Jerry Saltz is my Muse
Last year, I read "How to be an Artist" by Jerry Saltz. He is the "Brad Pitt" of art critics. His book is a motivational book of art proverbs. I have listed the most impactful ones for me personally below. Number #42 is my daily mantra that I must repeat even when my inner critic tells me how bad I am. I hope you enjoy the cliff notes version:
The artist is on a continually evolving path, accumulating experience but always starting over.
From the moment a new work is completed, the artist is parted from the work, and the viewer, in turn, becomes a participant in it. The viewer completes the work, unmasking and remaking it.
If you're an aspiring artist, I want you to remember: Nothing happens if you're not working. But anything can happen when you are.
I want you to trust yourself because that's what you'll need to get you through the dark hours of the creative night.
Let go of being "good." Start thinking about creating.
You have to earn an audience
Style is the unstable essence an artist brings to a genre
Any convention can be turned into a great tool, hijacked in service of your own vision
Keep a pocket-size sketch pad with you at all times.
Sister Mary Corita Kent said, "The only rule is work. If you work, it will lead to something. It's the people who do all of the work all the time who eventually catch on to things."
Many great artists, writers, actors, and others started late
An artwork should express thought and emotion
A work of art cannot depend on explanation. The meaning has got to be there in the work.
It's as good as it can be right now, and that's probably more than good enough. You'll make the next one better, or different, or more like yourself. Do not get hung up working on one super-project forever.
Train yourself to look deliberately, and the mysteries of your taste and eye will become clearer to you. (Looking at art)
Artists see very differently. They get up very close to a work.
If you're stymied by some artists, keep their names on a list and keep coming back to them.
The subject matter of Francis Bacon's 1953 Study after Velázquez's Portrait of Pope Innocent X is a pope, a seated male in a transparent sort of box. That's it. The content, however, is the dark matter within the art that powers it, pushing it out at us, pulling us in. Bacon's content includes rage against authority; an indictment of religion, claustrophobia, hysteria, the madness of civilization; a protest against British strictures on homosexuality; the need for love; the powers of disgust and beauty; and sheer visual force.
Don't resist something if you're afraid it's taking you far afield of your usual direction
Be Matisse. If you paint awkwardly, make it work for you.
Hold on to your taste, even when you're embarrassed by it. Those darker sides of your taste can be secret drivers of your art. It might be 1960s psychedelic posters, comic strips ... whatever. These are forms of ancestor worship. Never renounce them for the sake of others' pieties.
You are an artist of modern life.
Whenever you're not sure what to do next in your work, momentarily shift your focus and pay attention to whatever songs, sounds, sights, words, news stories, images, or books happen to cross your field of awareness.
Every good work of art has courage in it somewhere.
Don't limit your potential by presenting yourself as just one kind of maker
Do everything you can to bond with artists.
Always protect the weakest artist in your gang.
Remember that only 1 percent of 1 percent of 1 percent of all artists get rich from their artwork
The best definition of success is time - the time to do your work
If you work very hard and try to be very honest with yourself, your art might tell you almost everything you need to know about yourself.
You have to put yourself out there. No matter how hard it is for you. You have to show up, apply to everything, go to openings even if it's just to stand around feeling inadequate. (The secret is, 80 percent of us are doing exactly this at most openings- and we often end up meeting other interesting artists there, commiserating, sharing thoughts about the work.) Talk to the other wallflowers! Most galleries, curators, collectors, and critics learn about artists through other artists. Pay attention to what the galleries are showing; figure out which ones might like what you do. Forget about the mega-galleries; look for places and people who might see your work as an opportunity. Don't overprice your work when you're getting started, either - that only makes it harder for anyone to take chance on you. (Jeff Koons priced his early work at less than fabrication cost.)
When it comes to writing artist statements: Keep it simple, stupid. Don't make writing a big deal.
The artist Julian Lethbridge has formulated an efficient description of wanting: "To be an artist," he says, "it helps to be persistent, obstinate, and determined. These are the things that enable an artist not to banish but to outwit the doubts that will come from many directions.
Envy distracts the mind, leaving less room for development and, most important, for honest self-criticism
Vow never to miss a deadline. If you don't have a deadline, set one for yourself
Accept that any piece of criticism might have a grain of truth to it
Art gives up its secrets very slowly. Thirty months isn't enough; it takes a lifetime
Probably 90 percent of all artists have had children
The biggest reward may be that artists' kids tend to have amazingly diverse, wonderful lives
Anyone may experience your art - any art - in any way that works for them
At the end of each day, you know something you didn't know at the beginning
I have one solution to turn away these demons: After beating yourself up for half an hour or so, stop and say out loud, "Yeah, but I'm a fucking genius."
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