Art Block - from guest blogger Courtney Davis

Art Block - from guest blogger Courtney Davis

Hi everyone, I hope you enjoyed my last post on using salt in paintings for a fun texture! I would love to see what everyone painted using salt! Feel free to send me a private message on Instagram. 


In today’s blog post, I wanted to talk about artist block. We all get it sometimes. Or we avoid a project we know we should be working on, but need something else to stimulate the artist's itch without being overtaxing or taking a long time. 


Some ways that I help with this, is I look for inspiration in many different ways. I’ll flip through an album of nature photos on my phone or on Pinterest. Another way is I flip through my notebook with all of my paint colors, to see if any particular paint stands out that day. I’ll pull up different artists that inspire me and look at their works as well. I also keep a note open in my notes app of paintings I would like to do, and ones I’ve done to help inspire more paintings. However, sometimes none of those options work. 


One thing that helps me is a project I did back in middle school. I grab a piece of paper, turn on some classical music, and take a big black pen or marker, then draw with the music without lifting my marker or pen. If the beat is intense I do quick sharp lines, if the music is soft and graceful I do long flowy lines with maybe a swoop in between. I move my hand in motion with the music. This helps break up the patterns in my brain and helps perfectionism go away when it comes to my paintings. 


Once the song is done, I will sometimes go in and fill in all of those little spots with different colors, and come up with a painting that reminds me of Picasso. When I did this exercise an idea of a flowy flower with leaves came into my brain. I quickly sketched it out with my alcohol pen - this is a simple project not meant to be perfect in any way, so I had fun with the shapes of the flowers - not aiming for realism. 


Once the ink had dried I used many different colors from the Smiling Hippo and painted the flowers purple, pink, and red, and leaves several shades of green. I also had polka dots throughout the painting, and I lightly dabbed red, teal, and gold honey-based paints from the Smiling Hippo to help spread more color across the painting. 


I love how this painting helped my artist itch, so I can focus on other paintings, and it inspired a floral collection I would eventually like to do in the future. Let me know how this exercise helps you, and I would love to see the creations you come up with. Until next time, for my last blog post, stay safe and be kind to one another.

Back to blog

Leave a comment