A small beginner’s manual from a budding artist to another
I used to hate making mistakes. They would mess with what I wanted to achieve and completely throw me off balance. The worst thing — they would make me believe I’m never going to be good at what I wanted to do.
A lot of people believe exactly that after they make, say, one or two pieces of art. They tell me, ‘I just can’t paint/draw like you!’ and while that is true in that context, if I were to be honest, objectively I’m not that great if compared to other artists. My art is generally only better than the art produced by this person — who believes they cannot paint like me and who has just now started on the art journey. After a few attempts a lot of people tend to give up and decide ‘I just can’t do it’. If that sounds familiar, please read on.
Now, granted, you’re not aiming to be the next Picasso and you’re just looking to make something pretty. Even so, it’s quite possible that you are making some basic mistakes and assumptions while creating art that are turning the process of artmaking into something tedious or frustrating. Much more than it needs to be.
As I said before, I used to hate making mistakes. A lot of those mistakes were made while I was trying to create something beautiful and I learned quite a bit from them. I don’t regret them but they sure were time wasters. I have written down a few basic things you should do to save your time and tears before you start making art or at least before you give up on art as something that doesn’t give you joy.
1. Find Your Reason for Creating Art
Very few people ask themselves why they want to do something and answer it honestly. Having a clear answer makes your actions more deliberate and less haphazard. It’s the same thing with art, and there’s no wrong answer. Here’s mine. I do it because I feel this is the best way I have to express my ideas and my emotions. I also do it because good art means something to people. I get a tremendous rush when I finish a piece that was earlier just a figment of my imagination and it is now real, on canvas, looking like I did it justice. That’s why I make art.
You could say you just want to try something new, or that you want to make something pretty or you want to learn how to express yourself. Just have the thought in your mind before you start off on a piece. Trust me, it will help.
2. Where Do I Start? Start Simple.
So you’ve thought of why you want to make art. Now what? Gotta start somewhere. If you already know you want to make florals it makes this step easier. If you don’t — here’s what I suggest doing.
Open up your browser, search for these topics one by one — ‘Floral art’, ‘beginners landscape art’, ‘portrait art’, ‘basic watercolor painting’ and ‘beginner’s art ideas’, ‘abstract art’. Go through the images and note what you fancy. A lot of the images will be linked to Youtube tutorials for the same artwork. Once you select the kind of art you like — you can dive into learning how to create it.
3. Use References Whenever You Can
Whenever I get compliments like, ‘How do you draw such cute cats’, my mind flashes back to me googling ‘Cat sitting cutely’ and scrolling through 10 (okay 50) images of cats to choose the one I’m going to refer.
SO many people believe that if you are an artist, you just know how to paint things from your imagination. While that may be true for some experienced artists, you should never shy away from using references when making an artwork. MOST artists use references, and you should too — especially if you are looking to recreate something realistically. The world is at your fingertips — search for the image you want and try to recreate it as a way to learn.
It’s not cheating, it has never been cheating. Don’t believe me? Here’s an image of old masters using a camera obscura to translate 3D scenes to a 2D surface like some kind of mechanical carbon paper.
At least you don't have to be physically present near your reference.
4. Choose Your Art Supplies With Care
The amount of times I wanted to throw my brushes or paints away because they just looked wrong no matter how much I worked on my strokes or how I managed the right amount of water or how lightly I used my brush is … well too many to count. I was using whatever was available, didn’t know the difference between cold pressed and hot pressed, mediums that can be used with paint, or brushes that looked fine in the shop but fell apart after one use.
You don’t need professional, artist grade supplies that cost a bomb but you DO need good supplies. They make a world of difference in how you experience making an artwork which in turn shows up in the results.
I can make a whole series of articles about the supplies for each medium but the general takeaway is this : Research the kind of supplies you want to work with. Let’s say you want to work with watercolors. You should be reading up on the different kinds of paper that can be used, the brushes and the paints. Find out which ones are the best and why. Find out which ones are good enough and affordable. Find out how to spot bad supplies (I’m looking at you, cake watercolors for kids.).
Bad supplies not only ruin your experience, they waste valuable time and money. Good enough but affordable supplies are what I would suggest for every beginner so that they can practice on those and then splurge on the professional ones once they have leveled up.
5. Patience is Key, Practice is Crucial
There’s this weird expectation that people have when they take up art — that they should immediately be able to create pretty stuff right off the bat. This happens a lot because of the time lapse videos on social media that condense an artists’ hours of work into 2–3 mins. Sometimes 30 seconds! This subconsciously gives the viewer an illusion of art being easy or quick.
When reality doesn’t match with Reels — people tend to get frustrated. ‘I just can’t paint like this! How do you do it?’ There’s a short answer.
I practice.
That’s all I do. Whatever I make is practice. Whatever I have been commissioned to do is practice. I can’t give you another answer to this because there is none.
It also takes an incredible amount of patience in the ADHD world to slowly keep working on something till the point you consider yourself ‘okay’ at it. Not even good, just okay. Most people give up a long time before they consider themselves okay because their “okay” is compared to a lot of people’s best work.
6. Social Media Can be Your Friend and Your Worst Enemy
Its very natural to want to show what you’ve created to your network of friends and family. We run on validation, whether we realize it or not, and its a nice feeling to be able to say ‘Hey! I made this!’.
I would like you to consider a few things before you start posting on social media.
a. Credit Credit Credit : If you have referenced another artist or tried to copy their work for learning a technique — you have to credit the artist, without fail. The artist owns the composition, the idea and execution. To try to pass an artwork that’s not your own as yours is a faux pas at best and unethical/criminal at worst.
b. Social media likes or followers do not say anything about your skill as an artist.
c. If you are aiming to be a ‘famous social media artist’ do know it takes daily work, presentation, marketing and a load of luck to ‘game’ the algorithm to pay attention to you and be famous on social media.
d. Number of followers on social media does not in anyway indicate the amount of money you can earn through art.
e. If you are planning to take pictures of your artwork to post on social media — daylight is your best friend.
7. Know When to Quit
If something doesn’t give you joy, then you should drop it. It’s difficult to do this, I understand. We have been conditioned to see quitting something as failure. Truth be told, quitting is just something that allows us to the next thing quicker.
If an artwork is looking worse after each stroke, tear up the canvas and dump it. Start new. If art as a hobby is not working out for you, quit the hobby. Start new.
It is better to do something and find out it is not working than never doing it or worse, to keep doing it because you fear the perception of failure.
So to sum up:
Find your reason for creating art
Start simple
Use references whenever you can
Choose your art supplies with care
Patience is key, Practice is Crucial
Social media can be your friend and your worst enemy
Know When to Quit
I have come across many people who want to start creating artwork and they say I should teach them. I tell them I’m not there yet. I can’t teach the exact techniques for each medium yet, as I am working on my skills.
What I can do, is give you the advice I never got but desperately needed. I hope that you save some time and heartache with these so that your journey into art is much smoother and full of wonder.
Until next time!
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