If you want to put a fine point to it, the first paragraph is beside the point. It’s the second paragraph you take exception to. My points further down should make things a bit clearer; specifically:

The reality is, people who are unskilled are not very creative. Their work is compromised on two levels, poor execution and limited imagination. One does not have the ability to “create” a more complex design because one cannot imagine how to make it. How many designers limit their designs to only those elements they have mastered?

In no way was the second paragraph intended to be taken for an abstract or summary. Neither is the excerpt I provided above. As such, I could save you some time by disclosing that most everything I’ve written on this site is likely to continue to disappoint you.

I think there are different definitions of creativity flying around here. We have the definition of “any work that Eric understands and respects.” This definition has the upside of being easy (just call Eric and ask him!) but the downside of possibly excluding truly good and creative work that Eric just happens not to understand or respect because of his personal quirks or because he’s never encountered it before. This definition of creativity can only be faked by fooling Eric, and since Eric is not fooled by posers then posers can’t fake creativity. So even by this definition creativity is not easy to fake.

And then there’s one that I proposed in the forum, “problem-solving.” By this definition, Kathleen is creative. No, it can’t be faked. No, it’s not an easy definition because not everyone will understand the problem being solved. (That doesn’t mean there isn’t one, or that nobody understands the problem just because not everybody does.)

The US military defines “creativity” as “not following instructions.” Through experimentation they have determined that people become more creative as they become more sleep-deprived. (Outside the military we would use the word “error-prone.”) I guess you could fake that one by making mistakes on purpose, but the military doesn’t reward creativity (by their definition) so you probably wouldn’t want to.

Creativity is also related to a sense of ownership.

People might believe they are creative when they are not, but that doesn’t make them successful fakes.

Sure you can fake creativity: Yoko Ono, John Cage, Jackson Pollack, …. You simply declare whatever it is that you want to bring into the world as “creative”, “unique”, “inspired”, appeal to taste, individuality, “vision” — even if, or even especially if, someone else has already done it — and then denigrate everyone who questions your creation as being narrow-minded, cold, lacking vision. Creativity is the easiest thing to fake because you can define it as you go while demonizing your detractors.

But not everyone develops skill. Sure, they say “I could if I wanted to”, but frequently they aren’t willing to put in the time. Or they believe that they already have the skill but haven’t the basis on which to judge their own efforts. Plus they can excuse away any problems in execution with an appeal to their creativity (”it wasn’t accepted because it was ahead of its time” or “my vision was compromised by the technicians who were supposed to give it life”).

The type of one-off revolutionary creativity like Punk Music that forces an establishment to strip itself to the essentials is likely to die on the vine, as Punk did, unless it can be sustained by some kind of skill, which Punk was not. Ultimately, evolutionary creativity wins the day because creativity and skill are joined — which was Kathleen’s original point, I think.

On your second paragraph: evil genius. Not a new idea.

Skill is the shell. Creativity is the core. Without the core, you have a hollow shell.

I’ve been called many things in my life but “hollow shell” isn’t one of them. Hollow shell or not, I manage to execute far in excess of many “enlightened creatives”, few of whom have skills commensurate to my own or even sufficient to permit execution on par with their own creativity. I find belief in a hierarchy in which “creatives” are deemed superior to others to be offensive and self serving.

Speaking of, recent research suggests creative thinkers are more unethical. The investigators find that creativity helps people find new and interesting ways to break rules and to come up with unique ways to justify their unethical actions after the fact. I wouldn’t say this is true across the board but have found it to be common in my practice. It’s how design evolves, creatives copy each other (which begs the question, what is creative?). It would also follow that creatives have misplaced priorities if they fear their non-creative but highly skilled counterparts (contractors, pattern makers etc) are the weak link of confidentiality in the gestation of their collections.

As an editor, I can hone skill by calling attention to grammar, spelling, the use of metaphor or simile, brevity, suspension of disbelief, characterization. But the writing could still be boring because it lacks creativity.

Skill is the shell. Creativity is the core. Without the core, you have a hollow shell. You can develop skill, but you cannot fake creativity.