Artist Block? Breaking it with Play


Was asked about Artist Block recently, from a friend Alex Sturdee and I answered:

“No. I don’t get it.”

“Never?” - AS

“Never.” 

I have countless tricks to break through that crap. So many in fact that they automatically kick in without me knowing. And I keep going. Here’s some top ones. 

1. Play. Number one solution to all this. Not feeling it? Tired? Just play. Don’t “make art”, just go nuts on the page. Make some marks. Play on the canvas. Let the image find you. Don’t go looking for it. Just cut loose with the soul purpose of having fun. No expectations. Some of my best pieces have just showed up when they saw me having fun.

2. Ingest Art. Consume Art. You can’t make anything if you don’t fill your head with lots of visual stimulation. Go down the internet rabbit hole in a genre you’re unfamiliar with. Get inspired. Look at past masters. Look at photography. Look at things that are very different from what you normally look at. You’re time is well spent.

3. Experiment. Find a new brush, tool, app, or color you’ve never played with. Try it. Don’t make art. Just play with the tool, call it an experiment and cut loose. 

Art has a habit of showing up when you don’t go looking for it. Technomancer (above) started as a doodle with no idea of what I was going to paint. I just wanted to play with a nice blue and some warm earth tones. 

Both Ion Galleon, and Beyond the Frozen Giants (above) showed up because I started doodling some clouds in a new app I wanted to play with. The images will find you. Your job is to get yourself in the mindset to receive them.Go play. You have my permission.

Go Play! – Sumrow

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