First off this week, as a contributing artist at Seranya, I want to say a big THANK YOU to all who stopped by Seranya Studio Art Boutique during Mill Street days. We had a fabulous time showing you the studio and were thrilled that you took time out of your day to spend it with us. Please come back again and take it all in as new art and artists are arriving every day. Thanks for checking out our classes and we hope to see many of you taking advantage of this opportunity.
What has been on my mind lately is learning to trust my inner voice. Do you trust that instinct that tells you how a certain piece of art should be completed? Does that voice speak to you? So often when working on a piece of art one wonders when is it finished.
It is at that moment that we often hear a little voice and an inner peaceful feeling when it is done, but we go ahead and listen to our brain chatter instead and continue on sometimes ruining the whole effect.
During an oil painting class I participated in, the teacher told us that when that little voice speaks, quick sign your piece because we all know once it is signed it is complete. How do you know when and how to come to that conclusion? Do we all struggle with that decision? When those around us give us their opinion of how it should be done, do we feel like maybe we should listen (after all, they are the potential buyers of our art) or should we continue to listen to that silent inner self that says it is finished, sign it and move on.
I have begun to listen more and more but still struggle with this when others suggest otherwise.
How do you handle this? Please share with us.
Stay tuned.
I never was a big fan of Andy Warhol. Just a little too off the wall. But I have to admit, at least for me, there is a lot of truth in when he said “Don’t think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it’s good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding, make even more art.” Oh, if it were only so easy. Many a painting I wouldn't listen to that inner voice and proceeded to ruin the painting, only because I hadn't achieved the vision I had but ruined it by pushing it and eventually over-working it. There were times when the voice said DONE, I signed it, and then went on to do some dramatic washes that turned the painting from mediocre to "Yes! That's what I wanted!". My propensity for detail can make that decision of when a painting is done very difficult a lot of the time. A little touch of color here, a shadow there. STOP ALREADY! One of the simple "tools" I use to help with this decision is to take my painting and place it in the window of my studio, facing out. Then I walk outside and look at the painting through the window at a normal viewing distance (not with my nose stuck to the paper). Amazing what a different perspective this can give. Another just as simple and maybe sometimes even more effective tool is to look at the painting in a mirror so the image is reversed. Again, it forces you to see the painting divorced of the history and emotions you lived through in creating the piece and see it more as a casual observer might see it. Try it once!
ReplyDeleteThose are some great ideas Richard, thanks for sharing them. Sometimes I will hide a piece that I am working on and walk away from it, then the next day come back and "see" what I think. We are always the ones who criticize ourselves the most it seems. Thanks for your input.
ReplyDeleteYesterday as I took up creating a doodle in my new sketch book, I found myself in this place you speak of! What it interesting, is I don't find that as often when I write. But I found more in creating in a different way. When to know it was finished was exactly what I was feeling. I had to laugh reading your post about the suggestion of quick signing your piece so you couldn't add to it. That was exactly what I had done! But I also find it interesting to think in terms of who I feel about being a human being - I'm a work in progress who is never finished. Well, when I am, that means I will have left this earthly place. But as in art, we are all a work in progress. Each step we take, each art piece we tackle, we get a little better each time.
ReplyDeleteIsn't that the truth Barbara--we are all works of art in progress. As Joan Anderson so aptly put it--an unfinished woman (or man) Sometimes it is good to take time to reflect on our journey and to appreciate how far we've come.
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