A Tip on Style & Creativity

Was This My Style?
(Oil on Canvas Panel)

Here’s a tip—don’t let yourself become bogged down by the inability to break out of your art comfort zone. We all have one. It can become a prison of sorts if you never, or hardly ever, try to leave it.

If you call yourself an artist, it shouldn’t be difficult. Artists are supposed to have more than the average amount of creativity, so let it  out sometimes.

Have you noticed that many well-known and especially famous artists’ work all has a similar look. That's their style, as in “all of his work has a spiritual moodiness (or something) to it.” Case in point--Thomas Kinkade. On second thought, his work usually gets a strong reaction one way or the other, so not a good example, but you see where I’m going.

Anyway I can understand why this is so—commercial appeal. Once an artist has some success in either shows, galleries, or with collectors, why would he/she want to risk losing the $ucce$$ they’ve been striving to achieve?

Why indeed? If you have collectors, media, or others fawning all over your work, then you probably wouldn’t think of risking your celebrity (or good fortune) by changing your style.

Then there's the rest of us. We can end up with a lot of paintings (or sculptures or installation art) that all look pretty much the same. If you’re good at painting the Tuscan countryside, then by all means paint the Tuscan countryside, but please do it with some creativity so that all your paintings don’t have a golden sunset behind a grove of olive trees and a jug of wine, for example. Please.

Some will argue that having a style is your entryway to success (and if you were Claude Monet I would agree). However, think about not letting your style lead you down some winding path with a string of bland, same-old, same-old work. I’m just saying…

Happy Painting!