The Creative Personality: Name an individual (historical or contemporary) who you consider to be extremely creative. What about them or what they do led you to this decision? (Csikszentmihalyi, M. (1996, Jul). The creative personality. Psychology Today, 29, 36 – 40.)
Beyoncé Giselle Knowles-Carter, American singer songwriter is a modern creative personality. Stepping up within the musical industry as lead singer in Destiny’s Child girl group, forming in the late 1990’s, she immersed herself into fame. After the break up of Destiny’s Child in 2006 Beyoncé continued her career as a solo artist, still creating hit after hit to date. Throughout her career she has sold over 160 million records making her one of the most phenomenal artists in history. Beyoncé has been nominated for an amazing 165 awards, managing to walk away with 70 of them (Brittanica, 2019). Beyoncé has a particular method for her songwriting. She will develop mood boards and surround herself with people whom inspire her to create music that speaks to herself, her family and her fans. Beyoncé is an artist of whom will go down in history as an incredibly creative individual.
Throughout Beyoncé’s career she has been intensely hardworking and dedicated, however she has also faced many challenges and failures. In Csikszentmihalyi’s, The Creative Personality (Csikszentmihalyi, 1996), he discusses 10 contradicting traits in which can often be identified within a creative individual. These 10 traits show two conflicting sides or attributes of the individual’s personality, actions, intellect and behaviour.
Csikszentmihalyi’s eighth trait states, “Creative people are both rebellious and conservative” (Csikszentmihalyi, 1996). Time and time again Beyoncé has produced exceptional work, in which encourages her fame and her forever renowned career. Just as Csikszentmihalyi has described in one of his 10 creative personality traits, Beyoncé has taken several risks throughout her career to prove her talents worth and to get to the place she is today. In late 2013 Beyoncé dropped her self titled album, with no promotion and no public knowledge of the release. Any creative in the music industry feels pressure to promote and tease their albums or singles before release, this allows their fans to feel excitement and suspense, making them eager to purchase or listen to their creative pieces as soon as they drop. Beyoncé took a huge risk dropping this album so suddenly and was left waiting on the edge of her seat to hear the reviews. Unsurprisingly the album was a hit and many tracks hit number one on the charts worldwide. Beyoncé saw this release as a different way to approach her fans and express her music. She knew she would be going out blind, however wanted to take the chance and risk failure rather then be like any other music creator at that time and play their career safely.
Beyoncé is not only a singer and songwriter, however she is also a performer. Beyoncé can grace a stage of 100,000 people and instantly take the crowd on a journey. She believes her performance creativity comes from her stage alter ego “Sasha Fierce” (AllMusic, 2019). Csikszentmihalyi’s fourth trait, ” Creative people alternate between imagination and fantasy, and a rooted sense of reality” (Csikszentmihalyi, 1996), perfectly reflects Beyoncé’s creative stage character and her off stage character. Sasha Fierce allows her to be sassy, sexy, strong and aggressive. She uses her creative power to become an influential individual to all of her fans and loved ones. Beyoncé uses her creativity to encourage and empower women, people of colour, equality, the less fortunate and many more in hope to bury some of the terrible misbeliefs of past and present society. Off stage Beyoncé still advocates for all in which Sasha Fierce does on stage, however instead of leading the group as she would on stage, she uses her off stage life to be apart of the crowd and work for change with the rest of the world.
Beyoncé is a global sensation and will be for a long time to come. Through her creativity she radiates passion and a character in which inspires so many. She is a woman of whom has the opportunity to create and she will go down in history for her enormous effort and drive of this .
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