Outside Inspiration

Those creators who inspire revolution through dramatic improvement on or compelling deviation from the creations of their contemporaries are often regarded as originals. This seems to imply that they alone are the point of origin from which their ideas emanate, as if they are the creative equivalent of the Big Bang. However, unlike the Big Bang which has no fathomable history preceding it, every creator has a personal history chalk full of millions of stimuli and experiences which predates each and every one of their creations. Therefore, it is impossible for any person to create something which is devoid of outside inspiration. In his essay “The Etymology of Design: Pre Socratic Perspective” Kostas Terzidis breaks down notions of originality and innovation with respect to design when he claims
“design as a mental process of creation can be seen as bounded by the limits of preservation: any newly conceived thought, process, or form is nothing but a reordering of previous ones.”
If this is true then it is only the order and combination of ideas which can be called innovative. Likewise, it is not innovative ideas but rather innovative combinations or expressions of ideas which can make a creator revolutionary. This makes even more sense if one considers that these exalted revolutionary creations would not soar to such heights of popularity if they were not made up of ideas that resonated with great numbers of people.