HOW TO FIND YOUR ARTISTIC VOICE
I am really excited to have so many new paintings going on in the studio right now. All at various stages of beginnings. Here is another one of them. I am creating work for an exhibit at the San Luis Obispo Museum of Art to open in April of next year. Feeling creative and grateful. © 2021 David Limrite
“Your subject is yourself, your impressions, your emotions, in the presence of nature.”
Eugene Delacroix/Artist
How To Find Your Artistic Voice
A lot of artists want to talk to me about how to find their artistic voice. And, I get it. What artist doesn’t want their work to be unique and stand out. And, to feel authentic. Like themselves.
Artists want their work to to be authentic and reflect their own sensibility and taste. And, why not? I certainly do.
I have worked very hard over many years of creating in order to find my voice. And although at times, I think I have found it, my artistic voice seems to change, develop and morph all the time. Which I don’t mind. Keeps things interesting.
But no matter what I do, no matter what I create, my work always seems to look like I made it, with my colors, my line, my brush strokes, my strong value contrast and my energy.
As a result of my years of art making and my countless conversations with artists about “visual voice”, I have created a list of 10 things to consider when focusing on finding your artistic voice:
1. STYLE. If you are a landscape painter, you want to create landscapes that have a unique “look” to them. You want to present the landscape to the viewer in a different way than they are used to seeing a landscape. And, you want the painting to reflect how you feel about nature.
2. COLOR. Paint with your favorite colors. With colors that you love and cannot live without. Every painting you make will use these colors in some form or another.
3. TECHNIQUE. Paint every painting with the same techniques, methods and processes. You can experiment and jump around in a sketchbook. Settle in with your favorite techniques and explore within those parameters, painting after painting.
4. JUXTAPOSITIONS. Consider combining two unusual or opposite things in your paintings. I use a lot of black vs white, and careful, controlled line vs wild, emotional lines.
5. SUBJECT. You must work with a subject matter that you are absolutely passionate about. I have been working with the figure of over 30 years, and I never get tired of it. Pick something you are passionate about. If you are an abstract painter, what inspires you to make the shapes, textures and colors that you make? Stick with that.
6. CONCEPT. Likewise, figure out what the message, idea, or theme is behind your images. Mine is “emotion”. My figures are created with emotion, are about emotion, and exude emotion.
7. POINT OF VIEW. If you are a landscape painter, what do you want to say about your landscapes? Is it just beauty, or is it the effect that humans have had on the land? In my figurative work, I am not only interested in emotion, but how little, or how much emotion do we humans choose to reveal to others.
8. COMMUNICATION. How do you want to portray your message, thoughts or feelings to the viewer? I use the idea of reveal and conceal in my work. Parts of my figures reveal themselves to the viewer, and parts are hidden. The viewer has to work to find parts of the figure in my work, which echoes my theme.
9. CONSISTENCY. Every painting should have common threads that tie them all together. Color, technique, style. They should all be consistent in quality and craftsmanship as well.
10. DEDICATION. You must be dedicated to making decisions and committing to some, if not all of things on this list, for a long enough period of time, in order to create work that hangs together and reflects your unique creative visual voice.
One more thing.
A unique artistic voice develops when you commit to spending time in the studio pursuing your ideas and visions. And to making a lot of art.
Best,
David
By the way, I am teaching a 3 day workshop called PERSONAL PROJECTS: Developing Your Personal Voice As An Artist on July 30, 31 and August 1. Check it out and sign up here.