You are a combination of your influences

When you present them your Ideas, many people, including yourself, will tell you that to stand out from the rest you have to be original. However, this sounds better said than done. To find your own identity in a world where whether you want It or not you are bombarded with a lot of things that influence you subconsciously you have to pass through a series of stages that will take you to your unique style, and the first steps to this goal entails stealing. Have you ever heard the phrase "Good artists borrow, Great Artists steal" quoted to Pablo Picasso? Well, In order to be a great artist you have to precisely do that, and that's why in this article I will talk to you about the stages that the practicioner of any creative discipline has to go through before he/she comes to terms with his/her true artistic self. Let's Begin:

Stage 1: Imitation

If you try to be, for example, a pop musician without having listened to anything or having a sound to reference yourself with, you will end up making a collage of instruments placed in a incoherent way, being just bad and not making any progress towards originality. If you really want to get to the place where your Idols are (Which by default will be your influences) you have to imitate them, all in order to figure out the basics of how a complex and properly structured work of art functions. Once you have practiced making something as close as possible to your favorite artist, you can begin to follow new influences and be ready for the next step.

Stage 2: Amalgamation

This part is where all your influences combine to make something more original than what you had done before. By using elements and techniques that you have learned trying to replicate the work of the masters you admire, you'll be able to incorporate them in an harmonious way and create something better than the sum of Its parts. One example of this can be attributed to beatmakers: Listening and remaking their favourite beats they are able to learn all the methods the producers they like employ in their creations, and in this way use them to create new music.

Stage 3: Origination

This is more of an advice than a real stage. One thing that you should be wary of Is to get stuck in the same type of style, like only paying attention to realism or cubism and overlooking all the other painting currents, thus making your work suffer in Its creativity. By listening, reading, or seeing pieces of art from a style that's different from the one you're so accustomed to, you'll find that there are a lot of gems that you haven't given the benefit of the doubt to, and at the same time, you'll find new menthors and sources of inspiration which will bring a breath of fresh air to all your creations.

I hope that this article could have made clear to you the importance of imitation and "stealing" in the production of art, being the base for the development of the most creative minds in the world and the way in which fans can get close to their masters or even further, making you see that wearing your influences in your sleeve is not something bad at all. Thank you for your support and good luck!