I remember from school an art teacher saying
that there was nothing as scary as a blank sheet of paper. Nighmares, Zombies, Werewolves
and meeting the prospective mother-in-law for the first time aside, they do
have a point. Staring at that blank sheet of paper I wonder where to start, in
reality staring at my own inability to succeed, and the more I stare, the more
my will to begin is sucked into that figurative black hole. Suddenly I must
have every pencil super sharp, I need a cup of coffee, then a cigarette, I must
check to see if I have had any new emails, tweets or Facebook messages in the
past 30 seconds. Even the washing up, housework or the dreaded ironing seem like
attractive pastimes. The stark blankness of the sheet leaches all the
confidence out of me, and more than proportion or rendering or accuracy, confidence
is key to artistic mark-making.
As artists usually work in isolation there is
no one but myself to insist I get on with it as there is in my life drawing
class. I do have strategies though, my weekly life drawing habit being one. It
is about so much more than an attempt to capture the likeness of a nude. The
one to three minute warm up exercises practice more than observational drawing,
learning proportion, capturing movement, rendering a likeness, or being able to
assess and reproduce tones. They teach me to just get on and draw, making the
first mark without questioning, second-guessing or letting the brain interfere.
So Strategy number one is:
1. Go to life drawing (or a plein air) class
regularly and train yourself to learn to look and to get on with it without
questioning the mark before you have even made it.
2. Strategy number two is to stop the paper
being blank, even if that is just standing your coffee cup on it. Hell, spill
the coffee if you want to. Look at the work of Horst
Janssen if you want to see that a coffee cup ring does not
exclude your work from exhibition.
3. Put some music on. I mentioned this in a previous post. I have certain pieces of
music that inspire or motivate me, and others that get my feet moving (which
must be hard wired to the creative bit of my brain as it seems to kick start
that too). Some I have played so often that I am now hard-wired to want to draw
or paint when I hear them.
4. Take a bus ride. No seriously, something
about sitting inactive while the land or cityscape passes by really does lull
the critical brain and stir the creative brain – just remember to take a sketch
or notebook. (nb another variant of this is taking a bath, but that is hard to
do in the sink at my studio and the sketchbook tends to get wet).
5. Throw paint (preferably at paper or
canvas). A variant of strategy 2, and you may as well try some abstract art,
right?
6. Scribble or doodle – anything to get your
hand, creative brain and pencil moving . . .
and a scribble or doodle is throwaway. It doesn’t matter if it is not
perfect. Come to think of it, it doesn’t matter if your painting is not perfect
either.
7. Look at art. Get the books out (stay off
the internet). Collect images in a scrapbook that catch your eye and inspire.
They don’t have to (and shouldn’t) inspire you to copy, just inspire you to be
creative when you leaf through them.
8. I know I said social media and the
internet should not be used as procrastination, but through Facebook in
particular I have ‘met’ and made friends with some wonderful artists all over
the world. A select few of these have proven themselves firm friends and
virtual studio partners offering honest critiques, tips, hints, encouragement,
support, friendly ragging and arse-kicking through closed groups or private
messaging. Thanks guys – you know who
you are.
9. Ok so the practical strategy: make a plan
and timetable for the painting or drawing. Breaking the piece down into parts
can make to easier to get going, and writing it down on a calendar or in a
diary is like a promise or intention to do it and somehow it gets done almost
by itself. eg get the piece drawn up and blocked in/under-painted on Monday, paint
in the sky or background on Tuesday, then the (horse’s) muzzle, nose and eye
painted on Wednesday etc etc. It is not set in stone and sometimes I change the
‘promises’ as I go along but it is setting out as a start. Be careful with this
one though. Set manageable tasks or you will further demoralise yourself. It is
better to start off learning how much you are capable of within a certain
timeframe by setting too little in the tasks at first. Then you can be pleased
or even surprised when you achieve them early. Even now this happens sometimes
and I feel like I have been given a mini holiday. When it happens I sometimes
choose to have some ‘me-time’. Maybe I will go to the coffee shop to write in
my journal, maybe go for a ride on my horse or maybe I will be further inspired
by my ‘free-time’ to get out my sketchbook or even carry on working to get
ahead for tomorrow’s task.
10. The final strategy in my ‘top-ten’ comes
from a workshop that I attended with talks and demonstrations by a well-known US
based equestrian artist. One of her pieces of advice was to spend some time writing
before painting or drawing. These blog posts are by-products of this strategy,
but I have also started to use a journal to write (and sketch and doodle) about
individual pieces and what I am trying to achieve or the feelings I am trying
to emote in them. I am addicted to doing this now so thank you to her.
These are not prescriptive practices that you
must adhere to. They are just suggestions of some things that have worked for
me in the past either on their own or in combination. I am sure you have much
better suggestions than mine and please feel free to share them in the comments
below. Let’s take number eight to heart
rather than continuing to work in isolation.
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