Ten Best Art Mantras

The Ten Best Art Mantras

 Here are the ten best ideas to hold in you mind around painting, at least that's how it is for me at this moment in time. In no particular order-

1. The Three D's: Drive, Desire, and Discipline
2. Simplify your subject.
3. Think of shapes, not objects.
4. Use the largest brush you can for as long as you can.
5. Don't worry about making a mistake. It's just paint on a surface.
6. Paint from the large shapes to the small shapes.
7. Pay attention to edges- hard, soft and lost.
8. Remember what attracted you in the first place and paint that.
9. Be willing to make a lot of bad paintings, it happens before you get to the goodies.
10. Paint the same subject several times in a series.

  

"Gravely Spring"  6" x 12" more info

  Gravely Spring (above) is part of a pretty long series about trees. I have an intense interest in painting trees for some reason that is not part of my logical brain, the impulse is completely intuitive. The series goes forward without any sign of ending. Look around your nearby forest and you may see me there with my tippy easel trying to understand trees...

All the performances of human art, at which we look with praise and wonder, are instances of the restless force of perseverence. (Ben Jonson)