Creativity Deabte: "Does creativity come from the need to solve a problem or not?"
What is creativity? The Thesaurus definition of creativity is: Originality, imagination, inspitation, ingenuity, inventiveness, resourcefulness, creativeness, vision and innovation.
"Creativity is a process needed for problem-solving …not a special gift enjoyed by a few but a common ability possessed by most people” (Jones, 1993)
"Nothing is original. Steal from anywhere that resonates with inspiration or fuels your imagination. Devour old films, new films, music, books, paintings, photographs, poems, dreams, random conversations, architecture, bridges, street signs, trees, clouds, bodies of water, light & shadows. Select only things to steal from that speak directly to your soul. If you do this, your work (and theft) will be authentic. Authenticity is invaluable, originality is non-existent. And don't bother concealing your theivery - celebrate it if you feel like it. In any case, always remember what Jean-Luc Godard said: "It's not where you take things from - it's more where you take them to." - Jim Jarmusch
Is a text only Postmodern if the audience are aware of the "socially recognisable debris"?
Postmodern texts use addition, deletion, substition and transposition.
Addition: adding sources of inspiration together
Deletion: removing elements that make it identiical to original
Substition: substiting one thing in place of another
Transposition: taking two unconnecting things and then adding them together
Task 1: With Dan Black's Symphonies he uses addition by adding the theme City Of Prague Philharmonic Orchestra's version of Starman for the 1984 film Starman to the drum beat of Rihanna's Umbrella. This is also an example of transposition because there is no obvious connection between a theme tune to a 80's sci-fi film and present day R'n'B artist like Rihanna. The drum loop is slowed down and the lyrics are substituted for original lyrics written by Dan Black.
In terms of visuals for the music video he has used transposition by mixing together iconic imagery from a wide range of film genres that have no connection to create a montage of different films. He has used substitution here as well by using himself as the main character in story rather than use the original characters.
Task 2: Identify all the intertextual references and explain their significance.
Universal Studio Logo
Lost Highway
Film Noir
Tron
Sin City
King Soloman's Mines
Goldfinger
Bonanza
Japanese cinema
E.T.
Thunderbirds
King Kong/ Godzilla
These clips are used to show that no ideas are original because they can be inspired and adapted by anyone to create the same effect. This video uses intertextual references from films & TV that have no obvious relation to each other which makes it postmodern. Everything he used in the music and the video was taken from somewhere else, only the lyrics were original, he did this to make the point that he did this to show that anyone recreate these things.
Task 3:To what extent does the combination of video and song in Symphonies conform to Charles Jencks' view that: 'Post-Modernism is fundamentally the eclectic mixture of any tradition with that of its immediate past...' The combination of sources in the video and the song in Dan Black's Symphonies conforms to Charles Jenck's view because the various film and TV clips used in the video are taken from completely different genres
"The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there"
Before industrialisation we lacked the ability to mass produce things and relied on skilled craftsmen who had specific talents to produce things. When machines started to take over household "cottage" industries started to disappear as people turned to industrialised made products because they were produced faster and at a cheaper rate. As these machines required less specific skilled knowledge to produce things it meant more people were able to take up jobs in different fields that their predecessors would not have been able to do. For example in pre-industrialisation people would follow the craft of their fathers not only to carry on the business but because they were taught from a young age the skills.
Industrialisation was seen as progress which meant moving forward and leaving the past behind. It was revolution rather than evolution. The past was rejected by modernist artists and designers and they focused completely on the future. After the industrial revolution mass production meant everyone could own the same thing as products became less unique due to the lack of individual crafting.
"If you look to the future and keep one eye on the past you are blind in one eye. If you keep both eyes on the future and no eyes on the past you are blind in both eyes and God have mercy on you." -Beniton "In a kingdom of the blind, the one eyed man is King." -Desiderius Erasmus
Modernism started from about 1850. It proposes new forms of art on the grounds that they are more appropriate to present day and is characterised by constant innovation. It has often been driven by social and political issues, often utopian. Modernism was generally associated with ideal visions of human life, society and a belief in progress.
The terms modernism and modern art are used to describe the succession of art movements that critics and historians have identified since the Realism of Courbet, culminating in abstract art and its developments up to the 1960s. By that time modernism had become a dominant idea of art, and a particularly narrow theory of modernist painting had been made by the highly influential American critic Clement Greenberg. The reaction that then took place which was quickly identified as Postmodernism. Postmodernism rejects the modernist ideology that ignores the past and treats both the past and the future as the same. It also highlighted the paradox of making everything depthless.
"If the 'master craftsman' is no longer needed, what does that say about creation and talent?" "If everyone is talented then no one is, if everyone can make music then no one can."
It is the most realistic game because it is in real time, the aim is to drive the bus from Tucson, Arizona to Las Vegas, Nevada at the max. speed of 45mph. It takes 8 hours of continuous play to complete because it can't be paused. There is no passengers in the bus and no scenery or other traffic on the road. The bus veers to the right slightly which makes it impossible to fix a button to play it without a person controlling it. When it veers off the road the bus stalls and has to be towed back to the start in real time. When the player gets to Las Vegas they score one point they then get the option to make the return trip back to Tucson which earns them one more point. Penn Jillette commented in his radio show that the overly realistic nature of the game was in response to Janet Reno and the controversy surrounding violent video games at the time.
It does follow the conventions of a computer game because it has:
A mission to drive from Tucson to Las Vegas
Rewards when you earn a point from arriving at the destination
A problem the bus veers off the road and only drives at 45 mph
Progressive difficulty when driving back to Tucson it gets dark
Linear structure when the bus breaks down it results in having to be towed back to the start also resulting in the end of the game
With improved graphics games can look more realistic e.g. football games with players who look like real players
Games will program instructions into the loading screen because the manufacturers know that people won't read an instruction manual to learn how to play.
Ideas on Creativity: “There is no doubt that creativity is the most important human resource of all. Without creativity, there would be no progress, and we would be forever repeating the same patterns. Creativity involves breaking out of established patterns in order to look at things in a different way. It is also a great motivator because it makes people interested in what they are doing...it makes life more fun and more interesting." -Edward de Bono
"Even in literature and art, no man who bothers about originality will ever be original: whereas if you simply try to tell the truth (without caring twopence how often it has been told before) you will, nine times out of ten, become original without ever having noticed it." - C. S. Lewis
"Out of limitation come creativity." -Debbie Allen
"A truly creative person rids him or herself of all self-imposed limitations." -Gerald G. Jampolsky
"Problems cannot be solved by the same level of thinking that created them." - Albert Einstein
"Can anybody be given a great degree of creativity? No. They can be given the equipment to develop it - if they have it in them in the first place." - George Shearing
"Creativity and artistic endeavours have a mission that goes far beyond just making music for the sake of music." - Herbie Hancock
What do you understand by "Creativity" and to what extend have you been creative?
Creativity is where a person creates something new that is individual and original. It can be a product, piece of art, music, literature etc that is different, shows an inspiring concept, brings new ideas or meaning to the audience, something that expresses emotions and ideas to the viewer. Creativity is usually inspired by other creative products or ideas but can be totally original and innovative. Did you experience limits/blocks on your own creativity?
Time and equipment has limited my creativity to some extent because I've had to work in a time frame and use resources that were on offer to me however with more time and a wider range of resources I could have been more creative and created a better outcome.
How easy/difficult was it to be creative while still working to the brief?
While working to the brief it wasn't too difficult to still be creative because I was able to adapt it to my skills and experiment with new technologies to make a creative product.
How much of your creativity was about trial and error? A lot of my creativity is about trial and error because I need to test, practice and adapt my ideas before I create an effective outcome. For example with my digipak I played around in photoshop and the image on the front cover til I was happy that it worked.
Did working within conventions stifle your creativity?
To some extent working within conventions has stifled my creativity because I've had to ignore some ideas because they would not appeal to the audience. For example, at one point I wanted to include more abstract effects in the music video however we decided that it did not really fit with the mainstream pop genre of the music.
Things that have caught my eye and I find creative:
The visuals fit really well with the music, its uplifting and inspiring if you enjoy rugby. The colours they use incorporate the colours of the different nation's kits. Also shows iconic rugby images e.g. Jonny Wilkinson's drop kick, Francois Pienaar lifting the Webb Ellis cup, the haka. It also incorporates imagery of the host nation, New Zealand with the mountains in the background and the fern leaf which is the All Blacks' logo.
This is a really effective use photography and filming techniques to incorporate his signature artwork of silhouettes of the cat and the dog into an interesting alternative style of music video. It's really witty and shows the nightlife of a dog.
Thought to be a sculpture by Banksy given to support the Occup London movement in their protest against corporate greed and corruption. I think this is really effective and creative showing a iconic, well-known image and changing the meaning to send a strong message.
