the creative brain

I just picked up Nancy Andreasen's book, Creative Brain. In the hopes that there is an explanation for how/why I come up with ideas.

While getting ready for the installation, I hired my mother to help assemble pieces of the soft sculpture pollen spores. At a dinner party she explained her deplorable sweat shop conditions and was prompted to explain exactly why I wanted to put pollen in an installation. After a bit of explanation, a guest said ,"Oh. Is this like a Yoko Ono thing?" My poor mother.

I glanced at one page in the book that said creative minds don't work in isolation. "...the catalytic substrate for that process is often interaction with others and intellectual exchange of ideas." So one might argue that my ideas are the product of nurture - years of loving support and the exchange of silly creative ideas.

Thanks mom!