“The Feeling of Life”: Creative Dynamics Captured in Real Time

This article presents a proof-of-concept for the Researcher-As-Obstacle (RAO) framework, grounded in a case study with a professional artist. By deliberately interfering with the creative process through real-time micro-phenomenological questioning, we pursue a dual objective. First, methodologically, we demonstrate that this intervention is feasible and preserves the ecological validity of the creative act. Second, and crucially, we show that the protocol generates data of unexpected granularity, granting access to the “creative engine”: the minute-to-minute oscillation between action (what the artist does) and affect (how the work’s evolving form redirects action). This deep analysis allows us to conceptualize the “fertile self”, a productive zone situated between the risks of self-citation (repetition) and self-alienation (loss of agency). Within this zone, the artist is guided by a pre-reflective "feeling of life" felt in relation to the artwork-in-the-making. Consequently, the study validates RAO not merely as an observational tool, but as a generative instrument for theory building: the data suggest that the fertile self is structurally similar to Vygotsky’s zone of proximal development where the relation to the artwork acts as the guiding peer. RAO is thus established as a key method for grounding creativity research in the dynamic, first-person experience of the maker.