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Making Creativity Visible
Kevin Smokler, in a foreword to his anthology, Bookmark Now: Writing in Unreaderly Times, makes a point when he observes that "we live in a culture where we expect the creative to be visible."
Smokler’s insight really rings true. I wonder, however, the extent to which this is a good thing? How much visibility can the creative withstand or afford?
For those who are trying to build audiences or sell their work, making oneself visible is part of what it takes to feed the beast. To these ends, marketing and PR efforts are purposed toward a specific ends – creating demand and filling revenue coffers. It seems to me that making oneself visible – for most creatives – requires bigger & bigger investments of time, energy, and that most precious resource of all: focus.
How many times have you read or heard it opined that creativity is an unlimited resource? This might be true in the macro sense of the words, but at the personal level, it’s blather. Any experienced creative person knows that focus is in short supply.
There is danger here. These make-oneself-visible efforts take on a life of their own. Creative energy that once might have been tasked toward making work, is all too often repurposed to make celebrity instead.
Speaking personally, I’m struggling with these issues. Smokler’s insight feels very real to me. As a creative person, I believe that I am expected to make myself visible and, if I don’t, I fear that anything of value that I might create will be consigned to oblivion. While I am sure oblivion waits for all my creations – time erases all things – I’d like whatever value I do create to have some life, however brief. I don’t think I’m alone in my aspirations.
My friend Barry Lopez pondered over a decade ago, “What is it beyond celebrity that we can accomplish here?�
For me, this is one of those questions worth contemplating. I find much more fulfillment and joy in working than I have ever found in celebrity – not that I’ve had that much celebrity. Given that I work in the visibility business, there’s no little irony here.
With the emergence of what will inevitably be dubbed “The Creative Economy,� none of us will be able to escape the raucus torrent of hucksterism and celebrity for those whose creative outputs create wealth. It’s not coming, it’s already arrived.
But, to what ends? To reframe Barry’s question somewhat, what is it beyond wealth that The Creative Economy can accomplish here? What value – beyond celebrity and wealth - will be created? Perhaps more importantly on a personal level, what mechanisms will preserve time and focus for the real work of real people?
Posted on April 10, 2006 10:01 AM | Permalink
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