Competency vs. Creativity

[tim atherton]

You can also look at some of the most obvious examples.

Take Van Gogh - he had no training, he essentially invented his technique as his ideas progressed - which was both innovative and - by the objective measurements of the academies of the day - not at all competent. And what he produced was utterly creative (indeed revolutionary.)

[tim atherton]

BTW, I think innovation - being innovative - is in a way more limited than creativity.

It's about introducing or presenting something new but as part of a logical progression and to my mind often related to a process or technique or a way of doing something.

Creative/creativity also has to to with making something new but is much more "characterized by originality and expressiveness" and imagination. There is a bigger leap involved.

In photography, to take one example that's already been mentioned, the introduction of the Zone system may (be some) be considered innovative - but not a creative leap.

Innovation is a new (presumably better) way of doing something. Creativity is finding a new way of seeing or understanding something.

[John T]

Dick,

Why does an amateur need to pick one or the other? I would think that a goal could be to try to maximize both aspects in their photography. Excellence in technique means that the photographer's creativity won't be hindered by a lack of ability.

Tim,

I think that Van Gogh actually did take formal lessons at the Academy of Antwerp after he discovered that his technique wasn't good enough to communicate what he wanted to say. He was thought to have discovered Japanese perspective and the use of lighter values in his work here.

John

[John T]

Tim,

I agree with your comparison of "innovative" and "creative". I compare the process of creativity with scientific/historical process. It starts with inspiration (hypothesis), which leads to creativity (theory), which in turn leads to innovation (proof).

The more knowledge/ability you have at each step will allow you to more fully investigate and test out your ideas.

John

[Bruce Watson]

To me, seeing beautiful, even great images, in a well established way in a well established genre is not creativity. It is competency. True creativity breaks norms, established traditions and ways of seeing. Adams (as much as I love him) was competent. Weston was truly creative.

That's one definition perhaps, and even by that definition Adams was creative. He was one of the founders of Group 64 was he not? Wasn't he at the forefront of the push to move photography out of the pictorial movement and into the straight photography movement? Was he not a leader in the fight for acceptance of photography as art? Isn't he the guy usually credited with creating the photography department at MOMA? Doesn't at least some of this qualify as breaking norms and traditions?

But creativity can't be defined by whether or not it breaks norms or established traditions. People can be highly creative within existing norms and traditions. I would point out as just one example the many centuries of Japanese haiku. It's the most restrictive form of poetry I know, and yet it apparently leaves endless room for creativity. This leads me to think that part of creativity is exploring the existing norms and traditions and finding new ways to use them.

An alternate way to define creativity is using available materials and tools to bring into physical being the artist's vision. Knowing how to use the tools and materials is competence. Using them competently to bring your vision to life is creativity.

[Darryl Baird]

I don't agree with you at all. There are natural rhythms and patterns to nature, which manifest themselves in the world around us. Little things like the arrangements of petals in a flower, the patterns on a tree. The trick is trying to see them in a way which is pleasing - that is creativity. I don't see it as a matter of "competency" at all. As for Adams and Weston, I see both as creative, although I really don't care for Weston's work at all.

Sorry for a BIG disagreement here, but the notion of copying what is already in nature is a form of honoring beauty of ratifying and reinforcing our sense of it anyway. The creative/innovative person will see and (ultimately) show us something we haven't seen before. The aesthetic rules Adams (mostly) operated under were well established by the late 1700s -- the sublime, the beautiful, and the picturesque. Weston took natural forms as content and expressed a unique idea that mirrored HIS modern vision. (His daybooks are good sources of these ideas) Where Adams gets short shrift is his lack of recognition as an excellent abstract artist, but that is more a problem of the market for his images.

[Bruce Watson]

The creative/innovative person will see and (ultimately) show us something we haven't seen before.

That's an interesting thought, but I don't think it will stand up to much scrutiny. And it's a huge burden to put on the artist. How, for example, can the artist know what anyone else has seen before?

All the artist can do is show us something that the artist hasn't seen before. The artist is constrained by his/her own consciousness. All they can do is show us something that is meaningful to them. Only we can know if it shows us something we haven't seen before.

[paulr]

I agree with Kirk's general premise (it strikes me as almost self-evident, actually).

I'd also agree that Adams wasn't the towering creative force that Weston was, but I think it's going a bit far to say he wasn't creative (or innovative). He seemed less and less creative as time went on, in my opinion, because he lapsed into formula (a commercially successful formula, which I'm sure was no accident), and seemed less interested as time went on in images that might challenge his audience or himself. But I can think of a few things that we owe to him. One is the use of photography for pro-conservation propaganda. The other is the curious fusion of the f64 group's straight technical esthetic with the romanticism of Thomas Moran and other 19th century 'ain't nature grand' landscape painters.

Around the middle of his career (1940s, 1950s) he did a bunch of work of great subtlety and I think also creativity ... I'm thinking of what became the Portfolios. This didn't really rival Weston's innovation (it was a bit too much like what Weston had already done) but I think it had real depth, and was a fine example of the creative spirit.

Maybe a more obvious example would be to contrast Adams with one of the millions of Adams clones ... people who follow all the rules, make stunning, classical compositions and beautiful Adams-esq prints. Thee people are competent, even masterful, but their efforts make me sad because they amount to little more than copying. I see all that skill being squandered on something much less valuable than what it might be used for. My assumption is that everyone has something unique to offer. No two people see things exactly the same way or have the same cares, hopes, and loves, so it doesn't make sense, for example, for my work to look like yours, or like Ansel's.

[tim atherton]

I think that Van Gogh actually did take formal lessons at the Academy of Antwerp after he discovered that his technique wasn't good enough to communicate what he wanted to say. He was thought to have discovered Japanese perspective and the use of lighter values in his work here.

John

I think only for a total time of 1 - 2 months? He spent more time at the studio of Fernand Cormon in Paris, but it was, I recall, a fairly informal arrangement and was again only for a few months

[roteague]

Sorry for a BIG disagreement here, but the notion of copying what is already in nature is a form of honoring beauty of ratifying and reinforcing our sense of it anyway. The creative/innovative person will see and (ultimately) show us something we haven't seen before. The aesthetic rules Adams (mostly) operated under were well established by the late 1700s -- the sublime, the beautiful, and the picturesque. Weston took natural forms as content and expressed a unique idea that mirrored HIS modern vision. (His daybooks are good sources of these ideas) Where Adams gets short shrift is his lack of recognition as an excellent abstract artist, but that is more a problem of the market for his images.

I would suggest that both Adam's and Weston's work followed the "rules" of composition. Each just had different ways of coming to those conclusions.