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Materiality, Memory and Imagination: Using Empathy to Research Creativity

This article describes how empathy can be used as a research tool assisting the researcher to share in and, in so doing, verify the claims made by a series of collaborating, case study practitioners. The focus on empathy arises as part of the researcher’s intention to overcome the difficulties involved in understanding the nature of human experience and creative thought of another. The paper draws upon research journals, documentary photographs and videos made during the creation of a series of collaborative works. What emerges are a series of mutual, corresponding understandings between the researcher and her collaborators, regarding the impact of memory and materiality in the generation of concepts used in the development of the resulting artefacts. This collaborative and empathic methodology has been considered, by peer review, to be an innovative means of acquiring data. The collaborative art practice it documents also provides new insights through the production of original artworks as part of the research process. An early version of this paper was first presented at the 2007 Creativity and Cognition conference, Washington, USA were it was one of a small number of presented papers selected by an international review panel to be developed for the Leonardo journal. The resulting artefacts from this research have been exhibited publically and in an international context at the following galleries: the University of Newcastle New South Wales Gallery, Australia 2010; Howard Gardens Gallery 2011, Crafts in the Bay, Cardiff, 2011; and The MacLaurin Galleries, Scotland 2011. The value of this contribution to knowledge regarding empathy as a research tool in creative practice has been recognised in the field and beyond, and resulted in invited presentations at: ArtsHealth Symposium, University of Newcastle, Australia in 2008 and Empathy: Dynamics, dialogue, conflict, RIBA, London in 2012.