My mother tells me that I was 3 years old when I started painting every day. I took a short break from that when I had children, but now that they are in school, I have started up again. Daily practice is the most important way that art work develops. This is what has shaped my work the most. Daily painting had increased the speed with which I work and had made me more familiar with materials. The work is endless and I still feel like I could get infinitely better. I don’t feel like I have arrived at a place that I am confident enought that I feel like I could stop. I feel like I still have a ways to go. I learn every day. I push myself everyday.
Another important element to solidifying images in your head is collage. Collage allows you to move things around and consider new compositions. It also brings in outside elements from your work for inspitation. There are may ways to do this now with Pinterest and other digital sources. However, I am an analog person and I collect actual papers and rearrange them into ideas. Often I will collect my own photographs and then turn those into a collage. This is a low pressure way to devlop ideas. When you don't know what to do collage is a great way to stimulate new concepts. When they are done, I use the collages as references when I am painting. This naturally leds me to other things.
Each day when I go in to the studio, I have a plan. I know what I will work on ahead of time what aspect of a painting I will be working on and what I want to accomplish that day. Because I do it every day, I have become more efficient at working. These small steps every day eventually add up to a body of work. I know that it is hard to set aside time everyday, but even 15 minutes contributes to you practice and helps develop ideas.
Tell me, what do you do to move your work forward?
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