Ya'all need to practice before ya'll get better

glenmckenzie(justabitfurther)

Sep 4

It was early this holiday Monday morning here at the "old homestead" when I first thought of putting "pen to paper" for this post.

Then I got kind of sidelined for a moment or two or three watching old Aerosmith videos. Geez, those guys are old - but still poking away at it for the moment.

Nevertheless, I struggled yet managed in the past hour to retrieve myself from the rabbit hole known as YouTube.

Continuing on here, over the past month or so, I've managed to paint six or seven landscape acrylic paintings. Several have been Prince Edward Island-inspired pieces, while the rest are more Nova Scotia scenes.

What I haven't done is take pics of them and post the results here on WordPress. I must get that done soon.

A surprising, however not surprising result of these six or seven works, is the realization of this old adage that goes along the lines of, "Ya'all need to practice before ya'll get better."

We're not yapping here about "perfect practice" - but simply practice.

I must confess, have never had any formal art or painting lessons in a studio or classroom setting. I have watched and followed some YouTube videos by a variety of artists, but that's about the extent of it.

I will readily admit, that I have learned a few techniques and ideas from watching these, but again that encompasses any "formal" art training to speak of.

Now I suspect that there are "so-called rules" in painting that one is supposed to follow. The funny thing is, I have no idea if this is actually true, and if it is true "what rules am I supposed to follow?"

Following so-called rules might not be the best way to look at it. Perhaps these "rules(if they exist)" are more along the lines of suggestions and guidelines.

Forgetting the "painting rules" rabbit hole we just went down, what I have learned over the past month or so, is the idea I noted a few paragraphs ago ........ "Ya'all need to practice before ya'll get better." Just need to keep working at it.

One video series I did watch quite extensively, suggested that it could take twenty landscape paintings before you start to get the idea or concepts of landscape painting figured out.

Notice I used the phrase "start to get the idea or concepts" - not "you will have mastered the concepts."

In a similar vein, it takes time and practice/work to find and develop your own unique style as an artist.

In reality, much like discovering and working on developing who we are as a person, discovering our own unique style as an artist can take time as well.

And it just isn't simply the passage of time that creates this discovery of your artistic style, it is the combination of time and practice.

As it is in life, sometimes on the canvas things work out pretty sweet. Other times when the paint hits the canvas - not so much. And as it is in life, we should perhaps step back from the easel; look at the "bigger picture" and see if we can learn from our mistakes - whatever it might be.

Here's a different slant..... think about this.

Often when we view something about us(think of yourself as being a canvas) as a mistake; or failure ........ if we step back from it for a bit and come back to it the next day; week or some time frame..... what we now see is something that isn't a mistake; failure or some other unlikeable bit, but a beautiful feature that adds great value to the overall canvas(which is you).

That's enough for a holiday Monday morning.

--as always with love--

--- get outdoors; find inspiration; discover yourself ---