(#9) Be Kind to Your Art
Be kind to your art.
This is as much of a reminder for me as it is for everyone else. Some days I am so self critical and hate everything I make. I can find flaws and mistakes in just about everything. Working is so unpleasant when I’m in one of those moods.
The painting I spent way too long struggling over.
I just finished working on a watercolor painting for my drawing class. Watercolor, on its own, is a frustrating medium. I love it and I hate it. I love a challenge so I want to practice and get good at it, but it also makes me want to claw my eyes out. The assignment for the class was centered around appropriation. We got to choose two artists or styles or concepts and combine them. I didn’t feel very inspired by this assignment for whatever reason. I landed on a combination of a Dutch breakfast style still life painting and modern still life with a whisper of pop art (think Little Debbie picnic spread). I spent three class sessions on this painting but had to restart it because I got sick and could not get to the studio. I didn’t have my palette or my usual brushes and board. On top of my lack of enthusiasm about the assignment, I was extremely annoyed and had a bad attitude, which definitely is apparent in the painting. I think I made a mistake in my subject matter because painting a still life without actually having a reference is stupidly difficult. I had to create an image in my head and swap items around to figure out shadows and proportions but it was all in my imagination and had a high likelihood of being wildly inaccurate. I spent so long trying to fix a cupcake but trying to make corrections with watercolor is a nightmare. Can you tell I got frustrated? I had to take many breaks and hype myself up to paint again. Here are some thoughts that went through my head: “Why is this so hard? What am I doing wrong? Why can’t I just be done with this?”
Well, I finished the painting. It turned out fine. It’s not my favorite but it is done and I can move on. When I decided I was done, I had a moment of reflection in which I wished I had been a bit nicer to myself and the painting. Just because it did not turn out the way I wanted it to doesn’t mean the experience was not valuable.
I find myself putting pressure on each piece I’m making to be particularly exceptional. Gettting caught up in the final product instead of the process leads to disappoinment. In reality, it’s just practice. Instead of being critical, I have to remind myself that art can simply exist. It is allowed to be imperfect. It doesn’t need judgment all the time. There’s no benefit to antagonizing your art. At the end of the day, art is the extension of the self and we deserve to be kind to ourselves. So, here is a reminder to look at your art with kinder eyes. Your art will improve as a result.
