All my life I have been referred to as 'arty' and very rarely in a complimentary way as if being 'arty' is something to be frowned upon or isn't as good as being academic (clever). And when people start to talk about academia they refer to me as 'creative' like somehow creativity and being academic are opposing forces or you have to be one and not the other.
I'm the first to admit I didn't do well at school most of my grades are C and the only shining grades I got were in Art (B) and Graphics (A*). So I usually take people's comments about academics and creatives on the chin as my GCSE results speak for themselves, I can't argue if you're looking at grades. But the truth is intelligence only gets you so far and then you have to be creative. In fact, all of us are creative we all have to be creative in life, creativity is being imaginative and looking for the possibilities. Intelligence is the ability to acquire and apply knowledge, to apply something is to have understood it. And the truth be told, you can't have one without the other, you can't look for possibilities until you have understood the subject.
Being creative doesn't make you less intelligent and being intelligent (good at academia) doesn't make you less creative. Perhaps we need to redefine what we think creative is and appreciate that it apply's to all areas of life like cooking and finances and in all jobs. We all think of possibilities. And let's stop thinking of creatives as 'arty' in a derogatory way as to come up with solutions requires the ability to 'acquire and apply knowledge', meaning intelligence must come first and then the creativity is applied.
And lastly, there is nothing wrong with being 'arty' we all started out as a budding artist, painting and mark making as kids. It is only as we grow that we choose not to do those things anymore. But everyone can create art. Art is you expressing yourself through a medium. We all express ourselves through our clothes and the home decor choices we make, all of these could be described as a type of art.
To be 'arty', to be creative, is to be human. I am human. You are human. Let's be human kind.