GIVE UP ART

They definitely have helped me. The first thing that I would recommend is to go easy on yourself. In fact, however, that rarely happens. Most artists have to work really hard to get good at what they do. Although there are exceptions, most artists have to spend a ton of time practicing and refining their skills before they get really good. Think about it for a minute. Nobody expects people to be born knowing how to perform surgery or how to solve complex mathematical equations.

Instead, there is an expectation that things like math, science, etc. It makes sense that you would have to spend a lot of time refining your skills and practicing if you really want to get good. Every time you pick up a paintbrush, you are mastering skills that are going to help get you where you want to go. The key is to keep trying.

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Even if it feels like you are getting nowhere, I guarantee that you are making progress. Make sure that you save all of the art you do. Not only is it a great record of all of the hard work that you have put into the process but it also can be a fantastic way to check your progress. Compare it to what you are doing now. If you have been practicing diligently, there is a high likelihood that the art you are doing now is far better than the art that you were doing then.

Look for areas of improvement. Chances are, you will see a lot of them when you really start looking. Consistent practice is the only way to get better. Keeping a sketchbook is a fantastic way to build your skills. I would even recommend keeping more than one sketchbook. I have several sketchbooks going at any given time, each of which is for a slightly different purpose. One of my sketchbooks literally cost less than two dollars.

I use this sketchbook for messy activities like testing out paint colors, practicing making lines, doodling, or just messing around. The reason why I opted to get a super cheap sketchbook is because I found myself feeling hesitant to make a mess in my more expensive sketchbooks. I then have another slightly more expensive sketchbook that I use for doing basic sketches. If you're in it only for the money or accolades, assess where you're showing and be honest about your work versus the competition and remember, art and how art is judged is subjective.

If you're too depressed to go on, see the paragraph above. Lastly, if you're doing your best, really want it and are getting nowhere maybe you need a second opinion to put you on the right track.

That goes for your work and your marketing. There is enough talent, experience, knowledge right here on FASO to fill countless books. Read old blogs, read books, ask someone whose work you admire to look at yours and even offer to pay them for their time. There are definitely solutions. Pick the one and start.

Recognition, awards, and accolades elude almost everyone, regardless of career path - artist, actor, attorney, accountant. Good luck to the artist in question, who may continue to struggle even after leaving the art world, if external validation and praise is the goal. We frustrated artists should do what some famous writers have done, i.

As the "tries-and-misses" pile up, the art gets better. Honing a craft was never really easy. Raw talent doesn't build skill. Awards can be "luck", not really a "sign of merit. Brian, I have a different take. Not every artist is meant to make art. Some become artist because others told them they can draw so they should become one. I've known several artists give up these past four or five years. I didn't encourage them to keep going. I wonder if they got in the wrong field when they began. One very skilled painter wanted to give up, but I encouraged him to work harder and smarter. He is still making art.

He was meant to paint. We just had another one of Mikki's galleries fold. They had been in business 35 years. Times are tougher than I can remember. I survived the Jimmy Carter years, which were not as bad as things are now. People are scared to spend. We have been forced to become very inventive to maintain a nice income. Traditional hanging art on the walls no longer works for us. If I had not been immediately successful I often wonder how long I'd hung on. This was money. I had little kids to feed. Money was the key factor in my staying on as an artist. Kids seems to like to eat everyday.

I gave selling art three days.

• Maria Toumazou in Nicosia.
• Sunset (Bello).
• In The Valley Of The Shadow.
• 6. Bezpieczny dom (Salatka po amerykansku (po polsku, Polish version)).
• Las verdaderas mentiras (Spanish Edition).

If I had not sold something in three days I would have taken a job as a construction foreman. If I had not made that small sale my art career would have ended before I got started. I know that's not what folks want to hear, but it's the truth. My passion to be the best I could be drove me, but without an income I could not of continued. I would never have done art as a hobby. I can't do anything without giving it my all. I agree on the pity party. Instead of feeling sorry, give the supplies to someone that can use them and get a 9 to 5 if he can.

Mikki's younger brother got laid off and can't find a job. He is working part time because no one wants to pay health insurance. I no longer pressure artists to stay in the field if their heart is not in it. Get out and find something that makes you happy. If you can do something else you love then go for it. Art is a jealous lover Once I got hooked I couldn't leave. Art became my life. Now I feel the same way about writing. I have the desire to be the best I can be. I refuse to allow my lack of skills to keep me down. I continue to hack away day in and day out on another book. With 12 finished one more ready to be edited I'm working on Great topic as you always come up with.

Here is a true story about David Ferrer, the tennis player. As a young player his coach was upset with him for not working hard enough and locked him in a shed child abuse here but apparently OK in Spain. When David was let out, he chose to quite playing tennis and went to work in construction. After two weeks he went back to his coach and asked, please to be taken back. Since that incident Ferrer has become one of the most dedicated and hard working tennis players out there.

Let your friend quite. If he has the passion he will be back, better than ever. If not, than he doesn't have the passion and it is best that he do something else. Lack of recognition is not a reason to give up. It means that your style may not be popular with the judges in the contests you've entered or the awards you've gone out for OR that you're not entering enough contests, promoting yourself well enough, working in the right mediums for those contests -- and get this -- very very often contest judges face HARD CHOICES!

They have three prizes to give out and maybe 25 or 30 in the final rounds that they personally love and have to start nit picking on. This is where things like "Favorite subject" or "Hey someone didn't fill out the entry form exactly right, drop it" starts coming in. Always be very careful to follow every rule in a contest exactly. And then you're still taking pot luck. Not winning an award doesn't mean anything except that you tried for it.

Honorable Mentions are winning something - that's big in itself. It's also useful for marketing. That's what that is, aside from the prizes. Second point, lack of sales. Excuse me, did you notice the gigantic economic crisis going on? Or consider that a whole lot of the people who have been more recognized or earned more money are also seeing lower sales? You can't control that, it has nothing to do with the quality of your art.

It has nothing to do with the quality of your art either beyond a base level of competence. Some people are better at marketing too. Giving up doing it is not the same thing as giving up on doing it professionally. I did give up on sales that were too low even though I was getting recognition in the type of art I did and was getting gallery invitations. The galleries weren't managing to move anything I gave them and I didn't earn enough to live on.

I got to a point where all of my art time had to be on salable work, I could not afford to hold back a favorite even if it was a cheap sketch. There was a reason for it. That had nothing to do with the quality of my art.

Or even my marketing, I was better at it than I could keep up with. I had physical disabilities and wasn't so spectacularly famous that working only 1 or 2 days in a month producing fairly small pieces would give me enough to live on. That was an obstacle I still haven't overcome. I switched back to my main goal of being a full time writer because I can do writing on bad days that I'm not physically capable of painting well.

There's a lot of scut work in writing that can be done on days I feel dull and uncreative. Heck, there was that in art too - there were all the days spent mat cutting and shrink wrapping and doing paperwork and preparing for shows. Just took more physical energy for all that than it does to edit a manuscript on my computer. What I decided was that I'd still paint and now write about art as opposed to selling originals.

That'll be my best chance to stop living on disability and become self supporting again. I tried to quit doing it altogether but that didn't last. There came a point I missed it. Mysteriously, my art even improved during the hiatus. If you are too tired, too hungry or too sick, it won't come easy and you may produce substandard work. Mistakes you wouldn't make if you'd gotten enough sleep, remembered to eat or gotten out from under the stress will start to come up. Those pieces won't sell and that's even more demoralizing. So give yourself a break, paint for yourself for a while.

Ask the serious question of why you paint, because in the end it has to come from loving the process of doing it. Improvement and growth is lifelong. Of course there's always something beyond the horizon that you can't quite get and every time one of those milestones passes - new ones open up. To the point that painters who make me stand there in sheer awe watching them and gasp at their paintings will stare at something I love and go "I just can't make this one work.

That's a big danger for the skilled. Try something simpler or more challenging. Go back to basics or switch mediums. Do what you can to pick up your morale. Always give yourself time to paint what you love whether it will sell or not. When looking at what will sell, try to analyze why it sold and to whom. Painting local landscapes tends to go well in most places. Anywhere is scenic once a good artist gets out to paint it plein air. Have you done plein air lately? Those small, fresh, powerful paintings are one way to get around buyers' limited spending money and sometimes their limited wall space if they've collected for a long time.

Look at works of similar quality and subject and style to yours.

• Magassus Mountain.
• Naked Men Illustrated.
• Baltiques (French Edition).
• .
• Peter Saul and Mary Ltd!

That can be the kiss of death, buyers won't see that as a bargain, more think that you're not as good. Art pricing is subjective. It's counterintuitive but raising your prices may improve sales. Prints sales are very cost effective. Collectors who can't afford your originals will buy good archival prints and frame them and be much happier than if you don't offer them.

That's all marketing tips. If I didn't have the multiple disabilities I'm living with, I'd be applying them. Instead I'm back to sketching and painting in a wide variety of subjects and a wide variety of mediums. The advantage of not trying to sell is total freedom to paint what you want, something I cherish. There's my other reason not to go pro. I don't want to have to stick with the same type of thing in the same medium all the time even if it's one of my favorite things, because the rest will get neglected and so will anything new that I want to explore.

Far better to poke into anything that appeals to me today and write articles on technique and some good science fiction and fantasy novels too. So no, don't give up just because you're demoralized. Give up on "being professional" if the Business Side of being an artist is too much of a drag and you'd rather support your art with a different Profession.

You can even still sell a bit on the side to support your materials and have extra cash in a pinch. I switched from making it my main income to something on the side and something to write about. That was a "job" decision lifestyle choice. Being an artist, being a painter is completely different, a part of who I am that makes me a much better novelist and article writer. Shane, if you're a medical student you probably don't have time to do much of anything else. THe best way to keep on with art while doing that would be to get some small sketchbooks - 4 x 6" or even ATC size ones and use ball points or other simple pen sketching or pencil sketching mechanical pencil with a white eraser very good for this to constantly doodle and sketch.

Do life sketches wherever you are. Spend some of your free time painting and drawing in color, but use fast mediums and produce a lot of small loose works. Your observation, intuition, hand skills and general artistic growth will keep moving. If you want to sell any of them for pocket money, ATCs are good for that and you can get precut ATC cards in a great variety of papers and surfaces, even for pastels, watercolor or colored pencils.

The key here is that since your time is limited, you can use this life passage as a time to learn quick sketching and fast drawing and painting processes. Your skills will improve at a ludicrous gallop from doing it. Sketching is your friend. Pitt Artist Pens are another good medium for those quick sketches if you want color or a more expressive tip, the small brush tips are very good for fast sketching. They are permanent and archival. I had a set of 48 and now I'm back to using my 24 colors - four sets of six themed on basic, Terra earths , grays and landscape.

Those six packs are very portable. Watercolor pencils are another good quick-sketch medium, wash with a water brush nylon brush with water reservoir handle. Or get one of those brushes and a pocket pans set of 12 colors. Clean, tidy, pocket-small and has color. Very easily combined with pen sketching with waterproof pens. The thing is, you'll learn - and can go back to doing larger and more serious works during actual vacations and summer break and the like.

It's possible to do both, just adapt the style and techniques you're using to your real situation and don't beat yourself for needing sleep more than progress on a slow complex project. Lin -- Thank you. I benefited from having an extremely tough mentor in the past. Randy Norris did not accept excuses.

Robert -- You are correct. In the end it is all up to the artist Tim -- Interesting point. BUT he can tackle other things while still working toward tapping the passion he once had. I've known my fair share of artists who stopped creating Linda -- I'm glad you shared your story. I think part of the problem is that many selling artists are conditioned to feel that they must have instant financial success in order for their work to be credible.

BUT instant financial success is rare I suppose the key point is not to be intimidated by the success that other artists have. Fran you said, "Good luck to the artist in question, who may continue to struggle even after leaving the art world, if external validation and praise is the goal. Jack -- What would you have done in your spare time had that been the case? I mean, the way I see it If the artist had the drive to create art for years True, some artists enter from the get-go with marketing in mind.

BUT the artist I speak of had been creating art for years -- out of pure enjoyment Sharon -- Would it be so wrong for him to stray from thinking about marketing so much I don't 'get' why he -- or any other artist in that situation -- must walk away from both. For example, if art competition loses have an artist down Focus on the art.

You can halt marketing and competing As I mentioned earlier, I think it is important for artists to not get too wrapped up with prizes, juried exhibits, and so on -- and I will add exhibiting to that list. Robert -- You said, "So no, don't give up just because you're demoralized.

Art and Struggle: At what point should an artist 'give up'?

That said, let us not be coy Making a full-time living from selling art has never been easy. Also, I'm not sure that we should attach 'professional' to artists only if they are actively selling their work. I realize that is a 'touchy' subject in itself Brian, Would not I have done art in my spare time? I've never done anything part time. I started in art to earn money and no other reason. I saw it as a fast way to make money to feed my kids. It turned out I was right, but only because I came up with the idea to make the gold leaf art.

Which we think your grandfather purchased. I've never had any spare time. Whatever I did was full speed ahead. The only time I took off was to coach my kids and be at their games and events. When you grow up on your own and depend on yourself for support, time off is the worst thing you can have. I treated myself to the Cowboys football games after Went to a lot of games and got to know Coach Landry and many players.

Invited to sit on the sidelines at lots games, college and pro.

But, you also have to know when to leave and when to take the time to take care of your body, your health, and your emotional and social well-being. We have seen artists sacrifice both of these in the name of their craft. But, you need your body on the most basic of levels to create your work. Successful artists know that their success is a marathon and not a sprint, so you need to maintain your health to stay in the game. Make time in your schedule to stretch, exercise, go for walks, cook healthy meals and have conversations with your peers, family, and friends. Artist and creator of The Savvy Painter , Antrese Wood, points to these toxic relationships as holding artists back from reaching their potential.

We can choose who to listen to and what advice to take. You may have heard the adage that we are the sum of the five people we spend the most time with. Spend it with those that push you to succeed, those that have succeeded as an artist and those that inspire you to do so. Not all advice is created equal. This goes hand-in-hand with the fear of failure.

Artists who obsess on the need to make everything perfect often are afraid of failure. But, the irony in this is that they then fail to ever put anything out there. The only path to growth is putting your work out to the public. The hard reality is that you will probably fail over the course of your art career however you define that. The comforting part of this is that so will everyone else. Everyone contributes to the world in their own way. We need doctors and lawyers and teachers, but we also need artists and craftsman and creatives that make our world interesting, vibrant and enjoyable.