Discovery

Abstract

[Extract] Creative acts deploy patterns. Conversely, the act of creation has its own patterns. It is explicable and understandable because it exhibits certain recurring features. Paradoxically that which is most fresh and unpredictable has characteristic repeating traits. Its acts of revolution both cycle back to an old refrain and explode in time confounding expectation. One of the characteristic patterns of creation is that it clumps and clusters-it does not distribute evenly across time and space. One of the primary expressions of this is the periodic golden ages of creativity. In less poetic terms, all that means is that creativity concentrates in specific times and places. This is true both of acts of creation and of the institutions that serve to mid-wife invention and to disseminate inventive creations to the wider society. At various times, academies, churches, colleges guilds, patrons, councils and associations have performed this supplemental role, as hand-maiden to creation. In the twentieth century, both business firms and universities emerged as key institutions for creative dissemination and diffusion, and both have also acted as social crucibles for creation. In these roles, both have played a central role in the arts- and science- based economics that emerged in the industrial age and transformed the economic and social landscape beyond recognition.