I can offer some practical advice:
1. Ensure you always have to hand a means to record ideas. For a visual artist, this can be drawing in a sketchbook, but can equally be lists of things in a note to self via SMS or anything. Both ‘Yesterday’ (Paul McCartney and the Beatles) and ‘I Can’t Get No Satisfaction’ (Keith Richards and The Rolling Stones) were written by their authors in their dreams. The reason the authors did not forget them when they woke up was because they both slept with guitars by their bed.
2. Related to the preceding, know that the best ideas come when you are not looking for them. This is not hokey wisdom, this phenomenon has been subject to serious analysis. Many creative folk recognize that their best ideas come when they are running, walking, cooking, falling asleep, sitting in a cab etc. Mine come when I go for long walks and I make sure to have my voice memo app handy when I do. For some, alcohol or drugs serves the same purpose :). But be carful. I know artists whose works resemble each other's because they all use the same drug.
3. Take advantage of accidents, they are dancing lessons from god (Vonnegut). When writing lyrics for his songs, David Bowie (1947–2016)
would write words on individual sheets of paper which he would throw in
the air. The lyrics would evolve from the chance association of words with
each other as they landed on the ground. Leonardo Da Vinci got some of his ideas from looking at stains in plaster or clouds.
4. See something you like? Steal it! Make it your own! Look at how Manet's Olympia 'borrowed' from Titian and his Venus of Urbino. What he stole was the form, not (exactly) the content. This relates to something very significant: that it is almost impossible to invent in a vacuum. One could as easily steal pictorial form from adverts, movies... anything.
5. Putting in the hours helps more than in commonly recognized. Before The Beatles went to Germany, they were an entirely average band, typical of the time. When they came back, they were the Beatles. The difference? The gigged live for three evenings a week.
6. Look for patterns in your own work. The thing that drives your own creative profile is unique to you. It is already there... waiting to be seen. It is this that will direct you to choose one idea over another. Doubt me? Look at any artist's biography. See how evidence of their 'final form' is apparent even in their student work.
Two cool references:
- Johnson. S., 2010, Where Good Ideas Come From, Penguin UK.
- Currey, M. 2013, Daily Rituals: How Artists Work, Knopf.