May 2013 - 31 day PAINTING challenge!

UPDATE:

about 'ART BLOCK'

I love to paint! Very much.

Yet not all days are productive. It happens that I mess up and have to throw the whole thing away, or I feel like there is not enough energy left in me to finish something. I get upset and put off from time to time by miscellaneous factors, such as not living up to my own expectations, my mother not liking the painting, not selling a piece or bad communication with my commissioners. Sometimes I get trapped in an "art block" when my inner child cries of frustration and is too scared to simply pick that brush up and try again.

I know many of you experience the same kind of frustration. Many of you asked for tips on how to improve and I always attach the evergreen phrase "practice a LOT" that sadly carries a certain abstract feeling. Well, painting 3 pictures is not enough. Painting 53 is not enough - I've painted over 200 watercolors plus hundreds of scraps and it never feels accomplished.

Before you give it up completely, seeing the hundreds of paintings "to go" unachievable goal, think about painting as of an activity, not a final product. If there is enough love towards creating itself, art block never gets a chance. It does not matter how many paintings, what matters is that I get to spend significant amount of time every day doing what I love to do.

I came up with an idea to celebrate my love towards painting, it's called Jane's 31 day painting challenge! Ready to call me crazy? Wait til you see my table

Achievable goals:

Practice, practice, practice. Getting outside my comfort zone and change my subjects. Main technique (for now) remains watercolor.
Improve my self-management skills, making one painting a day plus online updating takes serious amount of time and can be done only when well-planned.
Keeping a closer touch with my watchers. Along with a current day painting, I will be blogging progress shots every day. I will be available for discussion.
Hopefully inspiring some of you to join me! No need to stick with 31 days, you can create a challenge on your own terms.
There will be a video every week to demonstrate current subject. Also, there will be 3 CONTEST painting days during which I will paint a portrait, a landscape and a pet/plant/subject based on your own pictures!

So what exactly would I paint during these 31 days?

1st week - PEOPLE & PORTRAITS: Let's begin with my "comfort zone". It's my favorite topic but I will still try my best to build on what I already know and experiment.
2nd week -  FIGURATIVE & DANCERS: Again my topic, I did not get to draw this in a very long time, SO looking forward to it!
3rd week - LANDSCAPES: YES! Something new for me, I used to draw landscapes with pencil when I was younger all the time but I never did one watercolor painting of it.
4th week - PLANTS & ANIMALS: I have to admit, this will be a suffering for me. Not that I don't like plants nor animals, I just can't relate to the subject as much as I can to human beings. But perhaps this week will change my life as I discover I only want to draw cat's fur all day long...

Lastly, contests:

29, 30, 31st May -I LOVE PAINTING contest!- I will paint 3 works based on 3 winners reference pictures. I will be announcing contest winners through the first half of June and publishing results til the end of June 2013. You can also join the contest on www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbi…




So, that's it, follow me for updates Or don't, rather paint yourself

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