down the subjects into smaller pieces, look at cause and effect, and rebuild the expected results from those nuclei. So, rather mathematical.<br>

Only when I became seriously interested in photography, I opened up more to allowing some sort of creativity from myself. It "feels" as a different activity, it's more an urge flowing without reason, without a need to be logical. Far more intuitive and less brain-loaded. But it is extremely mood-dependent, it sometimes clicks and then weeks not.<br>

But in trying to learn more and analysing a bit my own development(s), I do notice that the mathematical thinking can also be very prohibitive in creative attempts. It blocks the unexpected a bit, it tends to keep things conventional. It's too reasoned, yielding some technical perfection, but not as alive or 'heart-felt'.<br>

For example, many of Ansel Adams photos to me seem reasoned, Galen Rowell's far less so. Adams says perfect exposure, Rowell speaks a love of nature.</p>

<p>Photography, to me, has these two distinct sides: a technical side and a creative one. For the technical part, that is all pretty easy for me to understand. But I see that side as a tool one needs to master to progress seriously in the creative part. But the creative part is the hard part. I think development the other way around exist too: very creative people who have to work harder to learn that technical part in photography. I don't know which road is harder, it does not seem like a choice one has, but more a case of characteristics.</p>

<p>My point, and question, is purely on the creative part: do rationalisations limit creativity, or is it a different kind of creativity with different results? Is creativity a pure instinct, or a (consciously) developed skill?</p>

<p>Richard Feynman - an exquisitely rational, analytical person - was also full of creativity, whimsy, poetry, sly humor, and bad bongo playing. These things are not mutually exclusive. <br /><br />In fact, I'd argue that the more rational a person is, the better equipped they are to clearly see the tensions, subtleties, and contextual nuances that make creative communication (art, including photography in the way that it's usually discussed here) so powerful or enjoyable. A clearly thinking mind that understands causality isn't kept from enjoying a fantasy morality play, or from engaging their willing suspension of disbelief long enough to immerse themselves in an artist's message. They may find the artist's message to be irrelevant, or self-contradictory, or sophomoric, or sublime - but they're not kept from digesting it. <br /><br />Neither are they kept from employing those same tools in their own expression. One doesn't need to be - temporarily or otherwise - irrational in order to be inspired or even wildly creative. But reason is what allows the artist to keep the larger picture in mind, even as she permits <em>un-</em>reason to cast an interesting (or disturbing, or challenging, etc) light on a concept. Reason and rigidity are not the same thing. I've met plenty of people who are highly rigid in their irrationality.</p>

<p>What you are thinking can be seen in your photographs as well.</p>

<p>I used to separate art from science in my thinking, but the Mandlebrot set, and the images created out of that mathematics changed that for me. I now try to see things more holistically, art and science, now being the same for me.</p>

<p>technically, mechanically, researching, these are a things that must be absorbed in order to have useful output.</p>

<p>Wouter,</p>

<p>I want to think about what you've said a while longer before commenting, but I would be interested to hear what you and/or others think about the art at the links below as related to this topic:</p>

<p><a href="http://www.ericjhellergallery.com/index.pl?page=image;iid=11">http://www.ericjhellergallery.com/index.pl?page=image;iid=11</a></p>

<p><a href="http://www.ericjhellergallery.com/index.pl?page=image;iid=9">http://www.ericjhellergallery.com/index.pl?page=image;iid=9</a></p>

 

<p>Matt, Corey, thanks for the answers, good food for thought so I cannot really follow up yet (where needed). You are both right, I think, in noticing it's not a either/or thing. I think my post was a bit muddy on that point, and good to clarify that it's not meant as such.</p>

<p>Julie,<br /> fascinating! I studied chemistry for a while, and visualising the moleculair events always helped me understand the matters. This art revives that a bit. In the context of my question, I don't dare say, though, whether this would be instinct, or developed. But not limiting - at least not judging from the result. But the road for the artists to make this, that I cannot judge.</p>

 

<p>Wouter, thank you for your inspiring post. I had been thinking of this very subject this morning.</p>

<p>I feel that the reason photography calls to me so strongly is that I spend much of my day thinking of things very scientifically. I am a chemistry teacher and when I go into photography mode, it's a welcome challenge.</p>

<p>Photography forces me to use a part of my brain that is not normally engaged when I am thinking chemistry. As you said, </p>

 

<blockquote>

<p>Photography, to me, has these two distinct sides: a technical side and a creative one</p>

 

</blockquote>

<p>I completely agree, the technical side is the part that comes easy for myself. The artistic side is what I need to continue to work on, and I am finding it a challenge!</p>

<p>I teach creative writing, and I've had students ask me how I know when a story is complete. I tell them it's complete when it feel right. I use the same approach to photography. Like a lot of the pther posters, huge chunks of my day job are very linear and logical. when I'm composing a pic, I know it's right when it feels right</p>

<p><strong>Wouter</strong>, excellent topic and seems very personal to me as well.</p>

<p>I've been a bit of an academic most of my life, with degrees in Philosophy, one of which I had just completed before taking up photography more seriously. I actually did a lot of work in the Philosophy of Aesthetics, among other more traditional matters. I've always had a fairly organized, reasoned way of approaching life. My studies in Aesthetics, even since my undergraduate days in the seventies, always left me longing. Because I have often and seriously felt that the answer to the greater questions of Philosophy, even and maybe especially the big ones, reside in art.</p>

<p>When I first got into making photographs, I felt a bit of the struggle between creativity and my more logical, philosophical side. I have been learning what Matt seems already to know . . . thanks, Matt, for the significant insights. I can assert who I am, logical and philosophical, even by creative and imaginative means. It's when I try to be who I am not, in life and in photography, that I get into trouble and can feel disingenuous. When I let myself go and be who I am, even into rationality, I can be freer to explore. Each photographer or each artist doesn't have to conform to the myths (truths for many) of the image we have of artists.</p>

<p>Now, that having been said, as much as I affect my photographs, my photograph making affects me as well. So, I have actually become more disorganized and I think some of my friends and family will say I've become a little less rational as well. That feels liberating, too. I'm a bit messier around the house, I stay up 'til the wee hours of the morning many days working on photos. My schedule's a bit off, I tend to run late a little more where I always used to be right on time.</p>

<p>As for Philosophy, I never had a proclivity to need to answer the big questions for myself. I liked the process of philosophy more than I was seeking answers or solutions. On ethical questions, I tend to take more decisive stands and be fairly committed in my opinions. But on some of the more abstract questions, like whether or not we have free will or are determined, I seem to recognize the elegance of arguments on both sides and find that satisfactory. I think that balance of committment and more abstract appreciation works for me and does seem to guide a lot of my photograph making.</p>

<p > “Art cannot have the same truths as science”</p>

<p > </p>

<p > </p>

<p > Science is based at the core on imagination. We imagine then by various means try to find proofs of that imagination.</p>

<p > </p>

<p >Is it real or our imagination? Mathematics the basis of understanding of many imaginations was formulated on the religious symbol of zero…an act of imagination.</p>

<p > </p>

<p > </p>

<p >So, I suppose Art is the use of imaginations without the tools of proof which science uses. In itself does it need proofs other that what is …..</p>

<p> Wouter, I see the rational and the creMiliative and the rational as mostly separate channels, and definitely not mutually exclusive. Ansel Adams is a good example of someone in photography who was both rational and creative. So were Gjon Mili, Eliot Porter, Ernst Haas, and countless others.</p>

<p> </p>

<p>That first line should read: "Wouter, I see the rational and the creative as mostly separate channels, and definitely not mutually exclusive."</p>

<p> </p>

<p>Wouter,</p>

<p>I'm back ... and I still don't have a comment so much as more questions. I can't for the life of me think of any way that the making of art is irrational. You didn't use that word, but "rationality versus ... " leads me to jump to that conclusion. At the same time, I think I know what you're asking, but I'm not sure... Help!</p>

<p>Here is where I have gotten so far. When I go to the eye doctor to, among other things, he puts this monstrous composite lens thingy on my face -- looks like monster mechanical glasses -- and very rapidly slides different lenses on either eye while rapidly (too rapidly!) asking me "Better?, Better? Better?" If I don't answer immediately, he says, "Worse? Worse?" I can usually answer pretty fast whether I can see the eye chart better or worse with any given lens. To sum up, this is a process by which the doctor tracks down, via my feedback, which lens combination gives me the best corrected vision.</p>

<p>Getting to my point, I think that the quotidian process of making art, or making pictures is very much like that "Better? Better? Better?" process. It is, to my mind just as rational. What is ... different (I can't use the word "irrational") is what is meant by "Better?" in this case versus the eye-doctor.</p>

<p>And I will leave you breathless in suspense as to what I think "Better?" is about (<em>Better what</em>??!!). I just want to ask if I am on the right track. Is that what you mean by "versus creativity"? Because I find the *process* of making or pursuing art to be just as rational as that of science; it's not the *how* but the *what* that is different.</p>

<p>Matt, it needed some time to sink in, your post rang bells immediately, but more in the light of my own development. I guess the issue is, in a way, converting what you recognise in works of others and yourself into your own photos. Kind of the way back, where the lessons learnt (rationally) become 'creative second nature'.<br>

But apart from my own experiences, thanks for steering a lot of my topic start immediately off in a right direction.</p>

<p>Allen, your post is close to thoughts I have had often. Science, communication, art... in the end all results of human conventions and agreements, which are based on assumptions. But ultimately, it's unpractical and it ends up nowhere. It's denying the validity of the thought that that exact thought is itself invalid. It nullifies everything. Is it imagination? Shared among 6 billion people? Nah... I don't bet against the odds.</p>

<p>Wouter, I am glad that my remark, which was related to truth and lies in art and science, allowed your genial suggestion of this thread on the different but intriguing subject of rationality versus creativity.</p>

<p>For me it is more a question of rationality <strong>and</strong> creativity, or the role if any of rationality in creativity. For me creativity is both rational, and it is not. How might the two exist together? A rational process of analysis or synthesis (e.g., creativity) is expected to be highly objective, logical and « mechanical » (and/or systematic). We often say such a process is « irrational » if the person doing the analysis or synthesis displays personal emotions, feelings, instincts or culturally specific codes.</p>

<p>Creativity requires a good sense of observation, curiosity, questioning of norms, the ability to see things others have missed, the ability to conceive of numerous possibilities or ideas, and the ability to put together something that allows us to see established forms or visual information in new ways.</p>

<p>Rational methodology does encompass those requirements as well. However, what adds to creativity more than just the purely rational component are those highly subjective inputs based on our personal feelings, instincts, fantasies, and cultural bagage. And the irrationality (possibly) of chance.</p>

<p>Thus, creativity (in art, in science) requires some rational input, however great or slight, to organise our approach and facilitate our discovery of the unique, but it necessarily also requires (<em>the <strong>and</strong> qualification I make</em>) the highly important subjective and non-rational input that I have tried to describe above. There may be other elements of this that I have not addressed, but it is not an « either-or » situation between rational thought and creative thought and actions.</p>

<p>I recommend the following two books for those who are interested in exploring the topic of creativity and art making beyond the limits inherent in an internet forum:</p>

<p><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Art-Fear-Observations-Rewards-Artmaking/dp/0961454733/ref=pd_sim_b_2"> Art & Fear: Observations On the Perils (and Rewar...</a> (David Bayles)</p>

<p><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Creative-Habit-Learn-Life-ebook/dp/B000SEOWBG/ref=dp_kinw_strp_1?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2">The Creative Habit: Learn It and Use It for Life</a> (Twyla Tharp)</p>

<p>"To exist is an art." ---Kierkegaard<br>

"You are doing <em>it</em>. You are creating the universe with every breath and heartbeat." --- Alan Watts</p>

<p >Wouter, I feel that the ‘versus’<em> </em>in your question introduces an opposition where at most a distinction can be made. One can speak of tension, perhaps, but in the line of complementarity rather than in that of mutual exclusion. Take, for instance, the concept of artistic creation that developed during European Romanticism. Here, inspiration was often seen as an irrational flight of the human spirit, an uplifting of the human faculties onto a higher plane of sensibility (the German <em>Sturm und Drang</em> is a case in point), yet even then, paradoxically, the approach to artistic creation invariably showed itself to be disciplined, methodical and reasoned. In literature, painting, sculpture and music, the accepted and even conventional rules of composition were first adhered to and provided the foundation for whatever transmutation of them might take place in the white heat of inspiration. There was certainly an acute awareness that what creates the truly great work is an impulse of genius that appears to escape the constraints of strict reason. It might even seem akin to madness – more a creature of chaos than of cosmos. In practice, however, the resulting creation was, in each instance, by no means unrelated to reason. What that suggests is that the definition we often have of reason is too narrow. In our own case, it has been formed in the mould of modern empirical science but doesn’t encompass the full breadth of human experience, which continues to be rational even when it seems to lie beyond reason and refuse to accept its guidance. Is love sheer insanity, or is there not method in its madness? As Pascal nicely puts it: “Le coeur a des raisons que la raison ne connait pas”.</p>

<p > <br>

My own conviction is that, in photography as in other pursuits, we begin with rules that can be rationally codified. By adhering to them, we become technically and perhaps even aesthetically proficient, but we are still only providing a hearth for the spark that may one day ignite it all and give it a significance that is more than the sum of its parts. Where, then, does that spark come from? That is the mystery that makes Shapespeare a genius while another man remains a writer; it makes Ansel Adams a visionary while another remains a photographer peering through his viewfinder. I’m not sure there is any ready answer to that question.</p>

<p>I'm reminded, PJ, of something Chuck Close said: "Inspiration is for amateurs. The rest of us get to work!" <br /><br />It's a variation, of course, on the many comments that attribute genius mostly to a willingness to labor your butt off while so many other people muse about it, instead. I have (sub-genius!) creative flashes every day, and utterly lack the time (and mostly the discipline) to arrange for the circumstances to bring them to fruition as finished pieces of work. So instead, my photography is merely workman-like, and of very narrow, pedestrian interest. I rarely <em>try</em> the inspiration-y stuff because I know exactly how badly I'll hatchet it up, given the limited time I have to put into it. But the compositional rules you mention actually do help me out. I'm glad to study them and build up my toolbox, that way.</p>

<p><em>Rationality</em> is when you got the photograph you want and you know how you did it.<br>

<em>Creativity</em> is when you want the photograph you got and you don't know how you did it.<br>

Perhaps rationality is more certain, creativity is more fun, but the destination is the same.</p>

<p>"do rationalisations limit creativity, or is it a different kind of creativity with different results? Is creativity a pure instinct, or a (consciously) developed skill?"<br>

---There is no conflict between rationality and creativity, nor is there one between the process of conducting art and science. Art is self expression in the sense of expressing how one's own mind responds to the external world; science (here I mean an individual's 'doing' of science, as in the process of 'discovery') is the internalization of the external world in the sense of creating a mental abstraction of the observed reality (here of course I do not exclude the 'science of mind' from the 'science of the external world', because in this special case mind itself becomes the 'external world'). Both processes, as they occur within the mind of the creator (the artist or the scientist) may involve intuitive leaps as well as reasoned analysis. In contrast to the process taking place within the practitioner's mind, the 'exposition of scientific discovery' is all about the clarity of analysis and reasoning once a 'truth' has been perceived; art, like poetry, is most effective when it is oblique.</p>

<p> I think the problems of science <em>are </em>problems of art, albeit approached differently. Read <em>"Proust was a Neuroscientist" </em>by Lehrer (who by the way, happens to takes pictures).</p>

<p> On this question, our old, influential friend Don Francisco Goya said (in an expansion on the title of the Sleep of Reason produces Monsters): "imagination abandoned by reason generates monstrosity; together they form the mother of the arts and the origin of marvels."</p>

<p> </p>

<p>Forgive me if I am totally missing the point, but I don't think photography has to be either rational or creative. Ansel Adams, for example, who you mention, knew how to use his tools, his craft, to implement his vision, to make real an image he created in his head. I don't think we'd consider a painter uncreative for knowing which colors will give which effects or which brush to use. "Rationalism" is just a tool to carry out the creative vision. I guess if your creative vision is to be totally random and unpredictable, then I guess rationalism might be limiting, but then again you would still have to use some thought to pick random and unpredictable tools.<br>

Personally I don't buy into stereotype of the sloppy, creative genius who just happens to slap together masterpieces, unencumbered by the mundane details of technique. Artists know their craft, whether it's sculpture, painting, photography, or anything else. Great artists also tend to make it look easy, in my opinion, which is why it's sometimes tempting to discount the paintstaking work and skill involved.<br>

It's hard to know what creativity is or how to develop it. But I do think that learning the tools will only help creativity, not hinder it.<br>

Interesting thread, thanks to the OP for posting.</p>

<p>Wouter:</p>

<p>Right now I lack the time to read all of the posts so far. Having taken quick glances at some of them, I am compelled to agree with Animesh. In fact, there may be conflicts between rationality and creativity, but there need not be.</p>

<p>Congratulations! You've really opened a philosophical pandora's box. Philosophy throughout history has been engaged in trying to make out the distinctions between rationality, rationality and emotion, the rational and the mystical, the rational and the absurd, etc. So how much time do we have on this thread?</p>

<p>The title is obviously not the wisest choice. <em>Versus</em> is a bit the wrong word, and most are very correct in pointing that out. My apologies for that.<br>

Creativity is not opposed to rationality, and that's not so much the point I tried to raise. The point is that at a moment in one's development, do you feel whether your rationalism hinders or obstructs creativity. Is a normally rational approach a 'speed bump' in development of your creative vision? Can it feel like a box you need to break out of?<br>

<em>(Julie, I guess that is a 'yes' on the question whether you're on the right track) </em></p>

<p>With that said, I think some very insightfull answers have been posted that after will certainly raise some other points of their own - for that thanks to all who participate. This topic is close to me, so your input is much valued.</p>

<p>I wonder if it would help to discuss the rational side and the emotional side of creativity rather than considering rational and creative. Perhaps creative is a heading under which rational and emotional would both come.</p>

<p>Ansel Adams has been brought up several times, so I'll use my own photographic taste to make a point.</p>

<p>His work is a little too "rational" for me. I don't deny the significance of many of his methods and I have certainly enjoyed looking at his work and learning from what I've seen and read. But I think his technique does overshadow more emotional approaches to making photographs that I prefer.</p>

<p>Don't get me wrong, I am not minimizing technique by any means. I think it's crucial to an effectively expressed photograph. And I am not minimizing the zenith of photographic achievement of Adams, whose prints are stunning to behold. But there will always be something missing for me.</p>

<p>Though rationality does, as so many of us have understood, go hand in hand with creativity and also with more emotional aspects of photography and art, the creative partnership of the more rational side and the more emotional side is quite often, at least to this observer and maker, not equal. I sense in many, many photographers and artists a leaning one way or the other. Though I think all the below are both technically expert and creatively gifted (and not just gifted but studied and practiced as well), Piet Mondrian and M.C. Escher seem not only to come from a more rational place but strike my own rational side more than, say, Ernst Kirchner and Francis Bacon, who I think operate more emotionally. Georges Seurat leans more to the rational side for me than Edvard Munch (even though Munch deals with such psychological and internal imagery). There is more rationality in Mozart than in Tchaikovsky. (Even though I think Mozart was a creative genius, there is a more rational tinge to my experience of listening to him.) Adams seems more rational than Atget. Even within one person, there are more and less rational and emotional outpourings. Leibovitz's "art" or "commercial" photography strikes me as much more a product of her rational side than her body of more personal work devoted to her family. I look at her portrait of Scarlett Johannson next to the photo of her dying father and it's hard not to be moved by the different places inside her they seem to be coming from. Hearing her talk about the different approaches and working conditions of these two distinct parts of her body of work seemed to suggest what I had surmised.</p>

<p>In all the other examples, I don't actually prefer the rational or the more emotional of the pairs given. I do prefer most of them to Adams because of my own perceived coldness in his landscapes which just doesn't work that well for me. I don't think rational has to be cold, but I think it is for Adams.</p>