WISE WORDS FOR AN ART TYRO

(Note to my son, 1999)

Every painting is built on its predecessors, on what other people have done and are doing.  Plus whatever creative input you can manage.  These days very little is truly original, it is all about genre.  Hence, maybe, the angst in the art world. 

But this doesn’t mean that good and interesting painting can’t be done any more.  Take your ideas where you can.  Braque banned Picasso from his studio as he found that Picasso pinched all his best ideas; Picasso was explicitly prepared to copy other people, he said it was a sensible thing to do.  My friend the artist Bryan Ingham once said he would nick my best ideas, if I had any.  (He never nicked anything, alas.)

You need lots of art books and magazines around you.

When painting don’t do too much at a time – and don’t sit staring in admiration at what you have done.  This will just allow your mind to adjust to the faults in your work and encourage you to think that it is wonderful, when it isn’t.  Put it away, creep up on it, catch it unawares, so that it shows you what is wrong.

Attack and destroy ruthlessly.  If you have an idea, try it, even if you may spoil what you have done.

Rawness is better (more pleasing to the eye) than polish, rough lines are better that straight-edged ones, varied texture better than smooth.  And let the work’s ‘history’ show, by which I mean all the work that has gone on underneath the final layer of paint.  This will give it depth and interest and mystery maybe, rather than blandness.

The elements of a painting are form/shape, colour, texture, line.  Add movement, tension, contrast and you probably have a masterpiece.  If one of these elements is missing the painting is usually impoverished.

A good idea, if you are painting an area of colour, blue say, is to use two quite different blues, side by side or with one showing through the other.  This adds interest and tension.

Finally, don’t be in a hurry to sell or show your work, you will regret it deeply if you do.  Paintings should ideally stay in the studio for some months after you think they are finished.  If they still satisfy then they are ready to go.  You don’t want to start off by showing fourth-rate work – and getting known for that – when a few months could promote it all to third-rate.