I HATE MY ART. A blog about perfectionism, self-criticism, and patience.

Recently, I have been feeling out of touch with painting a lot. I didn’t seem to have much spare time and all the spare time that I did have I really did not feel inspired to paint. However, yesterday, I had a few hours free and I felt like it might be good to just do it. Just get back into it. Perhaps with a little acrylic study. Painting with oils requires such patience because of the unbelievably long drying times. So, I thought, acrylics might be a good way to get my groove back.

Wrong.

I hate the painting. Frankly, it just looks shit in my mind. In fact, I hate a lot of my paintings. I look at them and almost feel sick. Sick and embarrassed. “This is what you present as art?”, is what I ask myself.

After finishing the study, and completely thrown by the, in my mind, horrible outcome, I went out to meet a friend. I thought, maybe, when you come back the painting will look better. Maybe you just need some distance from it and then you will see it with fresh eyes and like it.

Wrong. Again.

After a few hours, I came back and saw the painting and I hated it still! It just looked gross and I wish I didn’t have to look at it. But I did. I did look at it. And I thought, what don’t I like about this painting? I realised that I thought it looked a bit dull.  

Still grumpy but too frustrated to just give up on it, I tried to work out how I could make it less dull. That’s it! The white reflections aren’t bright enough. They need a hint of yellow! And so, I added yellow. It looked better! But still, I hated it.

I continued on with my day, having a wave of resentment coming over me with every time I went back into my room and had to see the painting. Then, by the end of the day while doing something else entirely and glancing over at the painting every now and then, I realised. Of course it’s still dull, it’s just a random little bell floating in space. It needs a shadow!

So, this morning, I got up and added a shadow. And simple as that, now I look at the painting and, I don’t dare to say it, but I like it!

The thing is, maybe I tend to overdramatise these things. Maybe I tend to overreact a little to the extent that if I create something within 2 hours and don’t love it immediately, I question my entire existence as an artist and whether this is really what I want to do with my life if all I create is just shit. I may or may not have spiralled into these exact thoughts yesterday…

And it may seem silly to some.

However, I’m glad I had this experience. And, in fact, there’s a valuable lesson to be learnt from this – maybe some of you will relate. Because, why expect things to be perfect the first try? I imagine that even the most talented and most famous artists have pieces that they hate. Or pieces that take them weeks, months, even years to complete until they like it. Why do I put this pressure on myself to do something right the first try?

If you haven’t already gathered this, I am highly perfectionist. And it’s limiting on so many levels. I want to learn to accept that things take time, that everything is a journey: art, a career, life. If I don’t like something, step back. If I don’t like something, examine it. Why don’t I like it? If I don’t like something, keep working and trust the process. I promise you, it will be a good thing.