Walking the Creativity Tightrope: Teaching students to be appropriately radical

Abstract

Creativity has a significant place in visual arts education (Bastos & Zimmerman, 2015; Katz-Buonincontro, 2018; Kinsella, 2018; Sawyer, 2017; Stone, 2015; Ulger, 2019; Veon, 2014) but an understanding of creativity leads to the recognition that for something to be deemed creative, it must be both novel and appropriate in context (Amabile, 2018; Cropley, 2016; Goetz Zwirn & Vande Zande, 2015; Kaufman & Baer, 2012; Plucker, 2018). While the ‘in context’ addition to the concept of appropriate, creates more space for visual artists, the constraints of appropriateness remain. For a visual arts and design instructor, this creates tension. How do I encourage students to be creative and push boundaries, yet also teach them to be mindful of the constraints?
 This paper discusses observations in undergraduate design education studio classes wherein students learn to use process and thumbnail sketches to push their concepts beyond predictable and into the radical or novel realm. A modified design thinking process provides the structure that allows students to feel confident about exploring ideas. Ongoing feedback from peers and instructor serves to both push and reign in ideas when revisions are valuable. The process requires diligence and practice. It also requires that students work to break free from either/or thinking and view their work on a continuum.
 Reflecting on relevant methods for encouraging students to accept the value of novel ideas that also acknowledge the viewer is worthwhile. Encouraging students to recognize that creativity is enhanced through process while also engendering an understanding of the nature of creativity is valuable and can lead to the generation of radical ideas that have merit due not only to their novelty but also to their ‘appropriateness.’