The Art of Practice

Journal Entry: Wednesday, August 24, 2022

fs2927ct10 - collage on paper - Cecil Touchon

NOTE: I have probably used bits of this article in previous posts. As I mentioned in one post, I will occasionally repeat ideas that are foundational that need to be said over and over again to help lock in certain key ideas in the reader’s mind. So if you see something and say ‘Wait a minute, didn’t I read that already?’ Just read it again. The chances are you’ll get a new idea out of it.

An important thing is establishing a regular time to work on your art and a specific place to work on your art. This might be a desk or a wall with a nail or the floor or a chair or an easel depending on the kind of artistic activity you are engaged in – maybe even a whole room or maybe just your smartphone for that matter! I am a collage artist, painter and writer/publisher. For myself I need an easel, a collage table, and a computer on a table. And somewhere for my work supplies. At this point almost our whole 3,200 square foot house is studio. And I could easily use twice as much space as what we have. However, if I am making art while I am traveling, I can make do with a desk or kitchen table and a chair and a canvas bag with the right tools and supplies.

No matter where you live or how you live or what kind of art you practice or how much money you have or don’t have, or what disasters are happening around you, you can establish a space and a time to work every day. Even if you are too exhausted, too distraught, too depressed to work, go to your established space at your established time and just sit there, rest and contemplate rule #1 if nothing else and scribble something on a piece of paper, move things around, sharpen your pencils, write a note to yourself. Often one thing leads to another and soon you are working.  You don’t have to make any particular kind of art. It doesn’t have to be any particular quality. You can start with just some scribbles. Eventually you will have the desire to make improvements or adjustments.

There is no reason to judge anything you make. Is it good or no good? Who cares? It doesn’t matter just like thoughts wandering through your mind. That is something you decide much later, just make it and analyze it later as part of a group of works. It is better that you made something than to make nothing. That is how you develop and evolve. After 40 years I still make works all of the time without any expectation of making something of ‘worth’. Making nothing is a record as well, of not making it to the party. Not participating in the conversation.

Just like meditating, establishing your time and place for working on your creative work is a foundational and critical discipline. Are you too busy? Get up an hour earlier or stay up an hour later or both. You can always find an excuse to not work but why resist it? Excuses are a form of resistance.

If you find that it is nearly impossible for you to show up on time you are sabotaging your future. Pick a different time of the day or night or make an appointment with yourself, schedule yourself into the calendar. It is better to get more time on your work than less time. Be committed to you commitment.

If you are out on the go all of the time at least check in with yourself by creating something like a Google docs document and even from your phone you can add thoughts, notes, etc. to your journal that you can later access from your desktop or other computer that you normally use. There is always time sometime in the day to do something creative and capture it as a poem, a journal entry, a drawing, a photograph.

I did an experiment a couple of years ago where I kept a small sketchbook and a drawing tool with me all of the time and my idea was to make a drawing in all of the spare moments that my hands were free and I could draw something. Usually, they were 30 second to 5 minute drawings. Essentially, I was constantly doodling. I scanned and inventoried everything and every hundred drawings I published as a book. That year I made 868 small drawings not counting my normal artistic production of about 200 paintings and collages. It was a one-year experiment. My drawing production the year prior has been 12 drawings and the year after 220 drawings.

While you might think you don’t have much time to dedicate to making your art, obviously, as I discovered, there are many ‘wasted’ moments every day that, with intention and preparation and vision, you can be creatively productive. With meditation it is the same thing. Do you have 5 minutes free here and there? Use them to meditate.

Rule #2 – Seize the Day - Show up. Work every day at the established time. When the day is gone it is gone forever. You can’t make up for its loss. Make it habitual to show up on time.

Another thing that showing up every day does is it helps to signal the people around you that you are actually working and you are serious about it. If you only work on your art sporadically the people around you will assume you are not that serious and that they can encroach on your time since it is just a hobby as far as they can tell.

Early on I figured out that I needed to work hours that seemed like regular work time to most people and then, during those hours, I am ‘at work’ even if I am taking a nap from working in the middle of the night or reading something (research and development).

Artists, in a business sense, are manufacturers. We are making stuff for a presumed future market. If somebody asked me to do something I would just say ‘I am still at work, I get off at X o’clock, I can help you out then’. People normally respect that others can’t leave work to go do some random thing except in an emergency.

In terms of a sustainable lifestyle, you are going to have to think about what you are doing as a business. Since I am a visual artist, I think in terms of the production of products. This might be paintings or collages or drawings or photographs, sculptures, etc. but then there are poems, x number of pages a day of a novel or a screenplay resulting in published material, maybe beats, songs, compositions, recordings. Might be theatre, acting or performance gigs, concerts, etc. Our culture has a lot of artistic products and markets that go with them. The arts are rich with possibilities. But only a few of those possibilities are specific to any one of us depending on what kind of creative life we are living.

The production of products or artifacts is the first key to a self-sustaining artistic lifestyle. This is really just a matter of working in a way that generates sellable artifacts. Instead of drawing on a napkin, draw on a sheet of acid free art paper. Instead of singing in the shower, sing in front of a microphone with a recorder. If writing a poem or a story, keep going until it is finished and polished, organize them into a book document. Then publish it some way or other. Etc. and so forth. Do you love to have conversations, record them and post on youtube, etc.

Life is not about selling things. There is a danger of getting into the trap of thinking that way, but really, it is about pursuing your creative interests and getting better and deeper at it. If there is a market demand for what you are doing, good for you. But that is not the real purpose. Living out your creative life is the purpose. Discovering who you are and becoming who you could be is the purpose. Creating economic sustainability is a means to those purposes. There is no reason not to design the production of products into what you do. Once accumulated you have the option to exhibit them or sell them or you can just keep all of your work to yourself or give them away or trade for a work from another artist.

I think of it as setting up a basket to catch all of your interesting thoughts and ideas. I call it the ‘drip method’ like putting a bucket under a dripping faucet and eventually the bucket will be full to overflowing. You have caught the things that would otherwise be gone and forgotten that didn’t seem that significant at the time but in retrospect and with accumulation you will find that it does add up to something significant taken as a whole.

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