Can the creativity of an image be assessed without knowledge of the image’s context?

[Supriyo]

I

Each person decides if it's creativity based on ... what? His own personal reference--pointed creativity-o-meter calibrated from the Bureau of Creativity's Uniform Creativity module?

Level of experience. Many years back, when I saw the first photo of a waterfall with a long exposure, I thought it was creative because I had little experience. My feeling was valid relative to my experience then.

[Julie H]

Good. I understand you. Using your criteria to answer the OP question, then, "Can the creativity of an image be assessed without knowledge of the image’s context?", the answer is "YES!" because all images is creative by somebody's criteria. Or "NO!" because the word 'creativity' has been rendered completely meaningless -- it applies to all images and therefore to none.

[Supriyo]

Julie, I don't remember anyone in this or any previous forum ever claimed that creativity can be measured. As far as I remember its you who referred to measuring creativity because you misunderstood the point of the MRI study which was to identify areas of brain that contribute to creative thoughts. Totally different thing than any metric for creativity. Then you stated what cannot be measured is not science, which is also incorrect. Now if you want to coin ridiculous phrases like creativity meter to enjoy yourself, go ahead. I have no problem enjoying your show.

[Supriyo]

Good. I understand you. Using your criteria to answer the OP question, then, "Can the creativity of an image be assessed without knowledge of the image’s context?", the answer is "YES!" because all images is creative by somebody's criteria. Or "NO!" because the word 'creativity' has been rendered completely meaningless -- it applies to all images and therefore to none.

 

You generalized to "all images". I didn't. I said, people can find certain works creative depending on their level of experience. If you consider a basic experience level of the grownup population, that doesn't translate to "all images".

[Leslie Reid]

Fred asked, "Leslie, what's the similarity you find in the aspects of making we've described?"<br> <br>

Sorry, I should have elaborated on that. Here are the commonalities I saw:

• Coming up with a new concept for an image: looking for or recognizing a unique perspective or mood or atmosphere or effect (“It shows imagination”)
  
• Figuring out how to capture the “this is cool” that was recognized from the conceptualization (either in-camera or in post or both) (“a sense of craft” and “it shows imagination”)—the creative problem solving that goes into making the photographer’s vision of what could be into an image that the rest of us can see. <br><br>
  

And that was a very interesting paper you linked to, Supriyo--thanks for providing the link<br><br>

Looks like I need some help in figuring out how to quote from elsewhere in the thread--how are you doing that?

[Norma Desmond]

Here I would make the distinction that creativity like many other impressions can be subjective IMO. What is creative to a newbie (like I was to photography once) may not be so to a seasoned artist.

<br><br>Here I disagree. I don't really think terribly much is subjective. The seasoned artist, in saying that the newbie is not being creative, in the majority of cases, will be right. The fact that sometimes the seasoned artist will get this wrong doesn't make it all subjective. One way for the newbie to improve is to listen to what the seasoned artist has to say and, more importantly, figure out what the seasoned artist is doing and showing and then forge his or her own path inspired by such discovery.

<br><br>A caveat here . . . I don't think many seasoned artists would go about critiquing a newbie's work by saying "you're not creative." They'd get into the mud with them. They'd critique their work in artistic, esthetic, and personal terms, terms INTERNAL to the art itself, not trying to objectively fit it into some fixed or pre-defined notion of creativity.

<br><br>I think most artists would try to get into the mindset and feelset of the younger artist and help them fulfill whatever potential they see. But if they see a bunch of clichés or mimicry (as opposed to creativity) coming through, they might point out why those photos or paintings are clichés and show the newbie some photos that fall into that trap. If the newbie doesn't listen, but instead uses his or her subjectivity as an excuse, that newbie will likely not make terribly good photos.

<br><br>On the other hand, there are those rare newbies who will listen to nothing and forge their own way completely independently and really get to something. I don't think most will. That will be extremely rare.

[Julie H]

Leslie (if I can get this to upload) EITHER highlight one segment and you'll see a 'reply' flyout OR click the Reply:

[Norma Desmond]

Leslie, in my own way of photographing and working in general, uniqueness isn't necessarily part of the "it shows imagination" aspect. One of the reasons I think of that photo of Ian above as imaginative is because I felt (though probably didn't realize at the time) loosely influenced by some Japanese photographers I'd been newly exposed to at the time. I actually felt a certain joy not that I'd come up with something unique but that I'd applied something that moved me or meant something to me to something I was doing personally and that it seemed so well suited to Ian's character in the moment. Now, of course, that's unique in the sense that no one else did that very same thing at that very same moment except me, but that's not uniqueness in any significant sense of the word, IMO. By that standard, everything we do is unique. For me, the imaginative part was synthesizing something I'd seen and been provoked by (the high contrast Japanese styles which I had noticed really pushed the way a face could look and feel) with something I was feeling as very personal at the time, which was getting to know Ian and finding him incredibly photogenic.

<br><br>I keep using variants of the word "personal" because that's more significant to me than uniqueness or creativity.

<br><br>[Mind you, all this wasn't consciously on my mind at the time, of course. It's my analysis of what I feel was happening.]

<br><br>The craft part, then, didn't feel so much like a search for that "this is cool" moment. It felt a little more like the blind leading the blind. At the time, it was the uncertainty that drove me and there's still some of that involved when I look at it. That strong highlight around Ian's shadow, for example, I'm still not quite sure of it but my not being sure actually feels OK to me. I fine tuned it thus and am willing to live with the uncertainty of it. But I did not have a "this is cool" moment around some of the post processing choices I made here.

[Julie H]

Seasoned artists despise and disparage one another's work. The best critics are hated and disparaged by other critics and by most artists.

[Supriyo]

<br><br>Here I disagree. I don't really think terribly much is subjective. The seasoned artist, in saying that the newbie is not being creative, in the majority of cases, will be right. The fact that sometimes the seasoned artist will get this wrong doesn't make it all subjective. One way for the newbie to improve is to listen to what the seasoned artist has to say and, more importantly, figure out what the seasoned artist is doing and showing and then forge his or her own path inspired by such discovery.

<br><br>A caveat here . . . I don't think many seasoned artists would go about critiquing a newbie's work by saying "you're not creative." They'd get into the mud with them. They'd critique their work in artistic, esthetic, and personal terms, terms INTERNAL to the art itself, not trying to objectively fit it into some fixed or pre-defined notion of creativity.

<br><br>I think most artists would try to get into the mindset and feelset of the younger artist and help them fulfill whatever potential they see. But if they see a bunch of clichés or mimicry (as opposed to creativity) coming through, they might point out why those photos or paintings are clichés and show the newbie some photos that fall into that trap. If the newbie doesn't listen, but instead uses his or her subjectivity as an excuse, that newbie will likely not make terribly good photos.

<br><br>On the other hand, there are those rare newbies who will listen to nothing and forge their own way completely independently and really get to something. I don't think most will. That will be extremely rare.

 

Fred, I agree with you thats what an experienced artist would do while interacting with the newbie, and most of the time it would be in the newbie's interest to listen to him/her. However, I was trying to make a different point. I was considering the case where a newbie doesn't pretend to be creative, but rather have a genuine feeling about his/her thoughts.

<br><br>

A newbie may have seen a photo of a waterfall somewhere with a long exposure and it inspires him. So he goes and shoots one himself thinking thats very creative. Alternatively, there may be a newbie who has never seen a waterfall photo, but comes up with the idea of long exposure all by himself. The photos produced by both would possibly be cliches by modern standard, but I would consider the second newbie to be genuinely creative. The first one might fit your description of people who imagine themselves to be creative.

[Allen Herbert]

"n the creativity of an image be assessed without knowledge of the image’s context?"

 

in a practical sense we always have knowledge of the photo we took....because we took it.

 

But a photo can take on a life of its own....and we think wow I took that. Chaos, random, have important roles in photography. We think we are the masters but are we?

[Allen Herbert]

Jeez.

 

Cannot upload a photo.

[Norman 202]

The first one might fit your description of people who imagine themselves to be creative.

if someone imagines themself to be creative and they are not, aren't they being creative ;-)

[Julie H]

if someone imagines themself to be creative and they are not, aren't they being creative ;-)

 

 

Though I disagree with Supriyo about ... a few things ( LOL ), I actually think he's making a valid point. Since kindergarten, we've been encouraged to think that messing about with our crayons is creative. It's not like the teachers were lying, but it's also not like they knew (or even gave a thought to) what creativity is. Nor did I, with my lovely crayons ...

[DavidTriplett]

I've been trying to evaluate Julie's position and description of creativity against my own academic and professional experience of (1) trying to learn or be taught creative problem solving over many years of architectural education, and (2) wondering if my 30 years of professional design work that I think is creative is simply the work of a hack applying already-defined solutions within a known set of criteria. And, if this is true for me, then it must likewise be true of great and recognized Architects (you pick your favorites). I have no desire to belittle or demean Julie's position, but I remain fundamentally in disagreement. It has been my pleasure and privilege to read Julie's accounts of her process and expectations of her own creative path. Yet, she knowingly picks that path, prepares for it, and in doing so belies her own assertion that her creative process is to enter a void without precondition, how she might define what has now become new space around her.

 

it's not as if you or any artist can be thinking "Oh! I'm being creative!" as you're doing whatever. Creativity is the arrival at or discovery of a new space in your world that you can be in. That new space allows new/more/different, but what it allows is not creativity. Creativity was in the finding of the space.

 

I expect architecture school is like many other art education experiences: The central part of the pedagogy is the critique, where those who are acknowledged adepts in the art critique the work of the student, and the student is required to both listen and learn, as well as defend his work. It can be an emotionally brutal process, and is not for the fragile of ego. Among other things, this process teaches students how to apply a rigorous and demanding process to creative problem solving. Julie's position would, as I understand it, demands that the truly creative person/artist could not have any conception of any goal regarding their work before commencing the journey or arriving at the unknown (unknowable?) goal. I am reminded of the conversation between Alice and the Cheshire Cat. Forgive me if I misapply the principle, but by Julie's definition, is Alice being creative in wanting to just get somewhere, anywhere, without regard for any particular goal or pathway? Somehow, I think not. Every one of us, even Julie, lays the foundation for our creativity (or creative efforts) in how we learn and prepare, in perfecting our craft, and in understanding the means by which we communicate with others.

 

I never expect to be as creative as some others, but I also appreciate Fred's description of my photograph of Turret Arch. He described the result better than I ever could have. (Thank you, Fred.) I have no expectation of changing Julie's mind about her own creative process, nor would I really want to. What I hope this discussion and the very salient points made by Supriyo, Leslie, and Fred will do is provide learners in our chosen art an alternative and accessible definition of creativity that they can understand, apply, and experience for themselves. I state without reservation that real creativity is accessible to one degree or another to most people, and that "aha!" moment of creative insight will come, but it takes a substantial amount of preparation and thought for most of us to get there. I hope those who are learning this art do not consider themselves creative failures if they never reach that empty, Nirvana-like condition defined by Julie as the only truly creative construct.

Edited February 12, 2017 by DavidTriplett

[Leslie Reid]

And the Cheshire Cat conversation:

<br><br>“Alice: Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?

<br>The Cheshire Cat: That depends a good deal on where you want to get to.

<br>Alice: I don't much care where.

<br>The Cheshire Cat: Then it doesn't much matter which way you go.

<br>Alice: ...So long as I get somewhere.

<br>The Cheshire Cat: Oh, you're sure to do that, if only you walk long enough.”

<br><br>

And the reason I had it handy was that in one of my earlier posts I'd edited out the Humpty Dumpty conversation:

 

<br><br>I don't know what you mean by "glory",' Alice said.

<br>Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. 'Of course you don't — till I tell you. I meant "there's a nice knock-down argument for you!"'

<br>'But "glory" doesn't mean "a nice knock-down argument",' Alice objected.

<br>'When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, 'it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.'

[Sandy Vongries]

Art and architecture -- simply architecture must obey the laws of physics as well as the lesser constraints of popular genres in the the building has to stand and function. Creativity, obviously a wonderful thing -- primarily for the pleasure / satisfaction of the artist, and few genuine artists are herd animals. Obviously, like land wars in Asia, these are conversations I should avois.

[DavidTriplett]

Art and architecture -- simply architecture must obey the laws of physics as well as the lesser constraints of popular genres in the the building has to stand and function. Creativity, obviously a wonderful thing -- primarily for the pleasure / satisfaction of the artist, and few genuine artists are herd animals. Obviously, like land wars in Asia, these are conversations I should avois.

 

But Sandy, it's such an invigorating mental exercise!

[sjmurray]

I struggle with these conversations about creativity, mainly because I have been a “creative” person my whole life. I have never questioned it, analyzed it, or even tried to be creative on purpose, for that matter. For over the last 20 years of my professional life (in a hospital with a lot of brilliant people) I have created major changes in the way things were done in whatever workplace I was in. Other people have always regarded me as the “creative guy” and often with bewilderment as to how I do it. All I can say is that I, like the others in my family, and I suspect there are some genetics involved here, have always had the natural tendency to “think out of the box,” and to be able to construct solutions, often for problems that other people weren’t even aware of until they were presented with the solution. My father started his own advertising agency in his early 30’s as was very successful throughout his career. My brother (eight years younger) was a child intellectual and musical prodigy and did/does play classical as well as jazz, and actually taught keyboard improvisation at a local music school in Minneapolis (he is a psychiatrist now). BTW, for me photography is only one facet of who I am, and I am creative through all the facets of who I am. For me, creativity just happens as just part of my usual thoughts, except it turns out to be an idea that hasn’t been done before in a particular environment. I am primarily a visual thinker, so I tend to visualize the ideas very quickly. What takes time is the implementation. Once it’s accomplished, other people get on board and are really happy I did it. The article Suprio recently shared I think makes a lot of sense. Photographic creativity or artistic creativity is probably less obvious or demonstrable than making a big change in someone’s workplace. When I do photography, I’m not thinking particularly about being creative. I think it is a refreshing time for me because I am not solving any particular problem, but just exploring and being free with my visual senses. Is that creative? I suppose sometimes it is.

 

I’d like to share these resources:

 

Author Elizabeth Gilbert has a great TED talk on creativity:

 

And of course, one of my favorite talks on a couple of subjects that interrelate with creativity: mindfulness and awareness is by Jon Kabat-Zinn talking at Google.

 

[Julie H]

Julie's position would, as I understand it, demands that the truly creative person/artist could not have any conception of any goal regarding their work before commencing the journey or arriving at the unknown (unknowable?) goal. I am reminded of the conversation between Alice and the Cheshire Cat. Forgive me if I misapply the principle, but by Julie's definition, is Alice being creative in wanting to just get somewhere, anywhere, without regard for any particular goal or pathway?

 

 

Yes. Exactly. Thank you Leslie for quoting it in full.

<br> <br>

 

But why do you seem to worship creativity and devalue skill? I think skill is on a par with creativity. What's wrong with being a Weston or a Michael Jordon and putting the ball in the hoop with peerless skill? Versus any of a number of very creative artists I could mention whose work is irritating, ugly and obnoxious?

[Norma Desmond]

David, coincidentally, I was at the Cantor Museum on the Stanford Campus today, one of my favorite smaller museums in a very beautiful location on a now rare non-rainy afternoon, and these were among the introductory remarks to one of the more interesting exhibits. The word "creatively" is used in a very appropriate way, I think, a way that most here will understand. I think impossible-to-achieve notions of creativity are a matter of theoretical academic idealism but not of practical experience.

<br><br>

[Norma Desmond]

Leslie, this sculpture, by Deborah Butterfield (1999), is on display in the lobby of the Cantor. I was with four friends and all of us were remarking how clever and effective it was to use driftwood this way. One of the guys read the information plaque over on the wall describing the piece and came back to tell us that it was actually a bronze sculpture made to look like driftwood. (This furthers Phil's idea about such information being important to our understanding of how creative the sculpture is.) Funny story . . . he reached over to start to touch it because it looked so much like driftwood that it impelled him to want to feel it for himself. We all stopped him, knowing that you're not supposed to touch most things in museums. But he laughed and said that the plaque said you can touch it. We all did, figuring the artist knew viewers might want that kind of personal experience and confirmation of her materials. A guard came up to us and scolded us, so we referred him to the plaque, where he showed us that it actually suggested touching a sample "bone" that was sitting on a table behind us, and that we were not supposed to touch the finished sculpture itself. He had a good spirit and laughed along with us at our dumb mistake. But the point is, the artist actually realized just how surprising (and tactile) her work was that she actually offered the chance to touch and confirm what we were seeing by supplying the sample. We walked away a little embarrassed by our poor reading comprehension skills and the fact that we were five "sophisticated" 60-somethings who had just broken the rules and gotten into a wee bit of trouble. Here's the kind of thing you started the thread with, a case where context is necessary for the viewer. I think whether and what kind of context is helpful when viewing a photo or any kind of art will be case specific.

<br><br>

It also strikes me as I write this how much, for me, art is this kind of experience. Yes, sometimes I experience art subjectively and alone, with my own "inner" feelings, etc. But very often, I experience it with some sort of community spirit, like on this day. Sharing art with others is great. There are many reasons to prefer looking at art at a museum as opposed to books (the biggest being that you're seeing the original!), but a big one for me is hearing the reactions of and even just feeling the presence of others experiencing the art as well. I think there's something to be said for feeding off the feelings of others in responding to art and creativity. In this case, as in so many cases, the art experience will be wider and deeper than just my relationship to the art itself. Art has this kind of very expansive potential.

<br><br>

[Julie H]

"Creatively" does not = creativity by any definition. For example, I creatively rearrange the furniture in my room all the time.

[Norma Desmond]

Grasping at straws.

[DavidTriplett]

For Julie: If Fred's exemplar of the horse sculpture is creative (by your definition), which part of its evolution is creative? Is it the idea to replicate a horse in sculptural form? Is it the vision to use driftwood to do so? Is it the seeing of possibility in pieces of driftwood and collecting them to this purpose? Is it the construction of the original sculpture of the collected pieces? Or, is it the vision to then replicate the driftwood sculpture in bronze? I ask this question in an effort to understand and apply your process to a tangible result, eg the sculpture shared by Fred. If you find it creative, please help us understand how your definition of creativity applies to its creation. If not, then please explain why not. For me, I find it very creative, and it also reminds me of the tremendously creative equine props in the War Horse stage play.