Creativity: dying art form?

[thegoodfight7211]

Seems like the creativity in everything is gone these days. This has really been getting to me.

All around us, everything's reverting to "retro" styling because nobody can come up with anything new. Look at clothes...retro. Look at new cars...retro! Modern mainstream music is a joke. Bunch of talentless hacks getting by solely on sex appeal. Seems like even the Super Bowl commercials, once a thing that seemed to have a lot of effort put into them, were disappointing this year from the few that I saw. Where is the color and flavor in life these days?? I've barely even been on this earth for two decades, and I see it...I think you're blind if you don't.

I personally think it could be argued that it's because of the generation raised on ritalin...hmmmm
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Percy: '77 sage Westy, 2.0L FI (GD), 091 trans

[DMNCLNR]

For the most part everything is catered to the masses. Americas public is at a very low mentality. IE Brittany Spears, Byonce, Soulja Boy, and reality TV... I think creativity is lost through convenience, which causes laziness. I do however disagree with the retro styling. I love vintage things such as V.W's, bicycles, clothing etc.. If you look past the bullshit music and TV of bovine America, there is a lot of good stuff out there!
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To his their own PBJ
Pl@y@ #1

[79SuperVert]

There's retro for the sake of retro, like tailfins and platform shoes.

Then there's retro because it was a really good design and deserves to be revisited. Inexpensive cars that work well and are easy to fix never go out of style.
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Central Jersey VW Society

Wanted: Art Collins VW (Savannah, Georgia) items - license plate surrounds and other items. Also ivory "AM", "FM" and "SW" buttons for a US Blaupunkt Frankfurt.

[chickengeorge]

[Van-go108]

What is life all about anyways?
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1973 Thing
1957 Continental Mark II Click to view image

[Glenn]

[thegoodfight7211]

[thegoodfight7211]

[Vanhag]

Most people rely on their gadgets to be creative for them.
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[marklaken]

[thegoodfight7211]

I don't believe that it's nonexistent...I figure it's like the music thing, you have to seek it and dig a little bit. Only point I was trying to make was that it seems there was a time where innovation and good ideas weren't a commodity.
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Percy: '77 sage Westy, 2.0L FI (GD), 091 trans

[Russ Wolfe]

Intellectual Property laws stifle creativity.
Many are afraid that they will be sued if they come up with an idea, and someone else has already thought of it.
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[marklaken]

[kevtherev]

Hold the phone, you mean retro styling is a new thing...

I think not.
take a look around you, Architecture has always taken from the past. Clothing styles get rehashed, even food styles have been re-visited.

We are sentimental by nature, old fashioned things from the past, once thought of as vulgar or ostentatious become vogue when we feel vulnerable from our ever changing lives and social values.
yearning for a seemingly more stable past is picked up by manufacturers.

repackaging the past is creative in itself

[Karmann_65]

In the past, designers had scope to venture where nobody had gone before. Nowadays there's a commitment to staying in business by producing what's "needed" as opposed to what people might "want".

Taking the example of car design there definately seems to have been a point reached where everything is starting to look the same. Fins were fun, not practical. Bench seats,huge engines,chrome everywhere. Not much point to any of it but we all know now and knew then that it was exciting.

Jeremy Clarkson had a vaild point at the end of the last series....Has automotive technology and design really reached it's pinacle? Is this the end before whatever comes next? (Not a quote but that was the message).
Jellymould shapes now abound for sure but all the "modern day life" boxes are generally ticked because of it.

Wouldn't it be great if we could all be different?

The trend towards building a "resto VW" is perhaps an unspoken concensus that our beloved air cooled cars just aren't as commonplace as they used to be. There's a pride to be taken in keeping a little piece of history.

[LeviMan2001]

There's just to many people in the world to be unique. "Look what I did!" "nope, that guy over there just did the same thing".
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[Joey]

Like the Barenaked Ladies said.... "It's all been done before...".


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Joey

‘60 Kombi - '74 Bus - '79 Panel - '65 Beetle

[Iowa Mark]

There is plenty of creativity out there. The problem is there are also so many more bland imitations of past ideas that we are constantly bombarded with, we are too numb to recognize truly "new" when we see it. About two second after a new idea appears, someone has jumped on it and offered up their version. Instant old news. Not quite the brainstorm the guy who discovered fire had, but unique stuff just the same.

[lowbay]

i have this discussion with atleast 1 person a week, im an old soul for sure
i love old things especially from the 50's 60's and 70's, the music was way better inspired by way better drugs (not condoning them) the cars were still being designed by the people who wanted to drive them creativity in technology and everything else was really blooming, it would have been a much more fun time to live

in todays world, convinience has deffinately upstaged creativity... cars are designed by people who wouldnt be seen in the car they just designed
everyone is a "musician" because they bought the $9.99 dubbing software at walmart and everything else has been done they just keep relabeling it tv's, phones, computers, clothing its all the same old shit different smell

thats not to say there isnt new and exciting things happening, medical technologies in the last few years have been extraordinary as well as space exploration and the important things in life

screw convinience ive thought about it alot i could deffinately live without all the modern comforts cell phones, tv's etc...
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[Lee.]

Creativity is always out there. It's available and it's free.

You just never know..........Someone had an idea and it worked out.........