One of the things I keep telling myself is that the only way to get better is to practice. And that some of that practice will be pretty bad. And some might be kinda OK. If I am lucky, some of it might even be decent.
So with that in mind, about a month ago, I challenged myself over the course of an hour or so one evening to use my Tombow (watercolor) and Copic (alcohol) art markers to make a few simple impressionistic sketches. The self-imposed ground rules would be that I would limit myself to no more than 10 minutes for each piece, measured from the time I pulled out a new 6" by 8" sheet of Strathmore Marker paper to being done and prohibited from adding anything else. The results were...varied.
The first was sun setting over water. Not good. Not bad. Just uniformly mediocre.
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| Sunset Sky (#1) |
The second piece was a mountain lake with sun setting behind the mountain. I like everything about this one with the exception of wishing I had skipped the sunset part, which ruins the piece (to my eye). Not a bad idea, but poorly executed.
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| Mountain Lake (#2) |
The third piece was a fantasy inspired tower on a rocky promontory overlooking the sea. I like everything about this except for the tower itself.
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| Tower by the Sea (#3) |
The fourth piece was a view of distant fields. This is inspired by the oil paintings of Stuart Davies, whom I have been watching on YouTube. This is like #1 in that it doesn't feel overly good or bad to me - just uniformly mediocre. Although I do think I like the sky better than the land.
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| Distant Fields (#4) |
The fifth one of these is my favorite, by far. It is inspired by a real place, and very vivid memories from throughout my childhood and young adulthood. Brother Dave would hopefully look at this, read the caption, and say "yeah, I can see that." Hopefully. We've both seen that view often enough... In addition to being a real place, I think this is the best of this bunch from both a composition and execution standpoint. I like it a lot.
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| Sunset over Ordinary Point (#5) |
So there we have it. Five little pieces of art. I would have to say that this was a very useful exercise, and one that I will be repeating again in the near future (and possibly on a routine basis). Nothing beats practice, in any endeavor or artistic medium, and the result of this specific iteration is one little marker sketch that I really love.
I claim victory.
They all look great!
ReplyDeleteYou're right, the only way to get better at anything is to keep doing it, enjoy the journey, and as little judgment about "good"/"bad" as possible.
Fantastic. Good for you.