Critique of Creativity: Precarity, Subjectivity and Resistance in the ‘Creative Industries’

234 p. : il., Tablas.Libro ElectrónicoLa creatividad siempre está en movimiento: surge, se establece en el ente colectivo, palidece y desaparece a veces en el olvido; renace, vuelve con innovaciones, se reformula y resurge iniciando de nuevo el ciclo. Los viejos mitos de la creación y los creadores, los trabajos consagrados y los organismos privilegiados de los demiurgos están de nuevo en marcha, produciendo nuevos cambios. Los ensayos recogidos en este libro analizan ese resurgimiento complejo del mito de la creación y proponen una crítica contemporánea de la creatividad.Creativity is astir: reborn, re-conjured, re-branded, resurgent. The old myths of creation and creators – the hallowed labors and privileged agencies of demiurges and prime movers, of Biblical world-makers and self-fashioning artist-geniuses – are back underway, producing effects, circulating appeals. Much as the Catholic Church dresses the old creationism in the new gowns of ‘intelligent design’, the Creative Industries sound the clarion call to the Cultural Entrepreneurs. In the hype of the ‘creative class’ and the high flights of the digital bohemians, the renaissance of ‘the creatives’ is visibly enacted. The essays collected in this book analyze this complex resurgence of creation myths and formulate a contemporary critique of creativity.Contents vii Contributors ix Acknowledgements xv Introduction: On the Strange Case of ‘Creativity’ and its Troubled Resurrection 1 PART ONE: CREATIVITY 7 1 Immanent Effects: Notes on Cre-activity 9 2 The Geopolitics of Pimping 23 3 The Misfortunes of the ‘Artistic Critique’ and of Cultural Employment 41 4 ‘Creativity and Innovation’ in the Nineteenth Century: Harrison C. White and the Impressionist Revolution Reconsidered 57 PART TWO: PRECARIZATION 77 5 Virtuosos of Freedom: On the Implosion of Political Virtuosity and Productive Labour 79 6 Experiences Without Me, or, the Uncanny Grin of Precarity 91 7 Wit and Innovation 101 PART THREE: CREATIVITY INDUSTRIES 107 8 GovernCreativity, or, Creative Industries Austrian Style 109 9 The Los Angelesation of London: Three Short Waves of Young People’s Micro-Economies of Culture and Creativity in the UK 119 10 Unpredictable Outcomes / Unpredictable Outcasts: On Recent Debates over Creativity and the Creative Industries 133 11 Chanting the Creative Mantra: The Accelerating Economization of EU Cultural Policy 147 PART FOUR: CULTURE INDUSTRY 165 12 Culture Industry and the Administration of Terror 167 13 Add Value to Contents: The Valorization of Culture Today 183 14 Creative Industries as Mass Deception 191 Bibliography 20