Gustavo Lacerda

http://blog.ninapaley.com/2009/12/28/the-cult-of-originality/

Her main point is that our perception is itself subjective and creative, and a sincere retelling can therefore be enough to make stories interesting.

<< The artists’ challenge is to take ideas other people say are stupid, and manifest them anyway. The more original an idea, the more people will say it is stupid, and the more the artist must overcome to love it into being anyway.

Most “original” ideas are already out there, being scorned. Who’s going to work at manifesting an idea others have already said is stupid? All new ideas are rejected initially. Artists merely champion those lost, downtrodden little memes nobody else loves.

Maybe an artist gives a home to a meme everyone else is turning away. They feed and nurture it. It arrives in their mind as a spore from the commons (the “zeigeist”); they don’t actually originate it. The idea is in “the ether,” but most minds reject it, can’t feed it, or don’t offer it fertile soil in which to take root. For whatever reason, the artist does. They allow it to fruit and release seeds – art. And then they are praised as “original.” >>