Thomas Akhøj Ibsen

Kunstner, kunstklinker & Cand.Mag. i filosofi og kulturformidling

Why Creative People Sometimes Make No Sense

I’ve been having an insightful shuffle through Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s book Creativity: The Work and Lives of 91 Eminent People. Mihaly is a seminal professor of Psychology and Management, and is the Founding Co-Director of the Quality of Life Research Center at Claremont. He writes:

“I have devoted 30 years of research to how creative people live and work, to make more understandable the mysterious process by which they come up with new ideas and new things. If I had to express in one word what makes their personalities different from others, it’s complexity. They show tendencies of thought and action that in most people are segregated. They contain contradictory extremes; instead of being an individual, each of them is a multitude.”

Nine out of the ten people in me strongly agree with that statement. As someone paid to be creative, I sometimes feel kaleidoscopic in my views or opinions, and that “multitude” of expressions sometimes confuses those around me. Why does that happen? My thoughts make cohesive sense to me, yet others sometimes feel that I am contradicting myself or switching positions. What is wrong with me?

Mihaly describes 9 contradictory traits that are frequently present in creative people:

01

Most creative people have a great deal of physical energy, but are often quiet and at rest. They can work long hours at great concentration.

02

Most creative people tend to be smart and naive at the same time. “It involves fluency, or the ability to generate a great quantity of ideas; flexibility, or the ability to switch from one perspective to another; and originality in picking unusual associations of ideas. These are the dimensions of thinking that most creativity tests measure, and that most creativity workshops try to enhance.”

03

Most creative people combine both playfulness and productivity, which can sometimes mean both responsibility and irresponsibility. “Despite the carefree air that many creative people affect, most of them work late into the night and persist when less driven individuals would not.” Usually this perseverance occurs at the expense of other responsibilities, or other people.

04

Most creative people alternate fluently between imagination and fantasy, and a rooted sense of reality. In both art and science, movement forward involves a leap of imagination, a leap into a world that is different from our present. Interestingly, this visionary imagination works in conjunction with a hyperawareness of reality. Attention to real details allows a creative person to imagine ways to improve them.

05

Most creative people tend to be both introverted and extroverted. Many people tend toward one extreme or the other, but highly creative people are a balance of both simultaneously.

06

Most creative people are genuinely humble and display a strong sense of pride at the same time.

07

Most creative people are both rebellious and conservative. “It is impossible to be creative without having first internalized an area of culture. So it’s difficult to see how a person can be creative without being both traditional and conservative and at the same time rebellious and iconoclastic.”

08

Most creative people are very passionate about their work, but remain extremely objective about it as well. They are able to admit when something they have made is not very good.

09

Most creative people’s openness and sensitivity exposes them to a large amount of suffering and pain, but joy and life in the midst of that suffering. “Perhaps the most important quality, the one that is most consistently present in all creative individuals, is the ability to enjoy the process of creation for its own sake. Without this trait, poets would give up striving for perfection and would write commercial jingles, economists would work for banks where they would earn at least twice as much as they do at universities, and physicists would stop doing basic research and join industrial laboratories where the conditions are better and the expectations more predictable.”

Sometimes what appears to be a contradiction on the surface is actually a harmony in disguise. My problem has been primarily one of communication. I am learning to let people know what I am thinking and why, and explaining myself in a way that helps them understand why I am discussing multiple perspectives instead of just cleanly stating my own. At first it might not make sense, but give me/us long enough, and it will.

A trinity of Femme fatales 2/3

 

This is a man’s, man’s, man’s world
But it wouldn’t be nothing, nothing without a woman or a girl

This beautiful creature is made of old camera optics, my Danish passport, glue, resin, epoxy, toy wheels and small globe known as Earth. It resonates the fact that your chances in life are determined by where you are born. Aswell as a salute to womanhood. Praise them females! This is earthling and she is pregnant. #metoo

A trinity of Femme fatales 1/3

I have created a series of female/feminine sculptures – and it´s called A Trinity of Femme Fatales. They are still designed in a kind of ugly-aesthetic way, but there can be no doubt. These dangerously seductive ladies will bring insight, danger and renewed lust to your life. There is nothing like being attracted to – and seduced by a well-placed rubble of used hi-tech stuff and epoxy resin. You will want to lick them. Enjoy this new art!

A small reminder: The use of words to describe artwork is completely subjective, and artwork may mean different things to different people. Just as a proclaimer.

She´s an Iphone Lady:

Before the metaphysical art speaks – this sculpture is made by A discarded iPhone 3s, a cooling fan, keys, a stuffed baby crocodile head, led, military jacket heraldry, a turned wooden cup (self-made), epoxy clay & resin and acrylic paint.

 

female_2-copy

 

Lets talk art! The point, meaning and metaphysical dimension of the work. In other words – what I thought while I was making it. This mixed media garbage sculpture is part of a trio of femme fatal, sometimes called maneaters. It´s a short twisted story of womanhood.

Star Trek, a Croc-Mick-Jagger and a weapon:

This is a gathering of ideal culturally perceived “female” values. In a nutshell. The first thing to make a note off is the hand. She makes a Star Trek, Volcan hand sign: Live long and prosper. That is the word if you’re a nerd/Trekkie – dear reader.

The small male/crocodile dude is a sample of men as a declining breed of the human race. Less educated, drunk, unemployed and filled with violence. This little horny fucker is a tribute to Rolling Stones iconic logo. The big tongue that licks stuff. Sexy croc-Mick horny Jagger is fucking the leg of the lady queen. Or so I thought.

A cross, dress and an iPhone:

The Red Cross: An aid organization that helps people in need and it´s the symbol of humanism. I do believe in humanism, but I was hearing a strange and very angry radio program called Je Suis Jalving. It was intentionally rightwing-biased and 85% fear mongering. You know the Muslim’s are coming to take over the world. ISIS, the califate, illegal migrants are stealing our jobs… and so on. So I placed The Red Cross band on the left arm because the rightwing groups new enemy is the goodness industry… U know like the Nazis (the incarnation of evil in western thought and the 20th century).

The dress made of wood. WTF! Lady Gaga made one out of meat. A lady’s dress must at least be red. Red is the colour of blood, roses, and hot chilis. It’s a very passionate colour. Red can mean anger or desire. BUT Wood. Is a shitty brown colour! Why? It´s all about the ecology, one with nature and love.

What about the iPhone and the air fan (lady hat), you ask? All will be answered in due time.

Epozy or kintsugi – That is the question?

I made a small business that renovates broken ceramics and pottery. It´s called Reparatio – Reparation af Keramik and it´s a startup business. Very niche! One day I was googling the competition and I found this video from School Of Life. It´s about ‘Kintsugi’ and that is a remarkable Japanese art of repairing broken pottery with elegance and grace. I think it´s an amazing tradition with a lot to teach us – more generally about how to handle the broken bits of ourselves.

‘Kintsugi’ want´s the broken parts to be seen. I what them remain hidden. I´m like the plastic surgeon of pottery and the Japanese are… well… just watch the clip:-) Good day


 

Quick Guide to Art History for Dummies

 

Art History Timeline

The history of art is immense, the earliest cave paintings pre-date writing by almost 27,000 years! If you’re interested in art history, the first thing you should do is take a look at this table which briefly outlines the artists, traits, works, and events that make up major art periods and how art evolved to present day:

 

Art Periods/
Movements
Characteristics Chief Artists and Major Works Historical Events
Stone Age (30,000 b.c.–2500 b.c.) Cave painting, fertility goddesses, megalithic structures Lascaux Cave Painting, Woman of Willendorf, Stonehenge Ice Age ends (10,000 b.c.–8,000 b.c.); New Stone Age and first permanent settlements (8000 b.c.–2500 b.c.)
Mesopotamian (3500 b.c.–539 b.c.) Warrior art and narration in stone relief Standard of Ur, Gate of Ishtar, Stele of Hammurabi’s Code Sumerians invent writing (3400 b.c.); Hammurabi writes his law code (1780 b.c.); Abraham founds monotheism
Egyptian (3100 b.c.–30 b.c.) Art with an afterlife focus: pyramids and tomb painting Imhotep, Step Pyramid, Great Pyramids, Bust of Nefertiti Narmer unites Upper/Lower Egypt (3100 b.c.); Rameses II battles the Hittites (1274 b.c.); Cleopatra dies (30 b.c.)
Greek and Hellenistic (850 b.c.–31 b.c.) Greek idealism: balance, perfect proportions; architectural orders(Doric, Ionic, Corinthian) Parthenon, Myron, Phidias, Polykleitos, Praxiteles Athens defeats Persia at Marathon (490 b.c.); Peloponnesian Wars (431 b.c.–404 b.c.); Alexander the Great’s conquests (336 b.c.–323 b.c.)
Roman (500 b.c.– a.d. 476) Roman realism: practical and down to earth; the arch Augustus of Primaporta, Colosseum, Trajan’s Column, Pantheon Julius Caesar assassinated (44 b.c.); Augustus proclaimed Emperor (27 b.c.); Diocletian splits Empire (a.d. 292); Rome falls (a.d. 476)
Indian, Chinese, and Japanese(653 b.c.–a.d. 1900) Serene, meditative art, and Arts of the Floating World Gu Kaizhi, Li Cheng, Guo Xi, Hokusai, Hiroshige Birth of Buddha (563 b.c.); Silk Road opens (1st century b.c.); Buddhism spreads to China (1st–2nd centuries a.d.) and Japan (5th century a.d.)
Byzantine and Islamic (a.d. 476–a.d.1453) Heavenly Byzantine mosaics; Islamic architecture and amazing maze-like design Hagia Sophia, Andrei Rublev, Mosque of Córdoba, the Alhambra Justinian partly restores Western Roman Empire (a.d. 533–a.d. 562); Iconoclasm Controversy (a.d. 726–a.d. 843); Birth of Islam (a.d. 610) and Muslim Conquests (a.d. 632–a.d. 732)
Middle Ages (500–1400) Celtic art, Carolingian Renaissance, Romanesque, Gothic St. Sernin, Durham Cathedral, Notre Dame, Chartres, Cimabue, Duccio, Giotto Viking Raids (793–1066); Battle of Hastings (1066); Crusades I–IV (1095–1204); Black Death (1347–1351); Hundred Years’ War (1337–1453)
Early and High Renaissance (1400–1550) Rebirth of classical culture Ghiberti’s Doors, Brunelleschi, Donatello, Botticelli, Leonardo, Michelangelo, Raphael Gutenberg invents movable type (1447); Turks conquer Constantinople (1453); Columbus lands in New World (1492); Martin Luther starts Reformation (1517)
Venetian and Northern Renaissance (1430–1550) The Renaissance spreads north- ward to France, the Low Countries, Poland, Germany, and England Bellini, Giorgione, Titian, Dürer, Bruegel, Bosch, Jan van Eyck, Rogier van der Weyden Council of Trent and Counter-Reformation (1545–1563); Copernicus proves the Earth revolves around the Sun (1543
Mannerism (1527–1580) Art that breaks the rules; artifice over nature Tintoretto, El Greco, Pontormo, Bronzino, Cellini Magellan circumnavigates the globe (1520–1522)
Baroque (1600–1750) Splendor and flourish for God; art as a weapon in the religious wars Reubens, Rembrandt, Caravaggio, Palace of Versailles Thirty Years’ War between Catholics and Protestants (1618–1648)
Neoclassical (1750–1850) Art that recaptures Greco-Roman grace and grandeur David, Ingres, Greuze, Canova Enlightenment (18th century); Industrial Revolution (1760–1850)
Romanticism (1780–1850) The triumph of imagination and individuality Caspar Friedrich, Gericault, Delacroix, Turner, Benjamin West American Revolution (1775–1783); French Revolution (1789–1799); Napoleon crowned emperor of France (1803)
Realism (1848–1900) Celebrating working class and peasants;en plain air rustic painting Corot, Courbet, Daumier, Millet European democratic revolutions of 1848
Impressionism (1865–1885) Capturing fleeting effects of natural light Monet, Manet, Renoir, Pissarro, Cassatt, Morisot, Degas Franco-Prussian War (1870–1871); Unification of Germany (1871)
Post-Impressionism (1885–1910) A soft revolt against Impressionism Van Gogh, Gauguin, Cézanne, Seurat Belle Époque (late-19th-century Golden Age); Japan defeats Russia (1905)
Fauvism and Expressionism (1900–1935) Harsh colors and flat surfaces (Fauvism); emotion distorting form Matisse, Kirchner, Kandinsky, Marc Boxer Rebellion in China (1900); World War (1914–1918)
Cubism, Futurism, Supremativism, Constructivism, De Stijl (1905–1920) Pre– and Post–World War 1 art experiments: new forms to express modern life Picasso, Braque, Leger, Boccioni, Severini, Malevich Russian Revolution (1917); American women franchised (1920)
Dada and Surrealism(1917–1950) Ridiculous art; painting dreams and exploring the unconscious Duchamp, Dalí, Ernst, Magritte, de Chirico, Kahlo Disillusionment after World War I; The Great Depression (1929–1938); World War II (1939–1945) and Nazi horrors; atomic bombs dropped on Japan (1945)
Abstract Expressionism (1940s–1950s) and Pop Art (1960s) Post–World War II: pure abstraction and expression without form; popular art absorbs consumerism Gorky, Pollock, de Kooning, Rothko, Warhol, Lichtenstein Cold War and Vietnam War (U.S. enters 1965); U.S.S.R. suppresses Hungarian revolt (1956) Czechoslovakian revolt (1968)
Postmodernism and Deconstructivism (1970– ) Art without a center and reworking and mixing past styles Gerhard Richter, Cindy Sherman, Anselm Kiefer, Frank Gehry, Zaha Hadid Nuclear freeze movement; Cold War fizzles; Communism collapses in Eastern Europe and U.S.S.R. (1989–1991)