Sandy Claes: "Creativity has been a dirty word these last decades"

Sandy Claes

Sandy Claes is a media-designer, lecturer, researcher, independent filmmaker and artist from Belgium. She won several awards with her experimental films like "Bruised" or "On a lead".

Since the discovery of the “Creative City” (Charles Landry, 1995) and the “Creative Class” (Richard Florida, 2002) the future wealth of cities and whole economies has been tied to the growth of creativity: Which conditions encourage people to be more creative?

Creativity has been a dirty word these last decades. People believe only artists can be creative and they can’t imagine they are also creative everyday, e.g. when they only find leftovers in the fridge and still manage to create a tasty meal with it, or when they are too late and have to find a good excuse. So it’s not about stimulating creativity, it’s about encouraging people to find and be proud of their talent and making the word ‘creativity’ accessible again.

How can the promotion of creativity as societal strategy be planned? What are the limits in promoting creativity?

I believe making art more accessible to a broader public will help stimulate creativity. We can do this by integrating different forms of art in the society. Not only classic art forms where you just have to ‘look’ at, but also by participatory art where people are engaged to be co-creators of the artwork.
The limit of promoting creativity is reached when people feel like they are obliged to be creative.

What is the relation between creativity and the culture? Will creativity play a collaborative or competitive role in an increasingly cultural diverse and migrated society?

There is no doubt that creativity will help building bridges between different cultures. But it can also hinder, we have to be careful not to force our way of culture participation to other cultures. E.g. to promote integration into society we give migrants free tickets to the opera. But they don’t understand opera, so they don’t use this opportunity. Creativity has to help find a common language between cultures.

Interviewee’s profile

Sandy Claes at the set of "Bruised"

Name: Sandy Claes

Current occupation: Lecturer/Researcher/Independent filmmaker/Artist

Three crucial turning points in your professional life:

* Winning the award for best animation at the International short film festival Leuven with my graduation film ‘On a lead’
* Winning the award for best non-narrative film at I Castelli Animati in Rome, Italy, with ‘Bruised’. This film I created together with my partner Daan Wampers.
* Developing a new animation technique with ‘Domino’ and thereby receiving a lot of international attention.

The three most important regions in the structural process of transformation are:

* C-mine Genk, Belgium: The renovation of this old mine site is still in progress, but you can feel the creative energy. It will be a creative quarter with a school of arts (MAD faculty), artist’s workplaces, a cultural centre and a movie theater…
* Leuven; its International short film festival has been a very important guide in my life: watching those films persuaded me to study film, winning an award at that same festival gave me the confidence to continue.
* Tremelo, my hometown: a green area that provides an escape to the visual overload of the cities.

Which issue is vital for you?

Bringing art (back) to the public!



Related videos: 

• Underground Art-Gallery
• Dictatorship of the arts – Jonathan Meese
• Art and passion – Jose Manuel Barroso

Related blogs:

• The Art of living together: Cities and diversity
  
• Creativity @ the crossroads

Go to channels:

• Creative.Quarters
• Creative Minds
• INTER.view
• EUROPE IN SHORTS
• MEDIA ART