 BREACKING THE RULES
There is no great genius without some touch of madness.
Seneca (philosopher and playwright)
I see the mind of the 5-year-old as a volcano with two vents: destructiveness and creativity.
Sylvia Ashton-Warner (educator)
The passion for destruction is also creative passion.
Michail Aleksandrovic Bakunin (thinker and revolutionary)
Rules are what the artist breaks; the memorable never emerged from a formula.
Bill Bernbach (advertising pioneer)
I love fools’ experiments. I am always making them.
Charles Darwin (naturalist)
From diamonds, nothing is born / From manure, flowers
Fabrizio De Andrè (poet)
Creativity […] could be described as the act of putting two and two together to make five.
Arthur Koestler (essayist)
An idea with no chair to sit in is capable of creating a revolution.
Leo Longanesi (author)
Every creation is, at its root, the struggle between potential form and imitated form.
André Malraux (author)
One must still have chaos within oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star.
Friedrich Nietzsche (philosopher)
Every act of creation is first an act of destruction.
Pablo Picasso (painter)
The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes.
Marcel Proust (author)
Genius and madness have something in common: both live in a world that is different from that which exists for everyone else.
Arthur Schopenhauer (philosopher)
It requires a very unusual mind to undertake the analysis of the obvious.
Alfred North Whitehead (mathematician)
EMBRACING CHANGE
The world, our world, has existed since night of time, yet every day we must recreate it. If we did not walk upon the earth, it would not exist.
Breyten Breytenbach (author)
I can’t understand why people are afraid of new ideas. I’m frightened of the old ones.
John Cage (artist and author)
Nothing is more dangerous than idea when it’s the only one you have.
Émile-Auguste Chartier (philosopher)
Everything is creativity, in every change and in every individual.
Alden B. Dow (architect)
That mind that opens itself to a new idea never returns to its previous state.
Albert Einstein (physicist)
Be the change that you wish to see in the world.
Mahatma Gandhi (thinker)
Being creative means first of all doing something unusual… On the other hand, however unusual it may be, the idea also has to be reasonable for people to take it seriously.
Howard Gardner (psychologist)
Clear and precise ideas are the most dangerous, for one does not dare to change them.
André Gide (author)
Nothing in the world is so powerful as an idea whose time has come.
Victor Hugo (author)
Some people see things as they are and say why? I dream things that never were and say why not?
Robert Kennedy (US senator)
Only he is an artist who can make a riddle out of a solution.
Karl Kraus (author)
Towering genius disdains a beaten path. It seeks regions hitherto unexplored.
Abraham Lincoln (US president)
ON COMPETENCE
Adapt your techniques to an idea, not an idea to your techniques.
Bill Bernbach (advertising pioneer)
Ideas often kindle each other, like electrical sparks.
Friedrich Engels (philosopher)
Genius without education is like silver in the mine.
Benjamin Franklin (inventor)
Only an idiot is full of ideas.
Leo Longanesi (author)
Chance favors the prepared mind.
Louis Pasteur (chemist and biologist)
MANAGING EMOTIONS
If I create from the heart, nearly everything works; if from the head, almost nothing.
Marc Chagall (painter)
The whole difference between a construction and a creation is exactly this: that a thing constructed can be loved after it is constructed; but a thing created is loved before it exists.
G.K. Chesterton (author)
[Mystery] is the fundamental emotion that stands at the cradle of true art and true science.
Albert Einstein (physicist)
The conditions for creativity are the ability to be puzzled; to concentrate; to accept conflict and tension; to be born everyday; to feel a sense of self.
Eric Fromm (psychoanalyst, sociologist)
Creativity arises out of the tension between spontaneity and limitations, the latter (like river banks) forcing the spontaneity into the various forms which are essential to the work of art or poem.
Rollo May (psychoanalyst)
Creativity is the natural extension of our enthusiasm.
Florence Nightingale (nurse)
A painter paints to unload himself of feelings and visions. I go for a walk in the forest of Fontainebleau. I get 'green' indigestion. I must get rid of this sensation into a picture.
Pablo Picasso (painter)
The intellect seeks, the heart finds.
George Sand (author)
All thoughts start from emotions.
Leonardo da Vinci (inventor)
The capacity to still feel wonder is essential to the creative process.
Donald W. Winnicott (psychoanalyst)
ON DISCONTENT
The confident artist is a fool.
Giorgio Armani (fashion designer)
No one has ever written, painted, sculpted, modeled, built, or invented except literally to get out of hell.
Antonin Artaud (actor and playwright)
Everything comes to him who hustles while he waits. Restlessness is discontent, and discontent is the first necessity of progress Show me a thoroughly satisfied man and I will show you a failure.
Thomas Edison (inventor)
Creativity is an attempt to resolve a conflict generated by unexpressed biological impulses, such that unfulfilled desires are the driving force of the imagination, and they fuel our dreams and daydreams.
Sigmund Freud (psychoanalyst)
The root of creativity is found in the need to repair the good object destroyed during the depressive phase.
Melanie Klein (psychoanalyst)
Those who create are hard of heart.
Friedrich Nietzsche (philosopher)
Creativity is the process of sensing problems or gaps in information, then identifying the difficulties and seeking solutions through trial and error or through forming hypotheses.
Ellis Paul Torrance (psychologist)
KNOWING HOW TO RECOGNIZE A GOOD IDEA
Is creativity some obscure, esoteric art form? Not on your life. It’s the most practical thing a businessman can employ.
Bill Bernbach (advertising pioneer)
When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.
Arthur C. Clarke (scientist and author)
There is no adequate defense, except stupidity, against the impact of a new idea.
Percy Williams Bridgman (mathematician)
Experts tend to explain why certain things are impossible, whereas our emphasis has always been on creating something out of nothing.
Masaru Ibuka, (founder of Sony)
Creativity is the process that gives life to a new product.
James Taylor (economist)
Capital isn’t hard to find; intuition, yes.
Sam Walton (founder of Walmart)
ON SIMPLICITY
A characteristic of intuitive solutions and new ideas is that of being obvious once they are discovered.
Edward De Bono (essayist)
Genius might be the ability to say a profound thing in a simple way.
Charles Bukowski (author)
Genius is knowing how far out is too far.
Jean Cocteau (poet and novelist)
Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler.
Albert Einstein (physicist)
Creativity: that which wasn’t there before, but which can be made simply and completely.
Bruno Munari (designer)
Every great change is simple.
Ezra Pound (poet)
Creativity is never too contrived.
Albert Watson (photographer)
ON HUMOR
The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds the most discoveries, is not 'Eureka!' but 'That's funny'.
Isaac Asimov (author)
If I had no sense of humor, I would long ago have committed suicide.
Mahatma Gandhi (thinker)
ON CURIOSITY
Creativity is above all the ability to continually ask questions.
Piero Angela (television producer)
If we knew what we were doing, it wouldn’t be called research, would it?
Albert Einstein (physicist)
It is easier to judge a man’s ingenuity by his questions than by his answers.
Pierre Marc Gaston Duc de Lévis (essayist)
To see what is in front of one’s nose requires a constant struggle.
George Orwell (author)
There are more things in heaven and earth, Horace, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.
William Shakespeare (playwright)
The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible.
Oscar Wilde (author)
ON PERSISTENCE
The Three Rules of Work:
1. From clutter, find simplicity
2. From discord, find harmony
3. In the midst of difficulty lies opportunity.
Albert Einstein (physicist)
Genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration. Accordingly, a 'genius' is often merely a talented person who has done all of his or her homework.
Thomas Edison (inventor)
I never did anything worth doing entirely by accident.... Almost none of my inventions were derived in that manner. They were achieved by having trained myself to be analytical and to endure and tolerate hard work.
Thomas Edison (inventor)
I have far more respect for the person with a single idea who gets there than for the person with a thousand ideas who does nothing.
Thomas Edison (inventor)
There’s a way to do it better: find it.
Thomas Edison (inventor)
He that can have patience can have what he will.
Benjamin Franklin (inventor)
Creation is not a light-hearted game. The creator commits to a terrible adventure, which is to take upon himself all of the dangers that his creatures run.
Jean Genêt (author)
If I have ever made any valuable discoveries, it has been due more to patient attention, than to any other talent
Isaac Newton (mathematician and physicist)
What matters most is not the idea, but the capacity to believe in it completely.
Ezra Pound (poet)
The only place where success comes before work is in the dictionary.
Vidal Sassoon (hair stylist)
Opportunities multiply as they are seized.
Sun Tzu (strategist)
ON TALENT
Whatever creativity is, it is in part a solution to a problem.
Brian Aldiss (author)
The three things you can’t fake are erections, competence and creativity.
Douglas Coupland (author)
If we did all the things we are capable of, we would literally astound ourselves.
Thomas Edison (inventor)
The capacity to create useful or beautiful products and to find ways to resolve questions is not limited to people with special talents, but the birthright of every person of average intelligence.
Ernest Hilgard (psychologist)
For without invention, no one was ever a great man in his own trade.
Niccolò Machiavelli (author)
The best ideas are common property.
Seneca (philosopher)
Talent is a spring from which fresh water always flows. But this spring is worthless if no good use is made of it.
Ludwig Wittgenstein (philosopher)
ON VISION
Creativity is the greatest gift. It’s the one true bonus in life, the one that encompasses all the others.
Giovanni Agnelli (industrialist)
A different language is a different vision of life.
Federico Fellini (film director)
Creativity is the art that can give rise to visionary metaphorical relationships, as opposed to purely psychological ones.
Carl Gustav Jung (psychologist)
Three people were at work on a construction site. All were doing the same job, but when each was asked what the job was, the answers varied. "Breaking rocks," the first replied. "Earning my living," the second said. "Helping to build a cathedral," said the third.
Peter Schultz (chemist)
Progress, therefore, is not an accident, but a necessity. Instead of civilization being artificial, it is part of nature.
Herbert Spencer (sociologist)
Without freedom of choice, there is no creativity. Without creativity, there is no life.
Dr. Spock (Vulcan sage)
Creativity consists in maintaining a key aspect of the experience of childhood throughout one’s life: the capacity to create and recreate the world. Creativity is the omnipotence of the child’s mind.
Donald W. Winnicott (psychologist)
ON PERCEPTIONS
The important thing in science is not so much to obtain new facts as to discover new ways of thinking about them.
William Bragg (physicist)
Court an idea as long as you like, but be careful before marrying it.
Arturo Graf (poet, historian and author)
It is easier to split an atom than to crack a prejudice.
Albert Einstein (physicist)
Everyone knew it was impossible, until a fool who didn’t know came along and did it.
Albert Einstein (physicist)
Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of truth and knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the gods.
Albert Einstein (physicist)
Creativity requires the courage to let go of certainties.
Eric Fromm (psychoanalyst)
The difficulty lies not in the new ideas, but in escaping from the old ones, which ramify into every corner of our minds.
John Maynard Keynes (economist)
Creative life is always based on the values of the self, not on the values of the system.
Clark Moustakis (essayist)
Perhaps creativity is fumbling that dance step, or driving the chisel the wrong way into the stone.
Antoine de Saint-Exupery (author and aviator)
A man with a new idea is a crank until the idea succeeds.
Marc Twain (author)
THE VALUE OF ILLOGICAL THOUGHT
Creativity is suspended between memory and forgetting.
Jorges Louis Borges (author)
Don't think. Thinking is the enemy of creativity. It's self-conscious, and anything self-conscious is lousy. You can't try to do things. You simply must do things.
Ray Bradbury (author)
Reason is nothing without imagination.
Descartes (philosopher)
I work with my dreams or nightmares.
David Cronenberg (film director)
The act of making a scientific discovery or a technological invention is analogous, if not identical to the act of creating a work of art.
Mirko D. Grmek (epistemologist)
There is something more important than logic, and that is imagination.
Alfred Hitchcock (film director)
True creativity often starts where language ends.
Arthur Koestler (essayist)
To define is to kill; to suggest is to create.
Stéphane Mallarmé (author)
Those who dream by day are cognizant of many things that escape those who dream only at night.
Edgar Allan Poe (author)
Every discovery contains an irrational element or a creative intuition.
Karl Popper (philosopher)
AWARENESS OF THE CREATIVE PROCESS
To create is to give a shape to one’s destiny.
Albert Camus (author)
Invention, in my opinion, arises directly from idleness, possibly also from laziness.
Agatha Christie (author)
Try asking for a definition of creativity and you’ll find as many opinions as people you ask.
Barry Day (ad man)
Originality and creativity are nothing but the result of the wise management of combinations. The creative genius combines more rapidly, and with a greater critical sense of what gets tossed out and what gets saved, the same material that the failed genius has to work with.
Umberto Eco (semiologist)
The secret of creativity is knowing how to hide your sources.
Albert Einstein (physicist)
The idea that creative endeavor and mind-altering substances are intertwined is one of the great myths of our time.
Stephen King (author)
Ideas are transplanted by splitting, thoughts by sprouting.
Karl Kraus (author)
In my experience, I have found that creativity demands a vigilant mind, which is weakened by the influence of drugs.
Ernst Junger (philosopher and entomologist)
My typical day is a continuous wasting of time into which I try to include something creative. But this something creative that I include in the wasting of time wouldn’t be possible if I wasn’t wasting time.
Raffaele La Capria (author)
...an admirable facility in resembling the objects of the most distinct species […], in incorporating the most abstract thought, in reducing everything to imagery… the ability to discover and understand the relationships that connect details, and to generalize.
Giacomo Leopardi (poet)
You must be able to steal what you’ve seen. The true creative act is a sort of artful theft.
Andrei Longo (author)
My best thoughts come to me when I’m away from the typewriter.
Henry Miller (author)
We learn more when we are compelled to invent.
Jean Piaget (psychologist)
It is the tension between creativity and skepticism that has produced the stunning and unexpected findings of science.
Carl Sagan, (astronomer)
Any activity becomes creative when whoever is doing it tries to do it well, or better.
John Updike, (author)
Creativity comes to me only when I’ve got my back against the wall.
Vasco Rossi (songwriter)
Ideas can come while reading a good novel.
Ben van Berkel (architect)
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