Lesson 58

The skill you need to master is not to give up.

Rejection can hurt, but an artist’s life is full of rejections. Galleries, competitions, residencies. You need to have a thick skin.

If you enter art competitions most likely you will be paying not to be in an exhibition. 

To be an artist tenacity is essential. 

A 1st at University is no guarantee, particularly if you give up at 30 or 40. Often it’s not the high flyers that succeed but fairly average students who have the tenacity to continue to work and in their fifties produce fantastic stuff.

Artists are supposed to get better as they get older, don’t be distracted by the market continually searching for the next new young thing. We are all eventually eclipsed by a younger generation, just stick at it.

There are low periods in all our careers and production, like writers block.

You need to work through this. 

There are bad days and good days, but if you are working during a bad day when a good day comes you will fly. If you are not working through that bad day when a good day comes you will just think about getting your paints out or going to the studio.

Most artists have self doubt and are not as self confident as people might think. Self doubt is a good thing, you need to develop a critical relationship with your work and why you do it, but don’t let self doubt overcome you so much that you simply give up.

Lesson 58

Get your paints out and don’t stop.