My Top 5 Possibly Unnecessary (yet awesome) Art Tips

Art is an incredibly individual process, as I think we are all aware, however once you’ve been doing art for a while you have a tendency to come up with your own series of individual tips and tricks that make your art go a little faster and a little smoother.

I compiled these tips in order to remind myself that I have a process for my art and that if it is useful to me, it might be useful to you. So although these may seem like unnecessary art tips nothing is unnecessary if it works.

Number one: learn how to see. This sounds ridiculous, however, I was working on this digital painting which was my first attempt at ever doing something photorealistic and realized the trick for me was to stop seeing what I assumed I was seeing, and actually look at each individual speck of color on its own. I did this by zooming quite far in until I could no longer see the metaphorical forest for the trees and was able to zero in on just one strip of color. What was actually happening in here? What shade of orange was that? How close was that to the edge? Where were these little specks coming in? I wasn’t trying to look at it as though it were ice, I was trying to look at it as though it was just abstract colors. Then when I zoomed out it looked like I had miraculously made a piece of ice. It was kind of bonkers.

My second art tip is to find a routine. Just like being an author, you have to get into this kind of repetition where you arrive regardless of if the muse is there. Showing up is probably the most important thing besides just figuring out how to see what you’re seeing. If you’re not there, the art can’t happen. If you’re there, bad art can happen and that is better than no art. Occasionally great art happens, too of course. It’s the same as in the writing world: you show up, you put some words on a page it, and hope for the best. It doesn’t matter if the words are crappy because the exist and you can work with that. It doesn’t have to be anything crazier than that. Pick a time that works for you whether it’s first thing in the morning, last thing at night, or over lunch and just make sure you make time to doodle, draw, write, whatever your creative heart desires.

As for my third tip: eat good food. This one sounds a little weird, but I have chronic stomach issues and have found that the better I treat my diet the better my creativity can be. And I think this extends far beyond just someone with chronic issues. We overlook the power of health when it comes to doing things that don’t seem to require a tremendous amount of bodily effort.

We all know we need to take care of our wrists and avoid carpal tunnel, but we miss the fact that what we’re putting in our body is then going to fuel our brain. Take beets for example.  I’ve been reading Dr. Michael Gregor’s books and he talks about beets and how they increase the oxygen that your brain can use. I didn’t understand how (science isn’t my forte) but I searched online and found free divers will use beet juice order to get an extra 30 seconds out of their dives. These are people that will hold their breath for 7 minutes or more—not even kidding.

Think about what all that oxygen can do for your brain when you are in the middle of your creative endeavor. For me personally, I’ll get so in the zone that I actually forget to breathe, so having that extra oxygen keeping my brain functioning on top of making sure that it’s got the fuel it needs is probably a little important.

Tip four: play. Don’t take your art, your book, or yourself too seriously. This world has enough serious crap happening in it, and you can be the most dedicated, epic artist or writer out there, and you still you don’t want to be mired in this concept of being too studious and too professional. Once you let go of your perceived expectations on what you think people need of you, or what you think people want to see/will get you the most likes/will get you the most views, then you’ll free up brain bandwidth to then use for your projects. What matters is that you are doing art that brings you joy, that is expressing something that you need to express, that is helping you explore your own emotions, your own mind, and that you are able to then share that with whatever piece of the world you want to share it with—whether it is sharing it only with your loved one, or sharing it on the Internet to probably a void but that’s OK because you made something. I may or may not be speaking just to myself right now. Moving on.

Tip #5 your environment matters. Artists and creators are an incredible breed of humans. We can create in any situation, and we often have and do, but when you are a regular “career creator” it is important to make sure that the space you are creating in encourages your creativity. I spent the last two years creating at a small folding table and my creativity suffered. I don’t think it’s specifically the folding table, but we were living in a very unsettled, temporary way. We didn’t know how long we were staying, we didn’t know how to utilize the space, we didn’t know which of our things we needed, etc, but we’ve recently moved and rediscovered a foundation. I’ve been able to set up a proper desk and put up a little art on the walls and even have little fun trinkets that inspire me—such as chibi Disney villains and my jade plant. These are the things that are so influential to my state of mind that they translate directly into my level of creativity.

So let’s do a quick recap: you’re going to want to learn to see what it is you’re seeing and not what you’re at assuming that you see. You want to find a routine that helps you show up and get ready for the art whether the muse is there or not. You want to eat good food so that your brain is in a good place, so then your body is in a good place, so then your creativity can absolutely blossom (and special hint: that blossoming is probably going to happen from eating a lot more plants. Sorry). You want to make sure that you’re playing and having a good time with whatever it is you’re doing even if you’re on deadlines or working for a difficult client. And finally, your environment matters. Making things pretty and shiny around you might be exactly what you need to make things pretty and shiny on the page.

So go out there, find the version of these that works for you, and let me know if you have your own version of these tips. Most importantly: Keep creating.

Stay awesome and I’ll meet you back here again soon. See ya.