“Fear and self-consciousness are the most serious psychological hindrances in life. Awed by reports of great achievements of historic personalities, most people become perfectionists. They ‘know’ beforehand that their work cannot be worthwhile because they can ‘never’ match historical standards. The result is a paralysis of any creative attempt . . . Every school should build up an elementary curriculum with exercises that do not allow comparison of the student’s self-expression with the work of a ‘genius!’ The student must gain a range of experiences through his own experiments, form his own judgments, develop his own abilities before he studies the historically great. Then the student will discover in himself something resembling a sixth sense of which he had not been conscious before, a coordinating creative ability not to copy from, but to use indigenously. No matter how he employs this power later on, whether he uses it as painter, designer, lawyer, doctor, housewife, or bookkeeper, he will have gained a sense of joyous confidence in his own performance.”
(L. Moholy-Nagy, Vision in Motion)