Creativity in captivity

Water destroys and creates at the same time. (Image by 272447)

The art that people have made in quarantine is incredible.

Musicians are collaborating on complex multi-track recordings from afar — and sharing impromptu live concerts from their living rooms.

People are drawing and painting like crazy, setting up elaborate obstacle courses for their pets, and dancing up a storm.

This video by Quinn Wharton gained a million views in twenty-four hours. It’s impressive not only for the flawless dancing, but also for the cinematography. The moments when the panning is just slightly off from the camera source material make you realize how ambitious it was to do this work alone. These imperfections add greater depth to a masterful and hilarious performance.

And that’s not even addressing the lampshade, an inspired choice that gets even funnier as the film progresses. No partner? No problem.

Unlimited resources don’t necessarily lead us to the best outcomes. We might experience our most inspired moments when we have the fewest options at our disposal. Ingenious solutions arise when the chips are down. Creativity is strengthened by constraints.

Having infinite possibilities is overwhelming. If I tell writing students they can write about anything they want, their minds go blank. They won’t be able to think of anything. However, if I ask them to, for instance, write five hundred words about a terrible vacation, the wheels start turning. I’ve created a problem, and each student’s brain will get to work on a unique solution right away.

We do our best creative work within a structure. Ironically, the more structure we have, the easier it is to create. Experienced artists and designers are familiar with the architecture of their work, and can readily assemble the structures and build upon them. It’s this familiarity, not magical, capricious “creativity,” that makes them good at what they do.

For instance, we might set out to write a song in which the verses include five chords and have four lines of lyric in an ABAB rhyme scheme. It’s practically paint-by-numbers from there, right?

We could further stipulate that the lyrics must include the name of an American city and have a theme of regret. And maybe the chorus of the song is in G major, but the verses are in E minor.

We could get narrower and narrower — and yet no two songwriters would come up with the same end product. There is still plenty of room for individual expression within the tight parameters.

My little friend, the engineer.

The more challenging the circumstances, the harder we have to work to problem-solve, but we humans were built for such work. And even as the pandemic has created unusual constraints, we’ve found novel solutions to problems that have arisen. Organizations of all kinds, from government agencies to businesses to households, have had to navigate through a maze of new restrictions to accomplish their goals. They’re figuring it out. Some are coming up with fresh ideas that will continue to be useful long after the restrictions are lifted.

Boredom can be a consequence of having our preferred activities stripped away, but these, too, are constraints that can propel us toward creative solutions. Lots of kids were whiny at first, unable to attend school and follow their normal routines. But when I saw a photo of my three-year-old nephew putting a toy car into a long cardboard tube held at an angle and attached to a plastic track, I knew he was going to be just fine. Later, he turned this “tunnel” into a water slide for his beloved cars.

It’s a cruel truth of the world that many of our most valuable innovations were forged in the crucible of war, disease, or some other profound hardship. Even now, scientists around the world are racing to create a vaccine that could someday restore the society and lifestyle we once knew. They’re operating under tremendous pressure and peril, and the stakes are so high that they can’t quit until they’ve accomplished their mission. (It’s a Flaming Lips song made real.) Before them is an intense undertaking with formidable constraints — and the result, should it be successful, will be a triumph of human creativity and ingenuity.

In the meantime, the rest of us will make our lip synch videos, invent new indoor sports, and continue to find new ways of connecting with each other while maintaining social distancing. We’re forging new paths across a landscape we might have found impossible to cross before.

I can’t wait to see your contribution.