Not every painting you create is destined to become a masterpiece.
In fact, you’ll probably have more failures than successes when you’re just starting out.
In reality, that’s a good thing.
You learn from your mistakes, so use your less-than-stellar pieces as stepping stone to mastering your craft.
Don’t Allow Failure To Paralyze You
When we fail at a task, discouragement can lead to inactivity. Acknowledge you have a problem with the piece and start again. Whether you attempt to recreate the composition you’re unhappy with or move on to a new project, you owe it to yourself as an artist to continue on the path you’ve chosen.
Don’t allow a failed painting to damage your creativity. Creativity needs to be nurtured. You need to cultivate your blossoming creativity and that requires developing and feeding it. This means practice and experimentation. The more you work with your paints and brushes, the more effortlessly you’ll be able to use them. And the more you work with your mind developing well-defined themes and compositions, the more your creativity will flourish and mature.
Revisit Your Failure With Fresh Eyes
Don’t instantly discount your failure, and don’t instantly toss it in the trash. Put that irritating piece aside and just ignore it for the time being. When you’re in a better mood, take it out and examine it with fresh eyes.
The advantage of distancing yourself from a disappointing work for a while is that you can be less subjective about the piece that gave you such frustration. You can’t fix a problem if you don’t take the time and effort to identify what the problem is.
Pinpoint Specific Problems With Your Piece
It’s unlikely that your painting is a total disaster. Sure, maybe the composition is off, the colors are lackluster or the perspective is causing you to feel dizzy, but there’s probably some redeeming features to your piece.
If the colors are off, add a fresh layer of paint to bring up or tone down the hues. Muddy colors, incorrect tones and poor shadowing are all problems that can be corrected.
Add or remove elements of your layout to bring focus to the composition. The positioning, scale and size of the individual components may need adjusting to give the piece harmony and a proper focal point.
If your perspective is off, try sketching out a proper perspective drawing of your composition to see where the problem lies. You may be able to rework elements of the composition to adjust the perspective.
Use Your Piece To Create A New Painting
You may find that using your failure as a basis for a mixed media piece is the answer. Painting over the offending portions with a new creation or using collage to add layers of texture and interest to the piece may be easier than reworking the original composition.
Elements of the original painting may have lots of potential in color, texture and forms that will work with subsequent layers that result in a painting with depth and intricacy that you wouldn’t get when starting with a plain white support.
You may not succeed at everything you attempt, but making the most of your failures is the best way to learn and grow as an artist. If you’re not failing part of the time, then you’re not trying to exceed your current level of expertise.
Too many artists remain stuck at one level because it’s comfortable, they’re adequate at what they’re doing and they don’t experience the frustration of failure. But, then again, they never feel the joy in a new discovery and the pride in conquering a challenging artistic dilemma.
