RULES FOR PAINTERS? RULES FOR LIFE

 

In the first term one particular tutor provided advice and encouragements in the Painting and Colour Theory classes. A natural teacher*, with a lightness of touch, that  

I started to capture her ideas verbatim. Some are highly practical others knowingly philosophical. There were over thirty. Here are some and read like lessons for anyone's life.

RULES FOR PAINTERS - extracts

 

 

1.     Stand back from your work every two minutes to take stock.

2.     Don’t tickle your painting. Instead, go somewhere one it, do it and then again, stand    back.

3.     Painting is active practise not meditation.

4.     Start with overall form then go to detail at the finish

5.     Speed: What can you do to speed up the process? Avoid making the paper too wet for example.

6.      Time management. Meaning¹ tactics to ensure you are not waiting around. Instead have several pieces on the go at once.

7.     Never stop making work.

8.     The last surviving painter on this planet is the one truly driven to paint.

9.     What strategies can you develop to deflect influences that stop you enjoying painting?

10.  Never stop making marks.

11.  Painting demands huge reserves of energy, mental and physical.

12.  Don’t sit to paint, it drains your energy.

13.  Painting is knowing we have done our best.

14.  Don’t work about the system, worry about being an artist.

15.  Painting is about discipline, the long haul and going through hell and back.

16.  Painting is about how you see the world around you.

 

 

¹meaning mass production 

*She reminded me of Hector in Alan Bennett's The History Boys, Hector's  classes always appearing effortless, full of fun and deeper meaning