Madness and Creativiity

[liowkc]

Do you think there is a relationship between creativity and madness. Folks like Plato, Socrates and Aristotle believed that such a link exists. And we have common terms like "creative chaos". "mad genius"....

[Sophie]

I do, I think being slightly or very mad makes you unique and have a different sort of energy that leads itself to originally. Are we not all a little crazy? Perception plays a bigger role in this. What is crazy to one is normal to another and vice versa.

[Rodney Yates]

Creativity is definitely more evident in people who are 'driven' to fulfuil something in themselves, and not just from some external pressure to perform reliably. I think that might be a kind of 'mania', if not madness. Yes, I agree!

[Josephine]

There is a fine line between concious and unconcious. I think artists always ride that line. You have to be open to the things that effect you deeply, which is the antithesis of at least the American economic structure. Most people learn to shut that off to function in the real world. What is madness anyway? It's usually just classified as something that people don't understand. True insanity is something quite different and wouldnt' allow for great art in my opinion. It requires focus and concentration to do anything artistic, qualities which seem to be outside the abilities of a truly insane person. I do think though that high emotions are necessary but believe that emotions are the soul communicating while others would believe they are something to be squashed. In the end, it's all a matter of societal interpretation for sure.

[Rodney Yates]

To fulfil and see artwork to completion shows an unusual grittiness and determination, which might border on the obsessive... I think the 'visionary' aspect of perceiving what direction your work must take is definitely something suppressed, if not crowded out by our contemporaries. Perceptions of a reality which is somehow objective, or quantifyable is at odds with the chaotic something-out-of-nothing experiences which generate art from the creative imagination. Shrinks like to have it believed that if your perception includes things 'which are not there', you should be taken in for treatment (!) this is derisible in my book, and puts us at odds with this brand of tendential science - or pseudo-science, in which I include psychiatry. The artist most definitely gets a raw deal at the hands of these people, whose only concession to us is to provide a single 1-hour session per week of 'art therapy' - hardly enough to keep the artist's hand in, if you or I were to fall victim to these people.

[princee18]

i think mad, maniac, lunatic are the similar terms which are sometimes used with genious and creative people.If you want to get something you should be different and have to be passionate about it.