Art, Creativity, Innovation: Do you know the difference?

Check if you have got it all right?

Are you creative, innovative, or artistic? These are not interchangeable terms, and today I will tell you how they are related but different. But most importantly, I will tell you why it is so.

Art, creativity, and innovation are different concepts. Sure, they are correlated, but one does not imply the other.

If you can draw a good picture or if you paint, are you creative? If you design a new product or write a software code, are you creative or innovative? And if you do something that is less known to others, would you call it innovation?

I know; I am essentially debating semantics here. But I’m more interested in the details that separate them. If the words do not separate them accurately, then what does? What are those defining characteristics?

Now, you must understand that just because you can design it doesn’t make you creative. Artistic ability is essentially about cultivating skills and talents. One might do that to create fine works of art such as drawing, painting, sculpture, music, or something similar.

I think art is more about creating something to evoke or stimulate an emotional response.

Creativity, on the other hand, is more about the spontaneous development of new ideas. It is about out-of-the-box thinking.

Art and creativity have lots of similarities and plenty of overlap. But the required skill sets and intentions are quite the opposite.

Art is often created with a specific type of listener, viewer, or user in mind.

On the other hand, creativity or creative ability can be defined as the skill of pooling together different elements to find a solution to a particular problem.

Whether it is an art or a creative project, in both cases, the objective is to capture a message or meaning and then communicate it with a specific purpose.

The only difference is in the destination. Creative work is mostly outward-focused on the intended audience, whereas art is more inward-focused. Most art we have seen is some kind of self-reflection or self-expression of the creator.

Now, one thing we must understand is that creativity is a necessary precondition for innovation. Innovation is more about the implementation or creation of something new that can realize some value to others.

The main outcome or sometimes byproduct of innovation can be seen in the physical form. For example, it can be a demonstrable and vivid difference in a product, service, or industry. Innovation is more about a fundamentally new and tangible shift from the conventional.

So, creativity is to have ideas that something might be possible in the first place. But innovation is about taking action and making those ideas a reality rather than just contemplating.

This means creativity is not measurable because it can be subjective, but innovation is. And that is because the outcome of innovation can often manifest in a form that can be put to some kind of measurements.

To put it simply, creativity is an imaginative process, whereas innovation is a productive process.

So, as you can see. Art is inward-focused and mostly about personal expression. Creativity is outward-focused and is mostly about imagination or ideation. And innovation is a process. It is putting things into action and bringing creative ideas to life. This is why they are somewhat related and yet different from one another.

Now, you might be thinking. Which one are you? Artistic, creative, or innovative?

Here is a simple technique you can follow. Whatever you do, ask yourself, why do you do it? What’s the objective you have in mind when you do it? Say if you drawing, writing a composition, or maybe a blog post, or an article, or book; whatever that might be — Are you doing it because you want to express yourself, or you want people to hear you out or learn from you? Can it be scaled and distributed to many people? Is it a profitable venture?

When you have answers to these questions, circle back to this video. It will help you clarify whether your work is a piece of art, some creative output, or innovation?

So, now you know why being artistic, creative, and innovative are not the same. But in my opinion and experience, being artistic or creative can be easy compared to being innovative.

There is a reason for that. Innovation needs a lot more than just creative thinking and a bunch of ideas. I’ll write about it sometime later!