Two Opposing Views On Art Block

One of my mother’s best friends, Jill, an artist, just started a podcast, and the first episode is fantastic! It is delightful to listen to while drawing.

As a bonus, she interviews another one of my mother’s best friends, Rob, an artist as well.

Listen to it here.

In it, they say you have to deal with Art Block by just pushing through, and I wanted to write about that a bit in this article because I respectfully disagree.

To show you that I am not completely crazy, here is a video by a YouTuber that explains things in a way that is closer to my vision:

Watch it here.

This video is by Joe Hudson from Art of Accomplishment. The central theme of his channel is that if you feel a particular emotion, do not push it away; sit with it to experience and analyze it.

Jill, Rob, and Joe all have a lot of life experience, yet they have different perspectives on how to deal with art block.

Jill and Rob believe you should not wait for inspiration, but get into your studio and start working. Show up, and inspiration will, too.

Joe believes you have to try things, notice how you feel about doing them, and then act accordingly.

I lean towards Joe’s point of view.

The one view is about your identity: so you define yourself as an “Artist”? Then do the artist thing! Force yourself to do the art thing even if you don’t feel like it!

I see art students do the “250 box challenge” because they believe they have to, and they completely burn out.

It also shows if your heart is not in it.

I myself do follow my inspiration. Have done so all my life, and it has served me well. Right now, I came off a rush working on the website, and it slightly burned me out, so I find myself drawing more instead. Well, actually, right now I found myself inspired to write this article for the newsletter.

I program, I draw, I write. I am very aware of how I feel about the current activity, and when I am not feeling it, I switch to another.

Part of it is that it is about ego, your identity. If you define yourself as being an “artist”, one who paints on canvas, you feel that you have to do that to support that ego.

Instead, you can define yourself as a “creative” and write, program, sculpt, curate, act, play music, et cetera.

Doing one creative activity can also be a way to take a break from another, and taking breaks is essential. You come back invigorated.

So I lean more to Joe’s view. If you’re not feeling it, switch to doing something else.

At the end of the day, you can only do good work if you’re feeling it, having fun with it, and enjoying it.

That’s what works for me, anyway.

Yours sincerely,