Todd Siler (born August 23, 1953) is an American multimedia artist, author, educator, and inventor, equally well known for his art and for his work in creativity research. A graduate of

Bowdoin College Bowdoin College ( ) is a private liberal arts college in Brunswick, Maine. When Bowdoin was chartered in 1794, Maine was still a part of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The college offers 34 majors and 36 minors, as well as several joint eng ...

, he became the first visual artist to be granted a PhD from

MIT The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the m ...

(interdisciplinary studies in Psychology and Art, 1986). Siler began advocating the full integration of the arts and sciences in the 1970s and is the founder of the ArtScience Program and movement.

Creativity research

In the early 1980s, Siler made an extensive study of genius across numerous disciplines to see what, if anything, such highly creative people as

Albert Einstein Albert Einstein ( ; ; 14 March 1879 – 18 April 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist, widely acknowledged to be one of the greatest and most influential physicists of all time. Einstein is best known for developing the theory ...

and

Sergei Rachmaninoff Sergei Vasilyevich Rachmaninoff; in Russian pre-revolutionary script. (28 March 1943) was a Russian composer, virtuoso pianist, and conductor. Rachmaninoff is widely considered one of the finest pianists of his day and, as a composer, one o ...

have, or more importantly do, in common. Although such inquiries are standard, Siler's work went further than any work before or since in examining how methods used by highly creative people might work on the neurological and cellular level. "Creativity is any unconditioned response," is typical of Siler's approach, which both validates and challenges the work of luminaries in the field such as

Howard Gardner Howard Earl Gardner (born July 11, 1943) is an American developmental psychologist and the John H. and Elisabeth A. Hobbs Research Professor of Cognition and Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education at Harvard University. He is cur ...

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi Mihaly Robert Csikszentmihalyi (, hu, Csíkszentmihályi Mihály Róbert, ; 29 September 1934 – 20 October 2021) was a Hungarian-American psychologist. He recognized and named the psychological concept of "flow", a highly focused mental ...

and

Robert Root-Bernstein Robert Root-Bernstein (born August 7, 1953) ( PhD, Princeton University) is a professor of physiology at Michigan State University. In 1981, he was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship, commonly known as a "genius grant." He has also researched and cons ...

(Encyclopedia of Creativity, 1999). These theories were elaborated in two books, ''Breaking The Mind Barrier: The ArtScience of Neurocosmology'' (

Simon & Schuster Simon & Schuster () is an American publishing company and a subsidiary of Paramount Global. It was founded in New York City on January 2, 1924 by Richard L. Simon and M. Lincoln Schuster. As of 2016, Simon & Schuster was the third largest publ ...

, 1990; Touchstone Books, 1992), which is largely intended for scholars, and ''Think Like A Genius'' (

Bantam Books Bantam Books is an American publishing house owned entirely by parent company Random House, a subsidiary of Penguin Random House; it is an imprint of the Random House Publishing Group. It was formed in 1945 by Walter B. Pitkin, Jr., Sidney B. ...

, 1997; Transworld, 1998) written for the general reader. Siler has developed these theories into proprietary programs which are used extensively in schools and corporations.

Visual arts

The son of an aspiring concert pianist and bio-medical researcher, as a child, Siler was a prodigy in the fine arts, often using highly detailed drawings to express his ideas on integrating the arts and sciences. He studied art as an undergraduate, spending a year "apprenticed" in the studio of American artist

Leonard Baskin Leonard Baskin (August 15, 1922 – June 3, 2000) was an American sculptor, draughtsman and graphic artist, as well as founder of the Gehenna Press (1942–2000). One of America's first fine arts presses, it went on to become "one of the most imp ...

. In his 20s Siler was part of the same SoHo art scene which launched

Julian Schnabel Julian Schnabel (born October 26, 1951) is an American painter and filmmaker. In the 1980s, he received international attention for his "plate paintings" — with broken ceramic plates set onto large-scale paintings. Since the 1990s, he has been ...

Francesco Clemente Francesco Clemente (born 23 March 1952) is an Italian contemporary artist. He has lived at various times in Italy, India and New York City. Some of his work is influenced by the traditional art and culture of India. He has worked in various art ...

and

David Salle David Salle (born September 28, 1952; last name pronounced "Sally") is a Pictures Generation American painter, printmaker, photographer, and stage designer. Salle was born in Norman, Oklahoma, and lives and works in East Hampton, New York. He earn ...

. Today, Siler's artworks are in numerous public collections including the

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, often referred to as The Guggenheim, is an art museum at 1071 Fifth Avenue on the corner of East 89th Street on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York City. It is the permanent home of a continuously exp ...

, The

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 ...

(20th Century Collection), The

Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, and is often identified as one of ...

in New York City, the

Pushkin Museum The Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts (russian: Музей изобразительных искусств имени А. С. Пушкина, abbreviated as ) is the largest museum of European art in Moscow, located in Volkhonka street, just oppo ...

of Fine Arts in Moscow, and The

Israel Museum The Israel Museum ( he, מוזיאון ישראל, ''Muze'on Yisrael'') is an art and archaeological museum in Jerusalem. It was established in 1965 as Israel's largest and foremost cultural institution, and one of the world’s leading encyclopa ...

in Jerusalem. In 2006, Siler's multimedia exhibition at New York's Ronald Feldman Gallery showed off his artwork relating to what he described as a nature-inspired "Fractal Reactor", a nuclear fusion reactor based on

fractal geometry In mathematics, a fractal is a geometric shape containing detailed structure at arbitrarily small scales, usually having a fractal dimension strictly exceeding the topological dimension. Many fractals appear similar at various scales, as illu ...

Education and invention

As an artist who has championed the study of science, Siler worked with the Cherry Creek School District (Colorado) to pioneer experiential learning methodologies based on the understanding and creation of systems of metaphor. Siler was instrumental in developing the interdisciplinary curriculum for The Israel Arts and Science Academy (IASA) in Jerusalem. These programs have become popular with

Fortune 500 The ''Fortune'' 500 is an annual list compiled and published by ''Fortune'' magazine that ranks 500 of the largest United States corporations by total revenue for their respective fiscal years. The list includes publicly held companies, along ...

companies as a way of promoting out-of-the-box thinking. In addition to being an artist and scholar, Siler holds a number of patents on a wide range of inventions, including a widely used computer-graphics input device and textile printing machinery.

Awards

In 2011, Siler received the

Leonardo da Vinci World Award of Arts The Leonardo da Vinci World Award of Arts has been established by the World Cultural Council (Mexico) to acknowledge those who offer a positive message to mankind through different expressions of art. It is conferred upon "artist, sculptor, write ...

in recognition of his contributions to contemporary and visual arts, for stimulating creativity, inspiring innovation, and uniting art and science to enrich the experience of creative learning.

References

External links

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Todd Siler Metaphorming Minds Artist's Book

Website for Siler's book ''Think Like A Genius''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Siler, Todd 1953 births Living people Creativity researchers American installation artists Bowdoin College alumni American inventors 20th-century American painters American male painters 21st-century American painters 21st-century American male artists American self-help writers American science writers American education writers Nuclear technology 20th-century American sculptors 20th-century American male artists American male sculptors American contemporary painters