About drawing and painting

[Dias]

Hi! About painting and drawing I remember that as a young teenager I enjoyed doing something very similar to what now I know to be Mandalas, that lasted for some months and it stopped. At school I was good at copying something but not so creative to start anything new.
Sometimes I feel the urge to paint something but I don't know how to start. My difficulty is also this: I think that if you start a drawing or painting and if you are not super talented than it is a project that can take days or weeks or more until it is complete. Well, when I start something I need to finish it in the same day or it drives me crazy...knowing this I don't even start...I would like to be able to have and keep a project where I could spend some of my time when wanted without going crazy or anxious to finish it. I would like to enjoy the creative process as much or more than the completion of it. Does anyone else feels like this?And how to handle it?

 

[Loren]

Yes, I experience this, but, not as much with art/art projects, as with other things. Leaving things unfinished or incomplete, etcetera, is not an easy feat for me, and in my case is attributed to OCD. All you can do is to practice leaving things in thier present state for periods of time. A painting/ drawing project would be perfect for this.

 

[inkfingers]

Hmm. I have the opposite problem! I start a bunch of art projects, whether they are painting or crochet, and then I put them aside to start a new one. I have trouble finishing what I have started.

 

[Monachopia]

To just start creating without knowing where to start, perhaps following a tutorial on YouTube or SkillShare would be a good place to look. After the initial creator block is broken, you can go on from there to add your own flow to things.

I try to create something all the time, but I don't force myself to finish. Sometimes I still lack the skill to do it justice, and that's ok. I leave it, and then maybe 2 or more years later I come back to it and have the knowledge how it should be.

 

[Tom]

Maybe work out a sketch for a painting one day, and keep the style simple. Then do the painting another day. I think there are pads of paintable paper you can use rather then canvas which is expensive. For paint I would suggest a small set of acrylics and a few brushes. A 'fan brush' is nice for quick effects. Also you might try watercolors which are less expensive and tend towards quicker work. Though I never caught the hang of watercolors myself and am not sure about it.

 

[Theta.G]

Yes i feel you. It's a bit of a mind trick i guess. Once you actually get started then it's no problem.
However with inaction thoughts tend to run wild / the devils playground of drifting.
"Oh but what if do it in the wrong order, what if i don't have enough reference materials? how should i do the color palette!!!! how will i do this lighting or that shading..."
... All of that becomes answered once you get started.
Maybe gather some reference material. Start doing some outlines of whatever your drawing / painting. Rough sketches. Through those outlines or rough sketches you'll start to see what would go good where. Your color palette will begin to emerge. The visualized light source will add depth to your vision and illuminate the piece.

Tl;DR
This:

 

[Sid Delicious]

Even with professional art, it can take weeks, months, years to finish a large project. But I think the key is to break it down into smaller mini projects (as with most things) and tackle one at a time. Spend one day just planning the work and doing a very very rough sketch. The next day start on a detailed undersketch. Then start blocking in colours (I tend to spend an extra day beforehand covering the whole canvas/board/whatever in a base colour - ocre for warm tones, blue/teal for cold). Then start filling in the details of one section on another day. Then the same for each new section until the whole project is done. Then maybe leave it a week and come back to it to see if you can make any improvements. It's been a while since I've done any real painting, but in the past I could spend up to three months working on a large (A3+) very detailed project.

 

[Dias]

Thank you for your replies. I suppose the main thing for me is really just start and allow the individual creativity to manifest instead of having expectations and rigid ideas of how it should be. And accept that whatever is the final result it is ok because it is a part of me.

 

[Clueless in Canada]

I love to paint but it takes a huge amount of energy which I don't always have. I keep a variety of sketch books around so I can do different things depending on my mood and ability of the day. You mentioned mandalas and that made me wonder if you might like doing zentangles. You can set up all the pages in advance in a little sketch book and then draw zentangles any time anywhere. You can spend as little or as much time as you want at it.

 

[Dias]

Hi.
I didn't know this art form called zentangles.
I will try it. It is a very simple thing to do and it seems to fit me.
Thanks

 

[Clueless in Canada]

Hi.
I didn't know this art form called zentangles.
I will try it. It is a very simple thing to do and it seems to fit me.
Thanks

You are welcome. I have a little square sketch book, pen and pencil by my bed and I can even do Zentangles if I am having a rest in bed day. I hope you enjoy giving it a try.

 

[Dias]

This is what I like to do. Just patterns really.

 

[Clueless in Canada]

I love the blue and white and they remind of me of tiles. I am really bad at symmetry so doing this or mandalas would be an exercise in frustration for me.

 

[lateundiagnosed]

i am about to paint something and i dont expect it to last more than an hour. i watched someone paint with one of those pallet knife. it was extraordinary, i hate brushes anyway ,one mistake and its ruined,lol. im going to use brushes for the background tho because im just making a sky or something then start using the pallet knife to sort of draw like with a pin. when i finish ill post it. remember im a poor planner so.

 

[Butterfly88]

This is what I like to do. Just patterns really.

Nice! I see this post is old but just wanted to say this kind of reminds me of delftware by the colors.
Delftware - Wikipedia

 

[Moonhart44]

I feel like a lot of the creative process requires discipline. the idea of being inspired suddenly and that inspriation supposin to carry you for 20 hours of work is a little . . . ludicrous, meaning how can one do that? that surely is a lot of inpiration. It takes experience to learn to work longer and longer. I remember it took me 5 hours to draw one rose and now, 5 years later, i can draw one in one minute if i wanted to. It sounds like a long time, but also can feel very rewarding. Also keep yourself from distractions, that helps.