How To Discover Your Inner Artist

By Del Antonio. You might see a painting in a museum and be floored by what you see. You might watch a film and wake up in cold sweats wondering why you didn't think of that. You might be envious of a neighbor who decorates cakes better than you do, or you could even be reading this now and wondering how I shape thoughts so effortlessly. The truth of the matter, as well as the first lesson in discovering that artist dwelling inside you, is that it's not all that complicated.

Yes, I just said something amazingly simplistic which will ring both true and false. However, it's important I say this, because if you truly want to go on you've got to realize that there is a learnable craft to everything! Learning your craft, having useful tools, and devoting your time to practice and production will make you into that person who "gets it".

I'm writing this article because I have been a struggling artist for years. For as long as I can remember, I have doodled and brainstormed stories, dreamed up movie sequences, put together vanity productions, sketched, painted, photographed, and designed "things"! I went to school for 5 years learning about photography, web design, film making, and writing. And then for 5 years I surrendered my talent to St. Jude. Yes, I fell into the well with everybody else who "isn't doing what I really want to do." For me art is my vocation, and it is a pity I haven't been making my living from it, but it is a far more pitiable thing that I actually believed I had no talent.

The Patron Saint of Desperate Cases and Lost Causes

If you're not familiar with the figure of Thaddeus Jude, or St. Jude the patron saint of desperate cases and lost causes, you need only peruse your local Sunday classifieds where several prayers to St. Jude are often published. I am writing this article for those of you who feel their talent, or what they thought was talent, or what they thought might have been an inkling of talent has become a desperate case or even a lost cause. This is my meditation and prayer to you that you realize those essential things that will not only make that light bulb turn on in your mind, but give you the jump start to get working.

Let's get down to the nitty gritty. The second lesson is that it is more complicated than it seems. How can it be both? The same way eating is. One must find food first. Then they must lift it to their mouth. Salivary glands produce enzyme rich saliva which begins to dissolve starches, while your incisors and molars cut and mash food into smaller pieces. An intricate system of muscles and sinews controls your jaw to allow you to chew. It's already complicated and you haven't even swallowed yet. And yet we do this every day to maintain our bodies. It's easy because we've practiced it all our lives, our body instinctively knows what to do to produce the desired results. The craft of your chosen art is no different.

You are a consumer of your chosen art form. You want to be involved in this craft because you enjoy what you experience from its products and from its producers. Simply by your exposure to it, you are in the perfect position to be a producer as well. At this point you know what works, what doesn't work, what you prefer, and what's "magic" about this art. So now that you know the effects, now you've got to know the causes-the craft.

Like eating you'll need to put some time aside to take apart whatever it is: the painting, the film, the cake, etc. This is where specialty books come in. Familiarize yourself with the basics, craft books, history books, contemporary trends, etc. It will be almost certainly overwhelming. You can stop and rest, take a break, do something else. But then come back to a simple example of what you want to do. Put it in your mind that with the right tools and practice you can virtually copy this example.

Never underestimate the value of mimicry

Though you may want to be original, groundbreaking, or just better than what you're used to seeing, understand this one thing. All things are composed of smaller pieces of previously existing things. Its the law of conservation, and it applies to all crafts as well.

By copying the work of someone you admire, or even somebody who just inspires you for the moment, you build upon your skills as an artist in the most fundamental way-observing. An observant artist notices things in two general directions: toward the whole and toward the parts. For instance a cake decorator has to decide on the ingredients of their cake to produce a desired consistency (toward the whole), but toward the end of the process she or he must iron out the fine details of their design (toward the parts). Or another example is the film maker who has to shoot hundreds of scenes out of sequence just to make their deadline. They have to consider the continuity of the film when doing this (thinking toward the whole). And later when they are editing all the sequences together, they have to break down rough footage into individual shots (thinking toward the parts) to shape scenes which shape sequences, which shape acts, which shape the movie.

You can see now, that this intricate craft you are getting yourself into is going to require a lot of thinking, both in terms of the big picture and the fine details. Hopefully by practicing at it, by copying different examples you'll begin to understand intuitively. That is the goal of this first chapter. Once you get into the swing of emulating something, you'll begin to realize the potential benefits and drawbacks of doing something a certain way. You'll realize from the producer side of things what works, what doesn't work, what you prefer, and hopeflly what's "magic". You have officially jumped the line.

Congratulations!

I know you're a long way off from where you'd hoped to be, but take heart, you're doing the most difficult part of the whole creation process-you're getting into the habit. Now that you're half exhilarated and half frustrated, you might want to start thinking about tools.

In the next chapter I'll go into a little more detail about the types of tools you should make available to yourself, including the one's you're almost certainly overlooking!