Inspiration Fridays! Can you leave it alone?

Can you leave it alone?

Knowing when a painting is finished and then actually choosing to stop is a very underrated skill. It’s hard to stop. And not just because we’re secretly desperate for some ambiguous form of external approval, which then triggers our hypercritical perfectionism, manifesting in carefully, overworked paintings that look pretty much like we would expect (Oh… is that just me?), but because painting is like candy, it’s addictive.

“Art is never finished, only abandoned.” – Leonardo da Vinci

I was trained in the language of observation. Realism. Objectivity. Comparison. That classicism is still in there. But lately, I’ve been chasing something a little messier.

Painting realistically is like using a paper roadmap. 1 inch equals a mile. How many miles from here to Vancouver?
“Oh that’s where the eyeball is!’
How many miles to San Francisco?
“Oh, there’s the bottom of the chin!”

Abstraction is ditching the map and trusting the constellations. You might get where you’re headed, you might not.  It’s a bigger map and you can only read it after sunset.

8paint Inspiration Friday can you leave it alone

Works in Progress (mostly me)

There’s joy in letting go of the need to finish in a tidy, polished way. The longer I try to “complete” a piece, the more I risk squeezing the life out of it. I’ve “improved” pieces into oblivion. That awkward, electric tension between what’s rendered and what’s left raw? The wild brushstrokes, the unexplained edges, the bold choices I almost paint over? That’s me trusting the work. Trusting myself.

Realism gave me the tools. Abstraction reminds me to play.

If art is never finished, we don’t have to be either. We just have to know when to stop, and start the next one. I still don’t always get it right. But I’ve learned that sometimes, the boldest move you can make… is stepping away.

What’s one part of your work you’re tempted to “fix” that might actually be the most honest?

What signals do you listen for when deciding a piece is done?

Can you leave it alone?

 

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Inspiration Fridays! Is the tangent actually the main event?

Is the tangent actually the main event?

You know that feeling. You’re totally lit up about something, maybe even slightly unhinged. That can’t-stop-talking-about-it electric energy that makes your friends slowly back away? Yeah. That’s the good stuff.

“Creativity is a natural extension of our enthusiasm.” – Earl Nightingale

When we are following what excites us, the creativity flows. Getting ourselves to the studio is easy. Ideas show up faster. The whole experience of creating feels less like work and more like play. Which, ironically, is when our work gets really interesting.

Too often, we try to muscle our way through the act of making art. We show up with furrowed brows and tight shoulders, determined to be “productive” or “serious” or (my personal favorite) “legit.” The best paintings rarely come from that place. They come from joy. From curiosity. From full-throttle enthusiasm about some weird little idea that won’t leave us alone.

8paint Inspiration Friday Is the tangent actually the main event

Seclusion – Gabriel Mark Lipper – Acrylic on Canvas – 48″x48″

Gabriel Mark Lipper – Acrylic on Panel – 24″x49″You don’t have to wait for inspiration to strike like lightning.  Just pay attention to whatever makes your eyes light up. What colors are you obsessed with right now? What shapes keep showing up in your sketchbook? What painting would you make if no one else ever had to see it?

What are you ridiculously into right now?

What would your next painting look like if it was powered by pure joy?

Is the tangent actually the main event?

 

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Inspiration Fridays! Make It Yours (Even When It’s Theirs)

Make It Yours (Even When It’s Theirs)

Commissions, in an ideal world, can be a magic act of collaboration, but they can just as easily slip into the category of “group project gone wrong”.

“Every good painter paints what he is.” – Jackson Pollock

There’s nothing more dangerous than the idea of trying to make “good” art, whatever that means. Especially when creating not just for a hypothetical audience, but a very specific and real person. A person who loves what you do and has chosen to commission you to do something for them.

That kind of admiration makes it easy to loose ourselves. The compliment comes with an impossible melding of the minds. Not only do we need to create, they need to love what we create.

But my job isn’t to disappear inside their expectations. It’s to bring myself to the work.

Make It Yours (Even When It's Theirs)

Gabriel Mark Lipper – Acrylic on Panel – 24″x49″

Instead of asking, “Is this good?”, or even worse, “Will they like it?, try asking… “Is this me?”

It’s easy enough to second guess ourselves without going the extra mile and trying to second guess someone else. Why did they come to you? The thing that makes your paintings exciting for them isn’t how universally appealing they are. No one can make this work but you. What if the part you’re trying to smooth out, in anticipation of their preference or taste, the part that feels too strange, too abrupt or even, too soft, is actually the best part?

Commissions have challenged me, paid my bills, and pushed my skills in directions I never could have expected. One thing that I’ve learned is that I don’t know, and it doesn’t help to try to guess. If I try to paint as someone else and succeed, I may end up with another commission posing as someone I’m not. I like to focus on what happens in combustible space where their hopes and imaginations intersect with what lights me up.

Do your best work. Make the thing only you could make. And let the rest take care of itself.

 

What’s one thing in your work that only you would do?

What have you second guessed that ended up being the best part?

 

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