How to Get Over Art Block

Art block is a period of time when an artist lacks the motivation or ability to come up with new, original ideas. If you're currently suffering from art block, then this is the place for you because I have experienced it and so has every other artist ever... Probably. I'm not only going to go over the possible causes of art block, but I'm also going to provide some suggestions to get back on the creativity horse.

My personal theory is that art block comes from some sort of pressure or burn out. For both pressure and creativity, the solutions will be similar, if not exactly the same. For both of these issues, you're going to need to be gentle with yourself and find new ways to motivate and treat yourself. This is probably the solution to a lot of life problems, but we're only going to be addressing art block and its various cures.

It's important to recognize in yourself where the trouble is coming from. Is it from pressure? You have to succeed and be excellent or the world will implode? Do you need to never fail or your family will be disappointed? If it helps, you can ask yourself aloud, "what am I afraid of?" It may seem and feel silly, but I promise it's enlightening. If you have an answer to your question, congrats! Now you can move on to finding solutions to the problem. If you don't know what you're scared of, congrats! There is nothing to be scared of. Either way, you feel better and life goes on. (I would like to be clear: I'm not trying to invalidate your feelings; this exercise personally helps me because there really is nothing to be scared of. Everyone's life is different, but again, I'm only addressing art block, and how can making art be scary? "Oh no! I drew a stick figure, it came to life and is now holding my family hostage!" That only happens in Spongebob Squarepants.)

Now, let's move on to removing the weighing pressures of art. There's a few different possible causes: perfectionism, fear, deadlines, etc. Each of these can be a hindrance to your ultimate goal. It's vital to have and remember a personal goal that is not related to others' perception of you. I recommend trying to remember what inspired you as a kid and captured your imagination. Even if your tastes have changed, it is a good starting point for changing your focus from outward goals like jobs and the respect of others to creating something that inspires yourself. It's not about the end product but the process. Going back and fulfilling your childhood dreams is incredibly gratifying, even if it isn't "good," because I can almost guarantee it'll be better than when you tried as a kid. Plus, it gets you out of your norm routine, and it is incredibly gratifying to see yourself being able to do what you couldn't before.

1. Recreation

This leads into the next drawing idea! Recreate an old piece from the past that you were never satisfied with. This is perfect because it flexes your creativity to rethink a piece, it gives you a wonderful starting point, and there is nowhere to go but up. You already don't like the art you made, so there is no pressure that you will "destroy" the concept. I recommend keeping the old and new pieces to compare them later. It is such a confidence booster to be able to see exactly how much you have grown. Plus, no inspiration needed because the concept was already done by you. Just needs tweaking. This is a piece I recreated as an example. Plus, this is the first animal I've drawn believably that wasn't just copying of a photo reference. The bottom is an art piece I never liked where I just drew the frog from a photo then added stuff all around it. The top one is the same idea with a bit better execution. Plus, the frog itself was created by me, using multiple reference photos and not "copy/ drawing".

2. Journaling

Personally, I don't care all that much for journaling. The act of writing is much too slow to keep pace with my thoughts, BUT this is exactly why I think it is so useful. With ideas and thoughts running around my head constantly, it's hard to hold onto any one thing at a time, let alone remember the many brilliant thoughts I've had the last few weeks. Journaling is useful because it is the very, very first step to making an abstract thought into something physical. I love having junk journals because I get to write everything down with absolutely no judgment on the value of what I'm writing. Without deciding if something is good or bad before making it physical, I've started to realize I have way more good ideas than I had previously thought. Also, the ideas that I would have thought were amazing I find are maybe not as great. Journals are wonderful because they give you the ability to make judgment calls on ideas AFTER they are physical. What works in your abstract, unstructured thoughts may not work in the real world, and the ideas that seem silly at first may end up being your masterpiece. I also recommend dream journals. Some of my most fantastical ideas come when I'm in no-man's-land between being asleep and awake. Also, I'm the type of person who has some pretty wacky dreams, so having a journal next to me in the morning is helpful to write them down before I forget. (I always forget to do this though; I usually tell my husband which helps me remember.)

I've been keeping an art journal almost since I started drawing around sixteen. Like I said, I do not like writing because I'm too impatient to wait for my hand to keep up, but I like to draw still lifes of my legs and feet or the people in front of me or where I am at. In doing this, I've actually kept a sporadic log of my life since I started. I've drawn the legs of people I've sat with, the portrait of someone I had a crush on, the places I loved, the places I visited. I've even kept track of my own style, capturing my shoes, tights, and skirts. I remember way more of what is going on through my everyday sketches than if I had handwritten everything.

Also, it's great practice for drawing feet, which I like to think I'm good at. So, try art journaling if you want to practice life drawings and keep track of your life to look back on. (I won't lie, it can be a bit painful to look back on some of your old drawings, but it reminds you of how much your skills have grown when you think you've become stagnant.)

3. New Environment

Do you sit at your desk and stare at the paper with nothing working inside your brain? Do you inevitably end up scrolling on your phone or watching tv? Me too. I find every possible distraction I can before committing to the daunting task of creating. When I find myself trapped sitting at my chair with hours passing by unnoticed, I actually allow myself to "procrastinate". It's hard to create when there's other things that need doing. I will not lie; I'm a lazy son of a gun and hate cleaning, but when I want to make art, I absolutely cannot be surrounded by mess. I'll suddenly find myself sweeping and organizing and rearranging my room to make the optimal place for Art. It feels so cleansing to sit down with nothing to be bothered by. So if you're procrastinating on making art because the room's a mess or laundry needs to be done or food to be eaten, do those things! Healthy environments are not an obstacle to creation. I know very little about feng shui, but the small amount I do know has invigorated my art space. Sometimes, you just need a new space within your old space, so move things around. Maybe sit in a different room or go outside.

If this is still not helping you create. If your dusted tables, folded laundry, switched around bed are mocking you as you cannot put pen to paper, you might need a more drastic change. In this case, depending on what type of things you like to draw and what environments you enjoy, it is time to get up and leave the house. If you love animals, try to find a nearby zoo or aquarium. If you love figure drawing, find a busy road with lots of pedestrians. If you love to people watch, go where there's people; I especially love coffee shops. People are usually too intently focused on their own projects or conversations to really notice you. Also, coffee and pastries are at your disposal. If you're wanting to work on practicing perspective, backgrounds, or buildings, go downtown! The tall buildings create an impressive and imposing presence that's guaranteed to inspire you to capture their stature. It might even be the perfect time to try out that new pen of yours. If you're having trouble coming up with ideas, it might be time to go to the nearest art museum and do some master studies. Try and copy the artists from before; even if it doesn't give you more ideas, it'll make you stretch your art muscles.

4. New Skills

If for some reason you can't go anywhere else or if you just hate the outside, then learning a new technique, skill, or subject might be the thing to spark your imagination. If you primarily like to draw, maybe try painting. If you love to paint, try sculpting. If you love to knit, try embroidery. The thing about being an artist is you don't stop being an artist, even when trying something new. Artistry can be found in every single aspect of life. Art is defined as, "the conscious use of skill and creative imagination especially in the production of aesthetic objects" according to Merriam-Webster. Doesn't necessarily even need to be aesthetic. Your brain and effort is what makes something "art", so try something new and be bad at it.

Featured here on the right is one of my first attempts at embroidery. Is it perfect? Nope. Look at that circle, so uneven and squiggly. Did I enjoy making it? Absolutely.

I can pretty much guarantee trying new forms of creation will somehow tie back to your preferred medium of choice. Or maybe, you'll find another outlet to pour your love into, like welding or something. Don't define yourself by what you do because you are always going to be you, whether it's while you're painting, doing yoga, or doing some plumbing. Placing yourself into a box is a guaranteed way to make your creations boxed up as well. Let those creative juices flow!

Which brings me to the next idea: try a new subject. If you can't afford or don't want to try something new, try a different subject in your preferred medium. Before you grew up and learned the "rules" of art and before you were worried about something being "weird" or "good," what fascinated you? I encourage you to take this moment right here, right now, to think of the things you imagined and fixated on as a kid. Go on. Think about it. I'll wait...

Personally, I loved dragons, magic jewels, spies, and super powers. My younger cousins and friends outgrew their own fascination with the otherworldly way before I did, which, I won't lie, is a little embarrassing now that I think back to it, but that's who I am. Despite the hold these things had on me, I managed to convince myself that I wasn't good enough to create physical manifestations of the other worlds in my head with different laws of physics. I convinced myself that they would be stuck in my head to be slowly forgotten as I got older. There were better people out there who would do it in my stead. This was stupid on my part of course. I'm twenty-three years old and still can't draw a believable dragon because I let my adolescent self make a lifelong decision to not even try. (Well, I tried a couple times, but they didn't turn out how I wanted, so I gave up. You can see an example of an attempt on the left. It reads, "An artist's rendition of an artist's first rendition of a dragon.") The point is, who lets a child decide if they're good or bad at something? Then on top of that make lifelong decisions?? It was very silly of me, and, dare I say, childish.

To bring that back around to you, I want you to think back to what you would've loved as a kid but maybe you think is too difficult or silly to try now. I encourage you to do it anyway. Look up tutorials, find art books, befriend other artists to steal their art knowledge, do whatever it takes to make your child-self ecstatic to finally, after all these years, have their imagination become something physical. “Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up.” -Picasso

The way I've gone about this is to find art books explaining how to draw mythical creatures, specifically dragons. I've also taken an art course from Proko that has blown my mind and will help me create more than just dragons. Also, I recommend Proko courses. They have free lessons on their site and on Youtube, but, if you have the funds to spare, please please purchase one of their courses. I'm not sponsored or anything, but I swear the money I spent on the "Designing Dragons" course by Antonio Stappaerts is probably one of the best investments I've ever made (and I'm only halfway through). My skill level has gone up exponentially since I bought that course. If you do try this course out, you have to do the exercises otherwise it's a waste. The assignments are AMAZING. Anyways, enough about that. My point here is to tell you that trying a new subject is invigorating and will make you grow leaps and bounds.

You could also try picking up a new technique that you haven't previously conquered. There are still lifes, figure drawing, portraiture, gesture drawing, shading styles, different types of outline, inking, lighting; instruction for all of these things can be found for free on Youtube. All you need is some time and effort (and internet, which I'm assuming you have since you're reading this right now).

5. Connections

It's also important to find people who have a mutual interest in art. They don't necessarily need to have the same preferred medium, but my best ideas come when I'm talking with someone and we start to spitball about something silly or crazy. Who are you to decide what is and isn't crazy? We're artists, not scientists. (Unless you are a scientist, in which case I say, scientists are wrong most of the time and science by definition cannot prove anything, so anything is possible, so I'm still right. Aha!) If you can't afford art classes, I recommend looking at your local library to see if they have any free resources and books. Also, have I mentioned Proko? It's pretty great. And free.

The most valuable part of having an art friend is the ability to keep each other accountable and to receive constructive criticism, which doesn't always mean pointing out the bad things about each other's work. We can see all the mistakes in our art, so it's easy to miss the good things that we are doing, so it's just as useful to have a loving companion who can point out our successes and not just our failures. Plus, if there is something that is seems "off," they can sometimes tell more than we can.

6. Perfectionism

We're really getting to subjects that hit home for me. Perfectionism can be immobilizing because if something isn't perfect, why try, right? If this is something that you struggle with as well, I have a few tips that have helped me. First, I've moved on to mediums that can be "fixed," like oil paints and gouache. This is about "tricking" my brain into being more comfortable and brave with my mark making. What does it matter if the strokes I make are bad if I can just fix them later right? With watercolors on the other hand, the pigments tend to stain the paper, and the paints are not opaque enough to cover mistakes. On the right here is my first "official" oil painting that I completed. For the first time in a long time, it was pure joy for me to complete this. (There were, of course, frustrations with this piece as with all pieces, but you artists will understand the torture.)

7. Losing Control and Gaining Freedom

I also recommend that you start out with a medium like oil pastels that will not let you get finicky about details. It's so broad and messy that it can be difficult to control, which is a perfect exercise for control freaks. Once you realize you can't control everything, you can finally start to relax a bit. There is a beauty to being bad at something because you are no longer expected to turn out a masterpiece. It can come out like garbage, and you can still say you had fun. Once you get good at something, failure can feel like, well, failure. You might feel like you should be beyond making mistakes, but sometimes mistakes are the launching points of ingenuity. You can also base your work off scribbles. You can make pictures out of ink blots, "sculpting" the image out of the paper. Sometimes I like to splash color on my canvas when I gesso it to make it less terrifying. (This can backfire when it comes out super pretty, and you feel like you'll ruin it. Either way, you get something fun and pretty out of it.)

If you are feeling so much pressure with every project that you can't even start, it's time to start rapid fire making sketches. I know. I know. This seems counterintuitive. You might even say, "But the problem is starting. How am I to start a ton of art if I can't even start one?" This is where a junk journal or sketchbook comes into play. Get supplies that are cheap, disposable, or on sale. Maybe find an ugly sketchbook. The point is you don't want to care about the supplies, and they are disposable to you. Use printer paper. Use newsprint. Use the pencil you found at school. Get the sketchbook on clearance with the ripped cover. Do not value it at all. Then fill it. Draw ugly. Draw things you are very very bad at but you think are cool. Write notes on top of failed sketches. This is all about you getting into the habit and enjoyment of the creation process.

It doesn't matter if it turns out great or bad because it's about the facts that you started and you finished and you enjoyed it. Perfectionism comes when you are worried about the finished product, and it sucks the joy out of the whole process. You can even put notes on top of your experiment sketches, saying what you liked and didn't like, which makes it feel like studying; this will take the pressure off as well. If you make something beautiful, don't treasure it. Remind yourself that you did that, so you can do it again. Because you made something so wonderful, you have learned from it and will make something better later. The important part is to move on.

8. Hoarding

Another piece of advice is to start using those expensive paints that you treasure more than anything else. That giant canvas you've been saving to use on your to-be-determined masterpiece? It's time to go through your junk journal, find the first idea you find appealing, and just do it.

When I play video games, I hoard everything because I'm so worried about needing items in the future, but I hold onto things for so long that they inevitably become useless to me because I think there is always going to be the right moment for later. Not right now. When I played Skyrim, I died over and over and over and over because I was weighed down by my items. My husband always has to tell me to use my items, otherwise they are useless.

So I am telling you here and now, use those special, expensive, fancy paints or paper or canvas, because there is never going to be a right time if you don't start. It doesn't matter what time or subject or skill level, your masterpiece will never come to fruition if you don't put in the effort to make it good. Once you start doing this, I promise it gets easier and easier to create. My advice is to stop valuing your tools above your potential creations. You are the artist; you will make it good whether the tools are cheap or not. If you don't enjoy the process, you're not going to grow and push through the hard periods of being an artist.

9. Social Media

I have a folder for random bursts of inspiration I have while scrolling social media like Pinterest or Instagram. I save these for later when I'm lacking inspiration. For the record, I DO NOT RECOMMEND scrolling through social media to look for ideas. It leads to paralyzation and not creating art. Defeats the purpose. I will look through my saved folders for inspiration or even to study a particularly good or interesting work that I might want to learn from and emulate.

10. Rest and Growth

Last, but certainly not least, if you absolutely cannot get yourself to create or be excited about it, it is probably time for a break. Lots of artists will tell you you have to draw every single day or you're not improving, but I'm not one of them. Yes, drawing everyday is the ideal, and I do recommend at least one doodle, sketch, or exercise a day, but I think the biggest challenge in being an artist is continuing to cultivate your love of creation and flexing those muscles.

When you work out, you are supposed to give yourself a day or two throughout the week to rest and let your muscles rebuild themselves. The act of working out is literally tearing your muscles, but they heal stronger than they were before, and you do it again and again. So, let yourself take a few minutes, a few hours, a few weeks to rest up. All that matters is you come back to what you love. You wouldn't be here reading this article if you didn't love art, so I have no doubt that you will come back after your rest. Personally, I have found I usually come back from my rests even better than I was before; it's crazy. We are our own boss, which means we can't be burning our employee out.

If it makes you feel better about lacking motivation because you are unhappy with every piece of art you make, some artists say that it is because you are going through a growth spurt. Maybe your art looks ugly to you because your artistic eye is more knowledgable than before; it's just waiting for your hands to catch up to what you know, in which case all you need is time and patience. So, go out and do what you need to and do what you love.