The first Waffle Wednesday of 2022 was held on the 9th of February, and as a guest speaker we had Ville Räty. He is an artist, who talked about creativity and how to increase it.

Ville Räty is an artist, who has experience in visual arts from over 15 years. He has held exhibitions, created paintings and worked in different areas in the field of art. Ville has collaborated with Veikko Halmetoja for a few years regarding his own exhibition.

Creativity

Creativity is often linked to artists and people often think that dancers are very creative personas when they create dance choreographies or poets are creative because they create poems. Being artistic and creative is often linked together, but they should be separated since their definition is completely different. Everyone can be creative in their own work and life, but that does not mean that they are artistic.

If we think about the word creativity, we think that it means that we do new things or we do old things in new ways and that’s when we notice that the work of artists is not as creative as we think. Ville says that when you visit exhibitions, it often feels like you have seen it many times already. The reason behind this feeling is that the work of artist is often schematic.

What is creativity and why do we need it?

• To create a new ideology and ideas
• To do things in a new way compared to the old familiar way
• To link old things to create new conclusions
• Creativity is changing the weekdays for the better
• The desire to make things better with new ways

The world is changing rapidly and we need to change with it at the same time. This means that people want to do better and better all the time. The things that are now new and cool will change to standard pretty quickly. That is why companies need to be creative to stay in the loop and with the competition.

What stops you from being creative?

Being creative is related to brains, and brains want to use as little energy as possible. Learning new things and making things in a new way is making the brain use a lot of energy and that is why the brain is not cooperating with us. Staying in the same, familiar routines and doing the same things always creates a barrier between being creative and not.

The second big thing that stops us from being creative is early critic. One point of being creative is that you know how to make mistakes and learn from them. Without them you cannot create anything or make anything new. You should not start criticizing yourself too early or nothing will get done. For example in a group project where you should create new ideas by using small groups the final result will be more efficient. If you use big groups instead, getting results would be a little harder since the individuals may feel shameful and embarrassed about making mistakes which is the reason why their creativity is being stopped.

How can we be more creative?

You cannot make yourself creative, but you need to prepare yourself so that you can be creative. This basically means that you need to eat and rest well and exercise. It would be good to achieve a lifestyle without stress and allow yourself to be creative, do experiences and fail sometimes.

The brain needs activities all the time and this is why you should not be stuck in your own way, but try to do new things and think outside the box. For example if you don’t feel creative in a group meeting room, you could try to change the environment and search for new places where creativity could bloom.

Who is a creative person described by Ville?

• Brave
• Excited
• Open-minded
• Tries to do things that you love and doesn’t get stuck on their own ideas
• Dynamic multitasker
• Is open-minded to new experiences
• Tough and passionate
• Knows how to do things and is excited to learn new things

The center of the speech was the creative lifestyle, which Ville encourages people to practice. Creativity needs practice and development all the time, just like all the muscles in our bodies. That means that we need to feed our brain and solve problems such as physical and mathematics but also linguistic problems.

Ville says that creativity is like civilization / education. You cannot buy it and you also cannot turn into the creative person suddenly. We need to develop and educate ourselves so that our creativity can increase.

Ville Räty’s Instagram: here