Home › Forums › The Think Tank › Creativity › The feeling that I’m "wasting" my more pricey art supplies?
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March 26, 2018 at 8:03 pm #453599
OK, so it has taken me 15 years of drawing to draw on actual art paper.
For 15 years I used printer paper. 15 YEARS. Half of those as a legal adult!
That tells you a lot about my feelings of inadequacy as an artist, impostor syndrome, etc. That’s for another thread, but I wanted to talk here about the feeling that if I use my nicer art supplies at all, I’m “wasting” them, because what if it doesn’t turn out to be a Display Worthy Fine Art Masterpiece??
I own things like Derwent Graphic sketching pencils, Faber-Castell charcoal, Winsor & Newton watercolors (a few), and Prismacolor Premier pencils. And yet I use my HB dollar-store writing pencils, General’s charcoal, watercolor markers gotten at a discount online, and Crayola pencils.
I save up and get these art materials and then am afraid to use them. I use the cheap stuff because it doesn’t feel as intimidating, and doesn’t make me feel that my art is wasting it.
I think all this ties into my complexes about “not being a real artist” and “being bad at art” and the idea that “bad art shouldn’t be made,” or that “bad art shouldn’t use nice materials,” and perhaps most of all, “I’m not a good enough artist to deserve nice supplies.”and I’m not talking Arches watercolor paper…I’m talking like, I talked myself out of a $40 Cotman watercolor set recently because it was too nice for me. COTMAN WATERCOLORS, guys. When you feel too inadequate for Cotman, you know you got a problem.
But then, of course, I start feeling guilty for having a 150-set of Prismacolor Premiers and not using them…like “good, young, underprivileged artists would love to have that set! It’s a waste of them for YOU to even own them! Give them away!”
Any tips for getting yourself to the point of feeling that you are “worthy” of your supplies? I know “just use the supplies” and “just start” are great places to start, but I want to work on the underlying problem. I’ve started posting here and on Instagram, as well as posting speedpaints on YouTube, and blogging…but I still feel like a fraud.
Does anyone else struggle with this? I feel weird posting about it but often, when people post about their #artiststruggles, everyone weighs in and says they feel the same. So I wanted to reach out and say, you’re not alone – and regardless of your art skills, you ARE worth using that nice paper/pencil/canvas/paint!
~Julian
Comic artist, illustrator, watercolor newbie, art supply junkie.
Art blog: http://julianjaymes.com
Read my comic online!: http://julianjaymes.com/sidelinesMarch 26, 2018 at 10:02 pm #591983thing is, when you do decide to embrace quality supplies there’s going to be a learning curve to using them – yes, they’re different, yes, you just just get in there and use them and yes, not every work produced is a masterpiece, you’re not a robot.
la
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When the power of love overcomes the love of power, the world will know PeaceMarch 26, 2018 at 10:52 pm #592007I think you should keep using cheap supplies. That way if your work doesn’t come out the way you want you can blame the supplies.
You can bask in the empathy of others for the brilliant young artist that can only afford cheap – if only she had better materials to work with, imagine!
Starving artist persona works better with crappy materials.
You say you feel you’re not good enough to use artist’s grade materials but unless you try you will still have all those excuses to fall back on. Prove to yourself once and for all that you’re as bad as you think you are by using the top materials. Do not leave any room for doubt. If you can’t do good work with good materials then you can hold your head up high and say “I used the best, I tried my best and failed”. If you do everything in your power to succeed and still fail – there is honor in that.
http://s3.amazonaws.com/wetcanvas-hdc/Community/images/18-Sep-2019/1999899-sigsmall.jpg
STUDIOBONGOMarch 26, 2018 at 11:21 pm #591990Well, I have a different take on this topic. Damn, I just hate it when just very recently, I used expensive paints and and I ended up trashing my painting as I could not salvage it after much repainting and scraping paint off. My plan for next time, use cheap paints to do a small practice piece before using the expensive paints on a large canvas.
March 27, 2018 at 8:54 am #591980If you have those products and you’re not using them be aware that they can be compromised with time. Graphite and crayons can dry out, tube watercolors can solidify, paper can change color..etc.. might as well use them before you waste them.
If you don’t own them and don’t want to use them, then don’t. There’s no hard and fast rules, use what you want to use.
The Purple Dog Painting Blog
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Find me on FacebookMarch 27, 2018 at 8:55 am #591981Well, I have a different take on this topic. Damn, I just hate it when just very recently, I used expensive paints and and I ended up trashing my painting as I could not salvage it after much repainting and scraping paint off. My plan for next time, use cheap paints to do a small practice piece before using the expensive paints on a large canvas.
At least you learned something from it, so it’s not a total loss.
The Purple Dog Painting Blog
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Find me on FacebookMarch 27, 2018 at 9:09 am #591987The function of the overwhelming majority of your artwork is simply to teach you how to make the small fraction of your artwork that soars. –Art & Fear
It is only on a basis of knowledge that we can become free to compose naturally. -- Bernard Dunstan
blog.jlk.netMarch 27, 2018 at 9:16 am #591985How much do you figure a piece “should” cost to make? I am so used to paying about $100 to $200 to get something concrete that I can show, that I have no idea how much I “should” pay. Even with paintings, it is not uncommon to pay $100 for a decent canvas.
No longer a member of WC. Bye.
March 27, 2018 at 10:50 am #592005You are at the crossroad that is saying that it’s indeed time for you to go beyond using the cheap supplies because you are consciously raising the question to others outside of just “self.”
You really want to migrate to the serious stuff and by doing this you are admitting to “self” that you are a real artist with all the idioms that come with being a self-proclaimed creative.
Cut yourself some slack and dive in because you will eventually regret taking too long to jump into the art deep end if you keep dragging your feet.
March 27, 2018 at 11:59 am #592001I look at painting as more of a creative adventure and a pleasant way to spend my time. I’ve learned to put much less emphasis on the finished painting and just enjoy the time spent exploring color, techniques, etc.
I find that with this attitude I produce much better paintings in the end. I use the best materials that I can afford and I end up scrapping at least half of the work. However the pieces that I don’t scrap are usually pretty good and a reminder of the fun that I had creating them.
The only downside is that I find I have a harder time letting go of a painting when I sell it. I guess this is true for any artist. You are selling a piece of your soul, not just a piece of art.
March 27, 2018 at 10:47 pm #591991At least you learned something from it, so it’s not a total loss.
True, always learning!:)
March 31, 2018 at 7:12 am #592013I think there are serious problems with non-archive quality supplies that may need to be considered – even if you don’t consider yourself a ‘real’ artist (I don’t): Think of the future – I love looking at my mum’s amateur watercolours – she died years ago, but what a memory. Work on non-acid free paper may simply fall apart in time. Fugitive colours may disappear even if kept in the dark. Beginners tend to buy big sets – to save money – but I think there is no need – these sets usually contain colours that you will never need or use. Better to just buy a small carefully-chosen selection even if the unit price is higher. Think of yourself: – cheap watercolour paint has very different characteristics to the good stuff. The good stuff is simply beautiful, not crude, can make vibrant mixed colours and consistently change chroma with mixing complementaries. – cheap oil paint can be fugitive, have inconsistent drying times and mix oddly (colour varying as white added, making poor violets or greens etc) – cheap pencils vary too much to be able to rely on them and tend to be too hard to make good blacks. – cheap paper is usually too thin and too smooth. You don’t need to spend a lot to use the best: – the best pencils are not pricey – you only need one 2B pencil imo – buy good quality cartridge paper in bulk (no compromise here) – make your own sketchbooks – watercolours using only 3 tubes of paint. Choose non-fugitive colours. – one watercolour brush (not too small but very good quality – will last many years if looked after) – use a small selection of pastels, forcing you to mix on the paper or use optical mixing. – real stick charcoal is cheap… – oil paint on ‘Oil Painting Paper’ not canvas, solves the storage problem too. – use a restricted oil palette (I use white plus two each of reds, yellows and blues) – use water-soluble oils (eg Cobra – no solvents to buy, can work anywhere if you have little space / no studio (I don’t)). I think it is worth using the same high-quality materials over a long period – so that you know their capabilities inside-out and can concentrate on looking instead of tangling with technicalities all the time. (sorry about one long paragraph – I’m new here and can’t figure out how to make a new line!)
March 31, 2018 at 7:18 am #591982(sorry about one long paragraph – I’m new here and can’t figure out how to make a new line!)
No problem. You can press “enter” to start a new paragraph.
The Purple Dog Painting Blog
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Find me on FacebookApril 3, 2018 at 10:28 am #591996OK, so it has taken me 15 years of drawing to draw on actual art paper.
For 15 years I used printer paper. 15 YEARS. Half of those as a legal adult!
[…]Does anyone else struggle with this? I feel weird posting about it but often, when people post about their #artiststruggles, everyone weighs in and says they feel the same. So I wanted to reach out and say, you’re not alone – and regardless of your art skills, you ARE worth using that nice paper/pencil/canvas/paint!
~Julian
I was coincidentally talked about this matter on this post but from a different point of view. From the point of view of not painting unless you have the most expensive high quality, top line art materials.
Expensive art materials can be indeed very intimidating if you allow them to be so.
Art materials are your tools. You are the one who uses them, the one who controls them. They can’t make/create anything by themselves.Now their prices are subjective, are the prices that the sellers think that you – the artist/creator- you are ready to pay for buying them. The fact that some art materials are pricey doesn’t guarantees anything about their quality. The sellers have told you that these will last. It is impossible for them to know for sure though if their claims are true, ( even if their intentions are so), because they have tested their lightfastness and permanence in laboratories and it is impossible for them to know how each and every material will withstand the environmental conditions of the place that YOU live.
Some of the most basic, most permanent and most lightfast drawing materias now, are also the cheaper to produce and easier to be manufactured ever.
What I mean is that you can get charcoal from your stove and B. Sienna pigment from your garden. The first one is just burnt wood and the other one just soil of a specific colour.The school pencils are not less lightfast or different to use than the expensive ones. They might be better looking as products but there is not actual difference between the graphite of the cheap pencil from the graphite of the expensive one. ( except the wood that they might be made off).
So the idea that you paid for something extraordinary is a bit false. It is what the market sold to you not what actually happens.
In any case, my opinion is that by the time that you paid for these materials it would be beneficial for your development as a creator to use them like the other not that expensive art supplies that you have.
Mix and match them with the other ones and don’t bother that much for the permanency and lightfastness and such things as these are theoretical issues as well.
A painting made by non permanent materials will last at least for 30 years. If it is properly stored or displayed will last even more.
BUT you live now and you want to create something in the present and not -just in case that it turns out perfect and will worth to be preserved- for its future viewers.
Your aim is to create. If its future viewers want to conserve it they will find the way to do so.
Do you really think that Leonardo Da Vinci was very concerned about the permanency of his sketchbooks or that he did really bother his mind if his ink was acid free or archival?
He didn’t give a skato, trust me on that, he just sketched a wrote what he wanted to sketch and write and he didn’t bother about the future readers of his sketchbooks.
At the end of the day, none of us have ever read the original sketchbooks. We all read what he had to say in printed copies.
We found a way to present the context of his work which is the point.April 3, 2018 at 12:12 pm #591988…
Expensive art materials can be indeed very intimidating if you allow them to be so. …Beginners are intimated by all tools and materials. Just scan The Learning Zone for proof.
Also I find that a blank canvas/blank sheet of paper, is/can be intimidating to beginners, intermediates, and advanced painters whether or not they are amateur or professional.
It is only on a basis of knowledge that we can become free to compose naturally. -- Bernard Dunstan
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