On Purpose
Being vulnerable on purpose in your chosen creative medium, is one of the most valuable things you can do as an artist.
At least that’s what I’ve been told.
Vulnerable = Valuable
To be honest, I’m likely to have a huge vulnerability hangover after sharing this, but here I am.
Let me try and explain.
For a long time now, I've been drawing and painting faces because I love it.
The process almost always starts with a reference photo, but never with the intention of getting a likeness. That seems like too much bother for this purpose. I’m after the essence of what drew me to that image in the first place. I'd rather have fun getting all the information on the paper and enjoy the materials and the process.
The portraits I have created in the past, whether watercolor and graphite, collage and acrylics, or other mixed media, were my 'free time' paintings, or often my ‘warmup’ for the day. I wouldn’t refer to the reference I was taking inspiration from for very long. I went in my own direction. The final subject, composition, and other elements were a compilation of different pictures I fused in my mind.
It's really an intuitive exercise, a joyful exploration of line and color and texture and tone.
Until recently, that process worked fine for me because I'm not a 'portrait artist', so there’s been no pressure to actually try to render anything exact. They weren’t commission pieces with an explicit goal. They were done in my art journals and sketchbooks and as practice just because I am endlessly fascinated by the human face and figure in art.
Besides, exact is not who I am as an artist. If I wanted to be exact, I'd take a photograph. Loose and expressive is usually the intent for my work, even if it is representational.
In November, I decided to do a challenge. I wanted to answer some burning questions about portrait painting as a central focus in my art. I wanted to try a more intentional approach. I wanted to see if I could improve my skills and gain confidence.
So, I chose to do one of Sktchy’s 30 Faces in 30 Days. Sktchy (not a typo) is a community for portrait artists looking to learn new skills, share their art, and get feedback. Everyone is working from the same references during the challenge. One photo could inspire 10 or 10,000 different portraits. I loved this idea!
These were the parameters I set for myself:
1. 9 x 12 watercolor paper taped to finished size of 8 x 10
2. No other purpose than to paint and discover
3. Limited palette
3. Watercolor and graphite only
4. No stylizing — just straight use of materials and interpretation of the references
5. No time constraints, just try to move along fairly quickly
6. The process is the point
7. Make the finished pieces into a collection when done to SHARE on the interwebs
I can tell you that the first portrait in the flip book and the last one are in the right order, but all the others are not. To be honest, I lost track. I can also tell you that it took me closer to 2 months rather than 30 days. Haha It didn’t matter.
Daniel Smith watercolors is what I have been using for more than 5 years now. I’ve tried others, but I love DS. A warm and cool version of each of the primaries, as well as one or two neutrals, is what I generally aimed for (but by no means did I choose the same ones every time). Payne’s Gray and Van Dyke Brown are two of my go to neutrals. I included at least one granulating color also. Sometimes I would paint with the palette they recommended. Sometimes not.
There were a lot of firsts with these portraits because I wasn’t personally selecting the subject. Each one offered a different challenge and an opportunity to leave my comfort zone.
I’d never painted children before (the soft, round features are so different from adults). I’d never painted men before (think beards and bald spots).
“Never painted facial hair and full beards? No problem.
Just keep swimming,” I’d tell myself.
Piercings, wrinkles, tattoos, sunglasses, reflections, jewelry, clothing. There were so many different types of clothing! Denim and lace and leather, patterned and folded and flowered.
Watercolor is a difficult medium to tame. Edges are important…hard edges, soft edges, lost edges. Working light to dark (mostly). Transparent colors vs. semi-transparent vs. opaque. Controlling the water ratio and letting things dry properly before moving on to the next layers (that was a tough one, too).
Each time, my plan was to focus on getting the values and those shapes as close as I could and not get too detailed. But I also had fun with the details and playing around with less than traditional hues for effect and mood.
Many of paintings felt fresh and energetic to me at the end of the day, and many were overworked for sure (it's easy to do in watercolor). I really did try not to fuss with them and to keep my mind moving forward.
It was a push and pull internally, as well as outwardly, on the paper.
The planning took longer than the actual painting. The size of the subject relative to the paper, the composition, and decisions about the background were things I worked out as I sketched. The drawing was important for this process and I learned pretty quickly what information needed to be there for me and what didn't.
A few of the references were just a hard NO on any given day.
Often, I would pull up the email they sent with the reference photo and resistance would set in because either I didn’t like the photo, or it had elements I didn’t want to tackle.
I skipped around a lot, choosing photos that felt ‘easier’ on days I needed them to be. As I progressed, I became less particular about that. I ended up using all but three of the ones provided by Sktchy. Towards the end, I couldn't wait to get back to making ALL the decisions myself.
There were questions I hoped to answer by the end of the challenge and I think I did.
Q: Some would say every painting is a risk; that it's working towards something else; it's failing better each time. Is this true?
A: 110% - This journey is messy, but magic. We have to make really bad art and mediocre art and ‘average’ art to get to the ‘magic’ art. We have to allow room to learn.
Q: Could I complete all the portraits without getting bored or sidetracked or extremely frustrated?
A: Mostly, yes! Hanging each one up on my studio wall and watching the collection build was a big motivator. I didn’t allow frustration to set in on any given day. I loved walking in the room to see all of those faces looking back at me.
Q: Are portraits really a subject matter I want to paint?
A: Yes, yes, yes! I needed a strategy, an intention, and a process that would keep me coming back. And I’ve already moved on to projects of my exact choosing in the last couple of weeks and I'm loving it.
Q: Creative freedom vs. creative focus — Which is more important?
A: Both, in a combination that feels right for you. That’s the simple answer. When it comes to creative freedom, I’ve found that limited parameters give more, not less.
If you allow yourself unlimited time and materials and ideas and set out to create your 'masterpiece', you will flounder around in your own creative soup trying all the things and maybe feeling paralyzed by all the choices. (ask me how I know)
With a plan in place and a limited number of options, you are able to start and know when you're finished and move on to the next project fairly quickly. At least for me, this makes sense and it applies to most things in life that I want to do well.
Q: Does quantity override quality when you’re trying to improve your skills and relax about the whole thing?
A: Yesssssss. Contrary to popular belief, raw talent rarely plays a part in success. I said what I said. Creativity is innate in all of us, 100%, but getting better at making art is a skill. Like anything else, you must do it over and over again to improve (and over and over and over). You wouldn’t expect to play the piano beautifully the first time you sit down and put your hands on the keys, would you?
So, this brings me back to why it feels so vulnerable and why I’m determined to get this written (because I almost didn’t).
I think it’s this:
Our collective creativity as humans has a bigger impact and a deeper meaning than I think we realize. In the moment, it often feels like all we're doing is making art in a vacuum and sending it out into the void to possibly be judged and dismissed.
The value does come in the vulnerability (if it’s on purpose), because you never know who’s watching, reading, or listening. If we tried to only show the very best of ourselves, we’d be leaving out most stuff, wouldn’t we?
Share all that you can. Someone else might need to hear it. I am thankful for others who have done the same for me.
Here’s a few other things I try to keep in mind:
Be bold, even if you feel wobbly or your stuff looks wonky.
Explore everything you want.
Reach for knowledge, obsess over building your skills, but give yourself permission to fail, and remember what it felt like on the first day of school.
Honor and show love for yourself where you’re at right now.
Authentic work doesn’t come from taking shortcuts.
Clarity (truly) comes in the doing.
Create what you want to see in the world.
Erasing the past is no way to make progress. Cherish your early work.
It's interesting to contemplate an artist's work from their early days, isn’t it? You can see the progression as their skills and personal style develop. Sometimes, you can see an exact moment when the artist pivoted, a breakthrough in materials or design or technique, and their work changed forever, on purpose.
Artfully Yours,
