Art Firosofeee

Oct 16, 2007 18:48

This has been kind of brewing in my mind lately. So I thought I would get it out.

(I promise you this isn't a RANT)

Over the years ( and the last few months especially) I've become reasonably confident in the skills I have as an artist. Whether it is to make a background, break down anatomy, expressions, etc. I think it's actually important to have this kind of confidence. Where mine particularly stems from is how many boundaries I've been able to break.

I fully believe that Bruce Lee's philosophy on martial arts can be applied to visual and written story telling and art. One of the greatest boundaries young artists (well young and old) is the attribute of style. This has come up as a problem to me in filmmaking because i beleive that style can inhibit if it becomes a handicap. I suppose I can define style the best way I can right now,

Style is the way that an artist of any kind manipulates and changes the basics and the ways things are done.

People become so obsessed with becomming unique and different that they seek a different look, or try to look like their favorite artist. Unfortunately one of the ways that people look at this kind of thing is "the easiest" way to do art. Thusly why you will see so many Tim Burton and Jhonen Vasqueze work. I'm going to tell you right now. You can get as many comments, favourites and watches as you like, but the fact of the matter is that you will never be that unique. It's because the position of Jhonen Vasqueze and Tim Burton have already been taken.

Being different and unique is not a bad thing, in fact I embrace it. I also think it's great to want to be. The one thing you will want to keep in mind is a thing that all people lose sight of at one point or another. That is the BIG PICTURE. Don't be afraid to screw up, don't be afraid to venture outside your comfort zone. Draw from realism, who cares if it's bad. You can't say that makes your "style" bad. I'll get to this later.

People who don't typically know art (at least the inner workings of it) will misuse the term style. The way someone draws, and someone's style are actually two separate things altogether. If something looks off or wrong, it's not their style, it truly is off or wrong. This may mean that the artist themselves are not fully trained. It's not a bad thing, it just means that there is work to be done.

Too many times however people will stubbornly defend a person's foux style and this kind of ego-boost will also inhibit the artist themselves from improving. You will see many people state that the mistake is, "It's just my style." I'd like to call that a sorry ass excuse for not being able to draw better... but I digress.

Ultimately as I have said before, all artists, in one manor or another, wish to be unique and different from the crowd. So they seek a way to change things. Here's a golden rule to remember:

If you wish to change the way things work, then learn how they work in the first place.

This is where Bruce Lee's philosophy comes in. To this day I refuse to accept the idea I have a style. This in itself means that that this is my style. I still see myself as learning and I doubt that that will ever change. However there will come a point where I will develop a style, but the thing is that even if it is something simplistic or Genndy Tartakovski-esque, I would still be able to draw it realistically or be able to immitate other people's styles without hesitation.

You will find artists who try to travel outside their comfort zone to be easily discouraged and stop trying because they are bad at it. Some will say that it made their art worse. Like say life-drawing. Life drawing... does NOT, ABSOLUTELY POSITIVELY DOES NOT make you worse as an artist. What may happen is a simple thing where psychologically the way you do things can break down, and things will start to look primitive again. What you are doing is first including small elements that you have never used before, so things are going to look bad for a little bit. But what may be happening (if you keep practicing, for the love of GOD don't stop) is that the elements will be incorporated into your art and it will look even better than before.

Style before the basics is like the old story I've heard before. Style before the basics are usually just a series of bad habbits and not really good drawing at all. A habbit, of any form, is inhibiting to some degree. It's like an old man who, for years, walked down a path to get water, as tired as he got of walking down the path, it was so well inlaid, he found it hard and practically impossible to travel different paths and see new things. He could not see any other part of the woods he traveled in because he only traveled the one path.

Style is the icing on the cake. It's small, and indeed important, but if you have a badly baked cake then that icing isn't going to do much for you.

What will make you a trully great artists are the great many paths you know to get to your goal on paper. Not just the finished product.

Anyway, that's what I have to say on that.
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