Gift or Skill?

Is creativity a gift or a skill? It’s an interesting question that I was asked in one of my classes yesterday. My professor pulled up a Prada advertisement for their Summer 2021 show, and written on it was “Is creativity a gift or a skill? Answer at Prada .com". He then asked us what we thought about it. I don’t think it’s a black and white question. I think both answers are wrong. Creativity is a mix of both. It’s a gift because you can be born with a natural talent that cannot be taught. I don’t think you could train some of the things you gain from natural causes. Nobody can train to become Warhol; he was just born Warhol. As gifted as you are from birth, you can certainly gain some skill going forward. You can learn to brainstorm better; you can try new things and push your limits. In that case, you are teaching yourself, so you’re already behind the people who were born with a gift. It’s important to be born with a natural ability, but it is even more important to work on that ability. If you start out with great natural instinct, it can only get way better by practicing and learning new skills. I know so many people who are naturally amazing at drawing and creating some kind of art. They were born with that natural talent, but they try new things. They screenprint, block print, paint, use chalk or charcoal. Any medium you can think of they've tried. That's gaining skill on your natural talent. Creativity isn’t just a gift or a skill. It is both. I answered my professor with a much shorter version of this post. Luckily, he didn’t look at me like I was crazy and agreed. Few people argued with me and some argued it was a skill. I don’t know how you can think it is just a skill, but sometimes I can’t argue with questions that deal with personal opinions and have no actual answer. What do you think? Is creativity a gift or a skill? What about something like basketball or golf? Is it all skill or is there natural talent there? I think substituting creativity with some kind of sport in this situation makes things more clear. Anyone can become good at a sport if they try hard enough. They can practice every day, but at some point they’ll hit a plateau. Without natural skill, you can’t grow above and beyond that plateau. I’m not very athletic and have bad hand-eye coordination. I can play basketball all day long and that won’t change. I’ll gain some skill, but I can’t break through because I have no natural talent. That’s how I see it. I wrote this post because I want to know what you people think. I don’t know how people see gift vs. skill. If you want to comment on this post with your opinion it would be appreciated. You don’t have to answer based on creativity; you could use a personal example. Hopefully, I’ll get some responses. I’ve never said “Comment Down Below!” before on this blog. I haven’t said that since I was streaming on Twitch for a month. Hopefully your week is going great. I know I want this week to be over already. My spring break is next week and I’m ready to ride! Happy Wednesday and please respond if you can!