Day sixteen: Make whatever you want.

I read this great article about Jasper Johns’ new work last night.

This quote ends the article:

Even after 60 years of making art, though, Johns is still not entirely at ease with his practice. “I laboured over these a lot,” he says of “Regrets”. “Somehow what you end up with seems to be something you should have known was there to begin with, even though you had to work so hard to find it.”

That being an artist is still so arduous perplexes him. “I worry about the difficulty of making things, or the difficulty of knowing what to do,” he admits. “I may think, having been working at this all these years, why don’t I find it easy? Since it’s a relatively simple activity.”

It’s been interesting writing so far because it hasn’t really been about learning how to make art. I think when most people are learning to make, they want some specific instruction, some steps to follow. I think the best way to really learn is to just do something every day. If you don’t know what to do, ask yourself some of the questions below.

What do you want to see in the world?

How big is it?

What color should it be?

Is it for someone else or just for you?

What does the surface feel like?

How much does it weigh?

How will you make it?

You want to paint? Hold a brush in your hand. Put some paint on it. Put a mark on a surface with the brush. Done. Yes!

When I first started painting I was ten years old, and was really into drawing and painting complicated roller rink and carnival scenes. I would make up the stories of all the people I was painting as I painted them. They were very complicated. I learned about layering when I painted one such scene and realized after the foreground was done that it would look way better with a background, and when I painted in the background my poor painting skills ate some of the people I had so carefully painted. The real learning always comes from trial and error. I’m trying to make a horse right now. It looks completely different from the right and left sides. It bothered me terribly when I first made it, but now it’s starting to grow on me. I’m not sure if that is learning, but it’s something.