2023 (Recap of 2022, Creative Exploration & New Art Goals)

Well, hello… It’s been a whole solid year that I have abandoned my blog oops… But on the bright side, I can assure you, my time away from the Internet has been very well spent. So much has happened and honestly I’ll admit that 2022 slipped away much quicker than I thought it would, but perhaps it was because of how much I truly felt and enjoyed every bit of it! Let’s see how shall I quickly summarise this before getting into some reflections for 2023? HMMMM…

I suppose if you have been following me long enough you would know that I’ve always been telling everyone that my dream was to get into art school after Junior College and eventually be a freelance artist. So… Life update: I’m actually not in art school and I may or may not pursue the career of a freelance artist * cue GASP *

“WHYYYY??” You might ask, because it has been all I could talk about for years and it certainly seems odd that I am suddenly pivoting (and being vaguely happy about it??) Long story short, this decision was made mostly out of (being aggressively convinced to accept my art school rejection letters and unwillingly pushed to grow up and embrace) practicality. I won’t lie and tell you I am entirely satisfied with the direction my life has taken because some part of me will always wonder what I missed. I will always wonder…

What if I tried harder?

Did I not try hard enough?

Am I not passionate enough?

Do I not love art enough to give it everything, literally everything, I have?

What life could I be leading now if I didn’t “give up” when I faced rejection and the challenges of starting up my own art career?

I spent a long time coming to terms with these internal doubts even as I verbally tried to convince myself and everyone else around me that I was making the right choice by accepting the double degree offer to read Business Management and Accountancy. I tried really hard to convince myself that I was happy and satisfied to study these subjects (something I have never taken an interest in) rather than take a gap year, create more art, maybe take a foundation course and try applying to art schools again.

Unfortunately, as we all know, ignoring your feelings and just trying to move on never really works. Of course, I felt really bitter and frustrated for a long while (because why is it so hard to just do something you actually like?? Why can’t we all pursue happiness?) My rejection (and unexpected turn in life) stung especially more when I saw that my brother could pursue a Diploma in Game Development, something he actually enjoyed. I thought to myself, why can’t I do that too? Just because I was doing better academically and it would be a “waste” to pursue art instead? It seemed really unfair to me and I was genuinely angry at life for a bit. After a lot of time though, I think I have finally put enough distance and good experiences between Present Me and Just Rejected From A Bunch Of Art Schools and “Forced” Into A “Basic Degree” Past Me to actually accept and be truly grateful for the unexpected surprise that just swung right into my life and upended all my careful life planning.

With time, I have come to realise that while I was rightfully passionate about my dream of becoming a freelance artist, I was also very much laser-focused and acting based on what limited knowledge I had of the world at 15. Since I made up my mind back then that I wanted to “do something I actually enjoyed as my job for the rest of my life” I haven’t sat down to properly think about how I would do that and what practicalities would come into play. After being in business school for a whole year, talking to so many other people with new perspectives and actually learning more about how businesses and accounting actually works, I realised that I have a lot of learning and growing up to do. Of course I still believe that it’s a great quality to have to keep hoping for the most positive result in whatever you pursue, but I am also learning to keep an open mind to consider other perspectives even as I keep dreaming big.

So one big thing I did in 2022 at my new school was to hold a live portrait drawing booth. I would say that this experience really opened my eyes so much and I’ll forever be grateful that I had the chance to try that. I did not expect how much work would actually go into running an art booth just for a day! Apart from actually drawing, gathering my materials (testing them for archival properties like waterproof-ity, lightfastness aretheseevenactualwords etc) and spreading the news that I was actually running the booth, I didn’t realise how much many other things I would have to handle if I choose to run my art booth like an actual business - not just a fun hobby thing that I can sort of earn money out of.

These things (which I have completely overlooked all this while) are things like proper branding and marketing, inventory stocks, standard pricing, payment systems, accounting (!!! Which is so important especially if you’re running the business yourself!), keeping your own official sales records (which I did not realise how much work it was until that day itself so… thank goodness for my free of charge admin staff who showed up on that day and saved my butt! THANKS IAN IF YOU’RE READING THIS), order forms, commissions and on and on and on. I always used to complain that I have no interest in numbers and money, but I am actually genuinely so grateful that I was able to take basic Financial Accounting in my first semester at university. I learnt enough from that class to be able to keep track of my own accounts and… realise that after a whole day of sitting at my art booth and a whole week of frantically completing portrait commission orders, I made an average of 70 cents/hour ._.

Obviously, I am now rethinking my plans of running an art business. I now truly understand why there are so few full time freelance artists and can better appreciate and respect the people who consistently work on that on top of a full time job! It really isn’t easy. I do wonder though, if it means that I’m wiser for reconsidering my career options or disappointing for “giving up” so quickly?

I’m really not sure if I want to put so much work into a future career that would reap so little rewards (if at all sometimes!) and struggle so hard with it. This is also the point where I remember that the whole idea behind pursuing an art career in the first place is so that I can do something I enjoy as my job, but if it turns into such a mess and stressful struggle for me, is it really what I’m looking for? Honestly, I don’t really have an answer now, but I know that I’m more willing to try new things and keep striving to find a suitable sweet spot where I can both enjoy what I do and make a comfortable living out of it. Perhaps the answer will come to me soon, but for now I’m okay letting go of my expectations and opening all my doors :)

Which now nicely leads into… My art goals for the year!! (Oops don’t think my 2022 summary was very succinct, but hey, it’s representative of my thoughts and emotions regarding my future career path!) I figured that given the whole roller coaster of 2022, it would do me some good to spend some time to go more specifically into the details of my creative goals this year so I can guide myself to achieve greater improvement and not forget about my artistic adventures even as I study really hard in school. So here goes! Let’s take it one by one okay?

1. The first one off the top of my head would be MASTERING DRAMATIC LIGHTING! This one would be fun, fancy and also really help my understanding of light in a given piece, which would then help me better with contrast in my art pieces. So, the reason this is right at the front of my mind is that I very recently completed a digital painting where I challenged myself to try dramatic lighting. Without a reference. What I did was to basically eyeball some art pieces with really dramatic lighting, take some mental notes and then just went for it for my own painting. Surprisingly, it worked out pretty well and I really liked the effect, so I think this shall be my new focus this year, like how last year was mostly portraits.

1. Speaking of portraits, I also want to KEEP PRACTISING PORTRAITS, maybe try for a more caricature style and learn to draw them without specific / stationary references! Despite drawing over 300 faces (I kinda counted) over the past year or so, I still don’t feel very confident in capturing the unique features of some faces, particularly unfamiliar ones, so I would like to keep working on that and not leave that newfound skill to wither out over time!

1. Of course, practice makes a lot of difference and I’ve been seeing a lot of artists on social media actually learning new skills (be it composition, colour or lighting) by attempting to REPLICATE WORKS BY THE MASTERS. This seems like a really interesting concept to me and if I have the time, I would definitely like to try this out!

1. The next, more specific, goal would be to ACHIEVE SMOOTHER LINEWORK & FLOW in my figures! This one is something I still struggle with a lot. My figures tend to appear very stiff (perhaps because I am still building them from blocks rather than looking at the overall motion of the entire “object”?) And it really annoys me too because stiff figures are very very obvious even from afar and just makes the overall drawing look really awkward. Not sure how I should improve this though, but I know that using lots of references and practising more often would definitely help. This is something I discovered when I was learning how to draw up fancy / convincing / professional looking fashion illustrations within 2 weeks for my friend’s fashion show (another opportunity for creative expansion at Not Art School that I am grateful for!) It takes some serious practice and initial reliance on references to figure out what really makes a figure flow nicely and naturally. I guess I will be working on more quick GESTURE DRAWINGS this year then! :’)

1. Another goal is to PAINT MORE WITH WATERCOLOURS! I experimented lightly with watercolour sketches last year for portraits, on various paper types and just random spontaneous paintings in general. There is definitely room for me to experiment a bit more with this medium even with all the years I’ve been using it. I think as I grow more comfortable with creating spontaneously and loosely, I am also slowly stepping away from a purely realistic art style and venturing more into abstract shapes, less details and more implying rather and info-dumping if you catch my drift. For watercolours, while I’m glad that I am able to achieve relative realism with this iffy medium, I think there is also a lot of untapped potential in the way I use it. Definitely want to try more random splashing of colours and unplanned sketches this year!

1. Learn more about SHAPE LANGUAGE, more specifically when it comes to shading! Talking about abstractness, I find that I am still very detail oriented and always really tempted to fully blend things out. I want to be able to achieve what some artists are so so good at: leaving blocks of colour side by side, no blending at all, and making a lovely semi-realistic painting out of that. Particularly in portraits with harsh lighting, the contours and shapes are very obvious. I want to practise that more and better understanding and familiarise myself with that.

1. I suppose this also leads to VOLUME and FORESHORTENING and everything that goes with art basics. These concepts are really helpful to grasp but I think I haven’t sat down to properly study them. I find that a lot of times I draw things then realise that it’s realistically impossible for these things to exist because the volume overlaps, it looks weird or I just didn’t angle my lines right to imply enough receding distance. I really need to get around to studying more art theory, but knowing me, I will probably shove this to later so… Time to swap between drawing and reading on bus rides this year!!

Of course there are endless things I want to do, but there is only so much time in a year. It’s on my list to start painting on large canvases again, experiment with glow in the dark paints, paint my room wall (murals!!), try sculpting / carving one day, delve deeper into fashion illustration, try architectural designs, perhaps even try another short animation and so many other things! But for now, I think just focusing on these few up there are good enough to occupy me all year… probably with a lot of random scribbles in between as well!

Lastly, let’s not forget the other creative things I have explored in the past year which include clothes making and… drumrolllllllllllll BALLROOM DANCING! Congrats to Past Me for being brave enough to try out a dance form :’) Surprisingly, I haven’t broken any bones or injured any one (severely) on the dance floor yet. But yes, this counts as one of my creative goals for the year ahead as well: learn all 5 dances for standard ballroom! So far I’ve done Waltz, Tango and most of Quickstep, so I only have Viennese Waltz and Foxtrot left :)

I’m surprised by how much I can like an experience when I actually let myself try something new, like how I picked up sewing, playing the guitar, fashion illustration, portraits, ballroom! Never would I have imagined that I could do any of these things – and actually like it! So honestly, just as I wrote in my own general life goals for 2022 two years ago, I truly manifested “creative expansion” for the year :’) I didn’t spend a lot of time on my normal drawing and painting but I certainly did expand my knowledge of different art forms and grown to appreciate them.

Trying new creative forms gave me the chance to be new at something again and to learn something from scratch with fresh eyes. I must say, it truly is inspiring and refreshing to be a newbie at something! Plus, bonus! This newfound appreciation for other creative forms also inspired me to make art in new ways, for example, drawing waltzing figures! And that also links to fashion illustration and rendering the flow of all those gorgeous ballroom dresses! Needless to say, I am actually really excited to keep expanding creatively.

I think 2022 was very much a year of learning new things, expanding (creatively and as a person) and mostly just exploring. I spent the year or at least the second half of it learning to let go of my preconceived ideas of success, my fixed definitions of a dream and a rigid direction I was blindly stumbling towards at all costs. This year, in 2023, I want to learn to be young again.

Everyone always tells me how wonderful it must be to know what I want to do at a very young age, but I always tell them, that’s not true. If you don’t know where you want to go, any step you take is a step forward, but if you know where you want to be and you take any random step, that would be a step backwards. This perception made me very miserable for a while I must admit, but now I’m learning to let go. Taking a step in any direction is still taking a step at any rate! Besides, I am young. I have the time to decide what I want to do with my life. There’s nothing wrong changing my mind and starting over, because you know what, at least I’ve tried once. It’s okay not knowing where you want to go or feeling like you’re going nowhere. Someday, you will see that everything happened for a reason and that exact combination of happenstances will be what brings you to where you are today.

For now, I’m content to revel in my youth, appreciate the time I have and explore all my choices. Just because I’m slower than my original plan intended me to be, doesn’t mean that I’m behind. Besides! It’s not a race :’) Gotta fully enjoy life and every single choice I make and every single experience I decide to try. As my very wise friend once said, if it works it works, if it doesn’t, well you get character development. Which is true! Every experience helps you grow. I’m ready to go experience more of life this year and see what suits me now :)

Thanks for sticking with me through this longish ramble / rant / thought organisation document?? Maybe one day I’ll come back and read this and be proud of myself for making it this far and even further. Wherever you are in life out there, just remember to keep adding to your life. Make it shinier, make it happier, make it better. It’s your life to live, so keep trying even if you don’t really know if anything you’re doing helps. It does. One day you will see just how much it does.

Love, Cuix <3