The Creative Arc

There are four stages in an arc of artistic creativity:

Observation, Imitation, Transformation, Presentation

• I study the world.
• I learn to reproduce what I see.
• I simplify it, I exagerate it, I distort it, I re-combine it, I re-invent it.
• Finally I offer it to an audience.

The amount of emphasis placed on each stage varies from acting style to acting style. Method acting emphasises the first two, Musicals the last, and Mask work the third.