Creating vs. Re-creating

For every creative I know, before they were a creator, they were a re-creator.  Every writer first read what others had written, then wrote things (often in school) where they re-created what had already been done, and only then did they begin to take their first tentative steps into the world of creating something uniquely their own.

Musicians are even more prone to this.  I don't know of any composer who didn't first play music for years, taking the creations of someone else and breathing life into them.  Even Mozart played other people's music for a year or two before he started composing at the age of five.

And ask any visual artist, and they undoubtedly spent time copying other artists styles and techniques, trying them on for size to see which fit, which didn't, and which they could improve on.

Yes, the arts of creation and re-creation are so closely intertwined as to be almost indistinguishable at times.  I know of only one or two well-established composers who don't also perform music or conduct ensembles, and they are far and away the exception rather than the rule.  Most artists who create also re-create: musicians perform, artists sketch what they see before them, and writers read other writers' fiction (for isn't reading just a way of re-creating someone else's world in your own mind?).

The reasons for re-creating are two fold, and the importance of these reasons changes depending on where in the creative journey a creator is: 

• Learning how to create -- it's often said that learning comes from doing, and that's no exception for the creative.  If I want to learn how to write for orchestra, my job is made far easier if I play in an orchestra, learning how the instruments sound, how they interact, what they can do and what they can't.  If I want to write a novel, reading other novels teaches me how to pace a plot, punctuate dialog, write a beautiful description.
• Appreciating the art of creation -- do anything often enough or long enough, and it starts to lose some of its luster.  As awe-inspiring as it is, creating is no exception.  Write enough books for enough years, and the art loses its mystique, its allure.  Compose enough pieces for handbell choir, and eventually it stops feeling special.  Re-creating -- whether it be reading the works of others authors or playing the music of other composers -- helps to remind us why we create what we create in the first place.

Early in our creative careers, the learning is paramount: we don't know enough yet about what we want to do, so through re-creating the works of others, we learn how to do it ourselves.  As we begin taking our fledgling steps toward creating what we want, we haven't done it long enough to lose the joy and mystery of the creating, so any appreciating we do is only of the "Wow, isn't that neat, I wish I could do that" type.

Once our creative careers are underway, we learn less from recreating, though no matter how long a composer has composed, he still learns something new from the music he plays.  We do, however, gain a new appreciation for the well written work of a fellow composer, and remember our first pieces every time we see the name of a new composer emerge on the composing scene.  It's this appreciation, this recollection of why we started doing it in the first place, that renders it fresh and new again, and sends us back to write the next story, compose the next work, or paint the next painting.

No matter where you are along your creative path, make sure you take some time to re-create that which you want to create.  Read a short story, play a piece or two on piano, or grab a pencil and sketch something on the back of the water bill.  Get back in touch with the reason you want to create in the first place.  Then, once you're back in touch with it, get out there and create something wonderful!