What if we improve?

[Steven Sweeney]

The thread

[Lon Haverly]

Haa haa! Tha's funny, Michele!

[Lynn T. McCallum]

The Point Is....

If we are not improving with everything we do every day, including our talents or crafts, then what is the use?

If our art doesn't get better with every piece that is created or nothing was learned from a painting that failed, we fall short and we fail.

If we think we have learned everything and that there is no room for improvement, it's time to look at our works and ourselves. There is always a whole lot more to learn and always tons of room for improvement, no matter who we are.

The art of our past was a stepping stone and reflects our journey to where we are now.

Look at the Masters of our past and present, do you truly believe they went back to repaint a portrait? Some early works barely represent what their mature works looked like later. Look at Rembrandt, his work only got better (sure, he painted over failed paintnigs, but he never went back and got a painting that was already in another's possesion).

Ingres only got better. They didn't go back and fix the old paintings. Thank goodness that they didn't go back and repaint older works, we can now see how they grew personally and know that it is a long path to and for better works.

[Lynn T. McCallum]

See there is my point again. Typing and art. Art because I can, typing because I can't.

Grammar, spelling?

There is always room for improvement every day.

So, keep painting and learn something new everyday and don't look back.

Love, live and learn.

[Michael Fournier]

We all improve with experience. Of course the ideal would be to be able to paint without the need to earn a living and not have sold any paintings until we have established our style and expertise. But even I can look at paintings of artists whose earlier work was very, very good and see that their current work surpasses it in many ways. But I still like their early work just the same.

An artist who comes to mind is William Whitaker. Now he has been kind enough to have included a few galleries on his site of his earlier work. This retrospective shows a lot of very good paintings but I feel the work he is doing today is even more masterful. Does that mean his early work is not good? No of course not, and I would be more then proud to be the owner of any of his paintings.

For clients not to expect that your work will improve over time is unrealistic. But as your work improves and your reputation grows your fees will or at least should increase. I had a few early clients that could not afford what I now charge so they treasure the painting I did for them all the more.

Now, I am not a famous portrait artist by any means and my fame is very limited even within my own community, but nonetheless, my art has improved. It is in more demand and I can get higher fees than my early clients paid. I do not feel the need to apologize for my early work. It was the best I could do at the time and they paid a fair price for it as it was.