Genius & Creativity by Silvia Hartmann

Genius & Creativity?

by Silvia Hartmann

How do you get to be a "creative genius"?

I've always thought there's two parts to this.

One is the creativity, and the other is the expression thereof.

I've met many extremely creative people who have "nothing to show for it".

One is on the high end of that, an artist who literally smashes everything up he produces before the paint/clay etc has even dried.

Another is a bit further down that scale and he thinks and talks but doesn't actually ever pick up a chisel or paintbrush in actuality.

Now I personally pull projects quite brutally through all the domains and levels until they become manifest in the hard. In spite of the fact that according to many, I should not because I'm not a good enough writer, painter, songwriter, html writer, poet etc etc etc etc etc to "inflict my creations on the general public".

But I do it anyway. Just because I can. LOL.

Unless someone produces a court order to stop me from singing and selling CDs to the public, I shall do so. I mean it is everyone's right to do that, just as it is everyone else's right and ability to say, "Eeeouwh!" and NOT listen any further and NOT buy the damned CD!

I think I wrote in the ad for the Storyteller something along the lines of, "If you can't express yourself out aloud to an audience, you might well be a genius but no-one would ever know that, including yourself!"

So that's that end.

The other end is "creativity" itself.

I had a sticking point with that because of this strange idea that creativity is doing something that no-one's ever done before and that THAT should be hard or difficult.

But of course, it isn't.

• Anything at all that a person does and it comes from THEIR OWN HONEST AND TRUE EXPERIENCE AND ENDEAVOUR in the Universe at large is by definition, entirely unique. It has never been and thus, denotes "creative genius".

Where people go wrong is that they orientate themselves on stuff that's already been done by OTHER HUMAN BEINGS so they're re-cycling stuff, second hand stuff.

Instead, if one orientates oneself directly to a sunset, say, and tries to describe the experience of that in colours, words, shapes, or music, from a state of full on connectedness and from within the experience, one - anyone! - immediately creates absolutely unique art because of course each individual is absolutely unique and so will their expression be.

Once I got my head around the fact that I could absolutely paint MY OWN EXPERIENCE OF A SUNSET and that I did NOT have to attend 15 years of indoctrination college, sorry, art school I meant, AND that I have a right to do so as a human being by virtue of birth already, I could paint.

I could paint and I could further, exhibit, because then when someone turns up and says, "Oh but these paintings are childish. They lack subtlety, texture, and you're not supposed to use felt tip pens!" I have a smile and an answer for that.

I can say, "These are my paintings. If you don't like them, by all means, paint your own."

Which I do believe was what I said about the ideas for changing In Serein so it would be "more acceptable to the general public". I said, "Well that's my book, and that's how it is, why don't YOU write a book that YOU like?"

This is classed in general muppetville as utter arrogance, and if that's what it is, then so be it. I write my books and I paint my pictures. End of story. They are my best, my very best attempts at describing something I've seen, felt, heard, experienced and they are what they are, much as my life and my person is what it is.

I think that this basic centre and attitude is what makes you in the end, a true genius.

Every picture I paint, I learn something new.

My hand gets steadier and more confident with the brush. I know the paints better and what happens when you mix them, make them do things you want them to. I'm basically, becoming a better painter whilst I'm doing what I'm doing. I'm in my very own custom made art school where EVERYTHING is fascinating, has a reason, turns me on, makes me want to learn more, stretch further, try something more difficult and demanding as my confidence is growing.

One day, I'll really be a very good painter as well - it is inevitable if you keep going long enough! - and then I might even be able to paint my own window frames without blotching on the glass! What a bonus!

LOL.

But anyway. Creativity is something you do all the time if only you knew it, its only expression of experiences with the creative on a personal level. It has no rules or regulations at all, because no-one can come between you and the creative. It is everyone's right, it's built into everyone by right of birth and courtesy of the Creative, and it is completely uncriticisable as an endeavour (although muppets will try, and the parts of us that are still muppet entrained will try as well to be afraid when you first start, but it soon fades away!).

And it is in the act of *actually DOING* creativity in whatever medium that one becomes, over time, a genius.

© Silvia Hartmann 2004

Genius And Insanity