Horsham Society: Horsham invaded!

Early on a Fun Day Sunday morning Horsham was invaded, from the Drill Hall to Horsham Park. The intruders were very disciplined, they formed a regular line and advanced in good order accompanied by rhythmic music. Onlookers spotted a great dragon with mobile wings, several storks and lots of butterflies, at least one old grey lizard and two huge ice cream cones. Seed banks and toadstools mingled with a blue train and yet another dragon appeared, this one a gorgeous pink; cricketers and windmills accompanied a shaky rocket, all amid a phalanx of clouds on sticks with aeroplanes and quotations.

What was beyond dispute was that the invaders were of a very young age, mostly well below ten or so, and their invasion conveyed nothing of menace. Their music emphatically emphasised the contrary most infectiously. The Caribbean steel band had twirling dancers in gleaming costumes, while the Asian drums in the second group were beaten ferociously by smiling musicians. Both participants and bystanders were from multiple parts of the wider globe and were united by the simple fun of watching children parade their creations in a carnival mood.

Horsham felt all the better for it.

The children had received some adult guidance in the selection of their motifs, yet the results spoke clearly of small hands labouring away to produce individual shapes and particular forms, carried gleefully on parade. Their creativity was on show as was their cooperation in a group activity to give expression to their school, their ideas and perhaps hopes for the long future ahead of their young minds.

Sir Ken Robinson reminded us that “creativity is as important as literacy” and that “imagination is the source of every form of human achievement”. His TED talk (Technology, Entertainment and Design) reached 65 million viewers, so he certainly struck a chord with many.

While there has been much emphasis on STEM subjects in schools (science, technology, engineering, mathematics), the arts and music offer clear areas for the exercise of creativity. They are every bit as vital to our economy and well-being as a whole as the more technical achievements. We have a long record of huge success in popular music and in musical shows; British artists and composers have rightly been prominent and celebrated world-wide. The legendary success of the Phantom of the Opera, and the Harry Potter books show that imagination can be a path to notable fame as well as substantial fortune.

So, we must appreciate our national strengths and cultivate them among the young in our schools. All children have innate vivid imaginations, they use them to motivate their play hours, and they only abandon their fancies as more mundane curriculums bear down upon them. It has truly been said that we don’t grow into creativity, we grow out of it.

Fortune favours the prepared mind, and the prepared mind yields disciplined creativity.

Let Albert Einstein have the last word: “Creativity is intelligence having fun”.