Creativity in Times of Pandemic

There’s nothing like a global pandemic, the collapse of capitalism as we know it, loss of income, status, the erosion of everyday independences and the persistent fear for yourself and others of a virus that one great thinker once described as ‘invisible’ to soak up every last drop of one’s creativity juices. 

The expectation since day one of lockdown has been there will be a tsunami of creative output to match the great flourishes of creativity from the renaissance to Stock, Aitken and Waterman. 

Unfortunately, creativity doesn’t work that way, at least it doesn’t for me. 

Creatives are just as pre-occupied by whether there’s pasta on the supermarket shelf, whether the virus has accompanied them home on that tin of tomatoes or that suspicious looking eggplant. Writers are contemplating whether they can ever get use to the aroma of Glen 20 rather than the next great literary masterpiece. 

Shall I use myself as an example, as feeble as I might be as an example. 

In extraordinary times the ordinary can become astonishing. 

In recent weeks I’ve worked hard, very hard to improve my hand washing skills. I’ve imagined standing over the basin trying to work the Palmolive into a soapy lather with Yoda on my shoulder persistently prodding me while advising, "you must unlearn what you have learned." Over the weeks I personally believe I have reached Jedi Knight levels of hand sanitation. 

That was until a few days ago. 

I don’t take the Chief Medical Officer’s advice when it comes to hand sanitation. He feebly suggests that we should wash our hands for at least 20 seconds, which seems totally inadequate to a master of the art of lathering. I suggest was your hands for at least 45 seconds, there is simply no way the Rona, the flu, salmonella or the artificial flavourings from a box of shapes will ever survive such a foamy onslaught, not on my watch, which I have dutifully taken off and place aside beforehand. 

So it was with shock and my normal portion of disbelief when I discovered after one such froth fest, that despite my best efforts to harbour health from toil, there remained a tiny speck of potentially Rona filled grime under the corner of my left thumbnail.

How could this be?

Even after clipping my nails, over the coming days the speck of potentially life threatening filth kept on emerging. Staring at me through its’ beady, some would say, evil little eyes. So now the 45 seconds of hand wrenching has now stretched out to 80 seconds while I ensure all dirt is dispersed from under my thumbnails. 

How am I supposed to write a Miles Franklin award winning novel while this is the state of affairs?

The morphing of our lives into a black and white holding pattern, where so much of the colour and movement that filtered the view of all we would see and do, now sits alongside the 3D Glasses gathering dust in our television units. 

That colour and movement motivates creativity. I’m not saying the current circumstances we find ourselves in won’t, but it is going to take time to adjust.  So many creatives will fall between the cracks of the job seeker and job keeper programs, not a pay cheque in sight. 

There are a lot factors railing against creativity at the moment and yet daily we see people on social media creating hilarious and prophetic content, some of it art, most of it not. Although can all look forward to a new Bon Jovi single about the COVID-19 to hit our devices soon, so not all is lost. 

I can only speak for myself but my creativity is going to take a while to catch up to this new world of ours. This article is one small attempt to get back in the game, it’s also an attempt to decompress, find meaning and to tell you the battle of left thumb is over but the war goes on.