Teens/adults - Lesson 2: How Can I get better?
Wherever you land on the spectrum of creative ability, you can get better. People who practice improve. Martha Graham said, “We learn by practice. Whether it means to learn to dance by practicing dancing or to learn to live by practicing living, the principles are the same. One becomes in some area an athlete of God.”
If you had access to the great teachers of the world and all you had to do was sit down and listen, would you take advantage of it? You do have access, through their books. How about picking up some of the titles below and becoming a student of the masters?
Josef Albers, Interaction of Color. First published in 1963, this handbook on teaching arts, written by one of the 20th century’s great painters, has never gone out of print. The book, now in a 50th anniversary edition, is especially prized for teaching about color. Albers (1888-1976) writes, “In visual perception a color is almost never seen as it really is—as it physically is. This fact makes color the most relative medium in art. In order to use color effectively it is necessary to recognize that color deceives continually.” Originally taught as a course at the highly-influential Black Mountain College, Albers designed a series of simple exercises that “isolated some aspect of color interaction so as to observe that interaction carefully.” The Josef & Anni Albers Foundation
Arthur Wesley Dow, Composition: A Series of Exercises in Art Structure for the Use of Students and Teachers. First published in 1899, Composition was revolutionary for it day. Dow (1857-1922) taught that instead of imitating nature, the artist should take natural elements and use the principles of composition—line, mass, color—to create harmonious art works. He writes, “Composition, building up of harmony, is the fundamental process in all the fine arts. I hold that art should be approached through composition rather than through imitative drawing. The many different acts and processes combined in a work of art may be attacked and mastered one by one, and thereby a power gained to handle them unconsciously when they must be used together.” Available as a free Gutenberg.org download.
Bernard Golden, Unlock Your Creative Genius. This 2007 volume addresses the common problem of teens and adults who want to be creative—not just as artists—but stop themselves. Golden writes in the book’s introduction, “My premise is that the capacity to unlock our creative genius is based on our ability to overcome the tension we feel when we dare to create. Only then can we develop free and open access to explore our internal realities—our emotions, thoughts, images, and sensations. This ability depends on our resourcefulness in overcoming inhibitions such as fear, guilt, and shame, which may block access to and the expression of our creativity.”
Angela Gair, Artist’s Manual: A Complete Guide to Painting and Drawing Materials and Techniques and Simon Jennings, The New Artist’s Manual: The Complete Guide to Painting and Drawing Materials and Techniques. These two books (from 1996 and 2005, respectively, and others like them) provide an omnibus of advice on drawing and painting materials and techniques. Artists use them as reference tools—”How do I stretch canvas?”, “Which kind of paper is right for watercolors?”, “What is gesso?”—as well as creative prompts to get those juices flowing.
Textbooks on painting and drawing include: Charles Bargue, Drawing Course, Clint Brown and Cheryl McLean, Drawing from Life; Brian Curtis, Drawing from Observation; George Dibble, Watercolor: Materials and Techniques; Daniel M. Mendelowitz, Guide to Drawing; Harold Speed, The Practice and Science of Drawing; Teen Sale, Drawing: Contemporary Approach; and many, many others. For inspiration, go to textbooks.com and search “visual art textbooks.” Be prepared to scroll a long time.
Share with us
Are there other titles that have helped you develop as an artist that you’d like to share? Send author, title, your name, and the city where you live to glen@centerforlatterdaysaintarts.org