Definitions: ‘Generative’
“Having the power or function of generating, originating, producing, or reproducing”¹
I often find myself using the word ‘generative’ to assess the worth of a particular dance performance, or a rehearsal activity. I have decided it is a concept worth examining, in the first of what I hope will be a series of Definitions posts.
One of the purposes of making art, it seems to me, is to be generative. Not necessarily generating material or outcomes or that most maligned object of derision… content… but rather generating interest, next steps, collaborators, and provocations. Those long hours spent in the studio feeling directionless and unmotivated are a symptom, described evocatively by the antonyms of ‘generative’: ‘unproductive’, ‘infertile’, ‘unfruitful’². The cause of this malady is almost certain to be the lack of something generative. But how to dig oneself out when the ball is not already rolling, when momentum is not on one’s side and the inertia preventing one from finding an idea, a challenge, a pathway, is too great to lift? I usually give up to return another day, but I would be very curious to hear how you, dear reader, resolve this.
The act of being generative, in its modern definition, is torn between two natures.
The first is an organic generation, the blooming of thoughts and materials over time. Rick Rubin advocates for this conception of being generative:
We can call this the Seed phase. We are searching for potential starting points that, with love and care, can grow into something beautiful.³
Rubin, an experienced music producer, also alludes to other organic images when he discusses the collection of interests, including “germs”, planting and watering, “bear[ing] fruit”, morphing, growing, and the passivity of fishing⁴. This way of being generative requires time spent in a practice, a kind of quality over quantity approach to art-making which favours deep listening.
The second is a mechanical generation, the reformatting of ideas in a quasi-industrial process. This is the belief that underwrites professional repertoire companies, and also the use of artificial intelligence - the latest fad is literally called generative AI. Each new digital and online medium from the last decade or so has innovated on this lineage of content-above-all creation. I, like many artists, am eager to deride these methods of art-making but those of us in the emerging class of Neo-Luddites should remember that this is a powerful and valid way to be generative. The art produced by algorithms and predictive systems may be fundamentally remixes of existing works, but so is every artwork produced to date. Even Rubin’s universality recognises that “art is a circulation of energetic ideas” and that “what makes them appear new is that they’re combining differently each time they come back”⁵. This is the exact argument used by the proponents of generative AI; that all art is the reproduction of old components and that new technologies allow open-minded artists to do exactly this more easily - the ‘reproducing’ that Merriam-Webster included in their definition.
But enough about utilitarian production, and toward a more abstract definition. I began this piece with the assertion that I was not interested exclusively in the generation of material for external consumption but with the feeling of being generative. The art of being generative, in the present continuous tense. That feeling of oh don’t let this end yet, we’re on the verge of something. ‘Just let me turn my phone off, this is more important’. The sensation of a new pathway, knowing that it is not being recorded and so you must do your utmost to map it in your nervous system. A rhythm that suddenly matters more than anything. The first time you bodysurf with a partner. Seeing one of your dancers light up with a shared understanding. Yes and, what if, how about. A new pair of dance pants opening possibilities. ‘I actually disagree with you because’. I want to go again. A task that feels on the edge of attainability, the fear that you might not get it today, the hope that you can tomorrow, the confidence that you will eventually. This is generative.
¹ Merriam-Webster. (n.d.). Generative. In Merriam-Webster.com dictionary. Retrieved December 11, 2024, from https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/generative
² Merriam-Webster. (n.d.). Generative. In Merriam-Webster.com thesaurus. Retrieved December 11, 2024, from https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/generative
³Rubin R, 2023, The Creative Act: A Way of Being, Canongate Books Ltd, 14 High Street Edinburgh, page 143
⁴Rubin R, 2023, The Creative Act: A Way of Being, Canongate Books Ltd, 14 High Street Edinburgh, page 144-146
⁵ Rubin R, 2023, The Creative Act: A Way of Being, Canongate Books Ltd, 14 High Street Edinburgh, page 14
