Creativity is born when necessity to express meets atleast minimal preparation and skill to do so. Nothing magically just pours forth, but a burning necessity can compensate for a greater part the lack of skill than mastery of technique can artificially stimulate necessity.
I'd say it's better to know the cream of the crop intimately than waste time going through a vast catalog of half-decent, or even good, imitations. I strictly mean if you're seriously trying to learn something about a creative craft, I'm not talking about personal enjoyment. You don't have to like the best to acknowledge its merits and learn something from it. But, to repeat what others have said, that shouldn't exclude openness to experience: being a little bee and gathering bits from all kinds of flowers along the road to make honey, too. And I mean road in a literal sense. Go for a walk.
to create layers to our creations to the point that it's lore carries itself along for a fanbase
I think you're confining yourself to a too narrow a sense of what creativity can be and the forms it can manifest in. There's creativity that is needed in overcoming everyday obstacles and the aeshetics of the mundane. Also one's own self and self-image, if deliberately cultivated, is the product of a creative process; the disposition towards certain kinds of behaviour and awareness in making moral choices. This hearkens back to the origin of the word genius as a kind of guardian spirit.
talent hits a target no one else can hit, but genius hits one that no one else can see
This reminds me of Pound's categorization of literary types (paraphrased): 1) Inventors. People who create a new process or in whose work a new process is first exemplified. 2) Masters. People who combine a number of those processes and do it equally well or better than the inventors. 3) Diluters. People who strive after types 1 & 2 and can't do it quite as well. 4) Good writers without salient qualities. They're (un)fortunate enough to exist in a time when there is already much great work being done. 5) Writers of belles-lettres. People who didn't invent anything but specialize in some particular niche or gimmick, etc. They possess technical merit but don't capture life or the current historical moment in its fullness. 6) Inventors of crazes. Randoms who go viral and get their 15 minutes of fame.
>>1
I'd say it's better to know the cream of the crop intimately than waste time going through a vast catalog of half-decent, or even good, imitations. I strictly mean if you're seriously trying to learn something about a creative craft, I'm not talking about personal enjoyment. You don't have to like the best to acknowledge its merits and learn something from it. But, to repeat what others have said, that shouldn't exclude openness to experience: being a little bee and gathering bits from all kinds of flowers along the road to make honey, too. And I mean road in a literal sense. Go for a walk.
I think you're confining yourself to a too narrow a sense of what creativity can be and the forms it can manifest in. There's creativity that is needed in overcoming everyday obstacles and the aeshetics of the mundane. Also one's own self and self-image, if deliberately cultivated, is the product of a creative process; the disposition towards certain kinds of behaviour and awareness in making moral choices. This hearkens back to the origin of the word genius as a kind of guardian spirit.
>>3
This reminds me of Pound's categorization of literary types (paraphrased):
1) Inventors. People who create a new process or in whose work a new process is first exemplified.
2) Masters. People who combine a number of those processes and do it equally well or better than the inventors.
3) Diluters. People who strive after types 1 & 2 and can't do it quite as well.
4) Good writers without salient qualities. They're (un)fortunate enough to exist in a time when there is already much great work being done.
5) Writers of belles-lettres. People who didn't invent anything but specialize in some particular niche or gimmick, etc. They possess technical merit but don't capture life or the current historical moment in its fullness.
6) Inventors of crazes. Randoms who go viral and get their 15 minutes of fame.