CREATIVITY: The Sketch in the Arts and Sciences
Creativity has a history. It is hard for us to imagine that people have not always experimented, tried out, tested—sketched—ideas before putting them into practice. Yet, that is what the record shows: in the visual arts, for example, the medieval artist created unselfconsciously, out of a millennial workshop tradition that did not require "pre-visualization." The transition from the medieval model book, which provided a repertory of prototypes to be copied, to a series of preparatory studies in which a final design was worked out, took place in the Renaissance. In fact, our modern way of thinking "out loud," on paper or in some other medium, may be a relatively recent development. The purpose of this symposium is to explore the history of the creative process itself, by examining the evidence, of whatever kind, for trial and error—or its absence—in a variety of periods and disciplines. What is a preparatory study, and does it have a parallel history in different fields? What does a musical or choreographic sketch look (and sound) like? What is the history of the writer's "rough draft"? What constitutes a sketch in photography or film? How does the scientist, natural or mathematical, try out ideas before he can prove their validity? The symposium will include creative people as well as scholars, in the hope of shedding light on the edges of conception.
A Symposium Sponsored Jointly by
the School of Historical Studies, Institute for Advanced Study, and
the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts, National Gallery of Art
Wednesday, May 23, 2001, in Washington, DC
Thursday, May 24, and Friday, May 25, 2001, in Princeton, NJ
Organizers:
Henry A. Millon
Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts, NGA
and
Irving Lavin
School of Historical Studies, IAS
The Symposium was made possible by The Arthur Vining Davis Foundation, the J. Seward Johnson, Sr. Charitable Trusts and Mrs. F. Merle-Smith
Video Recording: Dario Mastroianni, 2001
Edited by: Uta Nitschke-Joseph, Marilyn Aronberg Lavin, and María Mercedes Tuya, March, 2021
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
May 23 Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts, National Gallery of Art
Elizabeth Cropper, Dean, Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts
Welcome
Henry A. Millon, Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts (emeritus)
Introductory Remarks
https://youtu.be/eWIHXGPjeWU
ARCHITECTURE
Henry A. Millon, moderator
James Ackermann, Harvard University (emeritus)
The Beginnings of Architectural Sketching
https://youtu.be/X6nQNdV8xJ8
Philippe Boudon, École d'Architecture de Paris-la-Villette
Kahn’s Square and Kant’s Square: Which Kind of “Intuition” in Architects’ Sketches
https://youtu.be/DgGgEvc5Te0
Frank O. Gehry, Gehry Partners LLP, Santa Monica, CA
Working Process
https://youtu.be/VXS475E2YEs
Greg Lynn, Greg Lynn FORM, Venice, CA
The Differential Calculus of the Sketch
https://youtu.be/dQQUD53OHIE
LITERATURE
James Ackermann, moderator
Shane Butler, University of Pennsylvania
Roman Rough Drafts and Literary Self-Consciousness
https://youtu.be/YzAdj3h0QNI
Paul Saenger, Newberry Library, Chicago, IL
From Compilatio to Cursiva: The Role of Media in the Genesis of Genius, 1400-1600
https://youtu.be/eEvrHJBbdzk
Marc Fumaroli, Collège de France, Paris
From Bees to Spiders:Essais, Pensées, Memoirs Streams of Consciousness
https://youtu.be/D0xQmwHcnOk
Peter Parshall, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC
The Unfinished Print
https://youtu.be/2IPiqofTY5w
Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, NJ
May 24 Wolfensohn Hall, Institute for Advanced Study
Giles Constable, Institute for Advanced Study
Welcome
Irving Lavin, Institute for Advanced Study
Introductory Remarks
https://youtu.be/lBMqMIxVYV8
MUSIC
Edward T. Cone, Princeton University (emeritus)
Moderator
Leo Treitler, City University of New York (emeritus)
Writing Music, Sketching Music
https://youtu.be/_mytLn1C7Rk
Lewis Lockwood, Harvard University
Beethoven’s Sketches: from Conceptual Image to Realization
https://youtu.be/BAzlsA-w_Ok
Robert Levin, Harvard University
Experience, Discipline, Fantasy: Improvisation in Classical Music and Jazz
https://youtu.be/ikbJkRX2SGQ
DANCE
Introduction: Irving Lavin
Twyla Tharp, Choreographer, New York, NY
Sketching and Choreography
https://youtu.be/JpGeHgZYrPA
May 25 Wolfensohn Hall, Institute for Advanced Study
NATURAL SCIENCES AND MATHEMATICS
Horst Bredekamp, Humboldt-Universität, Berlin
Moderator
Jean Dhombres, École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, Paris
Creation in Mathematics: The Question of the Sketch of the Proof
https://youtu.be/1cEwsKYgUE4
Michael S. Mahoney, Princeton University
Sketching Science in the Seventeenth Century
https://youtu.be/_XJerqMTsQ0
W. Bernhard Carlson, University of Virginia
Sketching as Re-representation: Edison and the Development of the Telephone, 1875-1879
https://youtu.be/UbCUKAhUmpc
VISUAL ARTS
Irving Lavin, moderator
James Cahill, University of California, Berkeley (emeritus)
Uses of Sketches by Chinese Painters
https://youtu.be/HnvGHYaY8Ns
Horst Bredekamp
Sketch Act
https://youtu.be/typ-AxarZn8
Introduction: Horst Bredekamp
Irving Lavin
'Bozzetto Style': The Renaissance Sculptor’s Handiwork
https://youtu.be/n00sS-21E1c
Kirk Varnedoe, Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY
A Modernity of Obsessive Calculations and Heedless Haste
https://youtu.be/BBHFZDs5Ryw