Frequently quoted in the context of contemporary philosophical reflections on ‘artistic creativity’, Edward Young’s Conjectures on Original Composition are generally read as articulating an anti‐traditionalist account of genius. Against this reading, I argue that Young does not reject the value of traditional models and conventions, but rather means to insist on the artist’s capacity to determine such values through her natural capacity for autonomous critical thinking. I support this claim by showing how he draws from Neo‐Platonism and the experimental philosophy (...) of Francis Bacon in order to develop what has all the appearances of a method of original composition. In the last lines of the paper, I suggest that this method may have heuristic value for the understanding of artworks as ‘artistic creations’ in the context of contemporary institutional theories of art. (shrink)