I learn from others, as much as others learn from me, not only by observation, but also by engaging in discussion about the work. I started the course hoping not only to be pushing myself, I expect others to push me as well, by giving me advice, sharing ideas, saying good with the bad. I expect that there is something someone might not like, someone to give me brutal truth, and not to worry about sparing my feelings, because only way I will learn and progress is if I push myself because of what was said about my work. I expect more than just: "uhmmmm its good" For me part of the growing is observing, and being able to express in words what you see in front of you, ie i like this part, its well done, however I do not like this and this because of .... I expect that from people teaching course and from other students. I do expect everyone to have an opinion, and to be able to express it... my feelings wont get hurt by one expressing them, they will however by people being silent, or by just stating positives. I like work dissected, analysed, because that is how I learn. I don't learn by someone serving me over-sugared, watered-down lemonade.
Since I finally decided to do in life what I truly love, some 6 years ago, which is painting and art, I have pushed myself hard, starting from stick figures and extremely loose work, to now days very tight work where I obsess over things being executed the way I want to. I get frustrated when things do not work out, but I push paint till I end up with the result that I might like. I observe other artist work, and look in it for things which I enjoy, which work, and try to apply things I learned from their work to my own. I look at many different surrealist nowdays, especially those dabbing into dark side of surrealism, macabre, and groups that produce work by collaboration like Exquisite Corpse I also like hyper-realism, and works by people like Denis Peterson, (yes his works are acrylic paintings not photos), Armin Mersmann, (yes its graphite work) to whom I have been thankful for some incredible support and advice they gave me in past. I also love nudes by awesome Australian figure artist David Wells, who has been my friend, supporter and mentor for past few years.
Thing is I am here to learn so please push me, criticise me, be brutally honest that is only way for me to grow.
Sandra, There will be some hard hitting critiques coming up in May that will review everyone's work and push boundaries. It is early days yet.
ReplyDeleteYou are right you have a lot to learn, but I ask you to trust that as a teacher of 25 years experience I have my own sense of timing.
For the moment I suggest you heed my advice I gave you on Tuesday. The drawing this week was observational and required hard looking, measurement and looking at spacial relationships. This you can do better by adjustment and editing. Your technique is quite individual, and I was genuine in quite liking the approach. D