Blocked Artists
Where does creative inspiration come from?
As artists and creatives, we can all become blocked. Artist block is a version of writer’s block and with it comes the fear of not being able to create. You want to paint but instead you make excuses or find distractions to do more mundane tasks which won’t overstretch your mind. Suddenly everything becomes essential, even housekeeping, rather than sitting down to create.
When you suffer from artist block, you try and paint but nothing feels right, you feel devoid of ideas and inspiration. You look at an empty canvas and actually feel frightened to mark its large white surface. This creative stagnation and lack of motivation usually comes after a long period of sustained creativity.
I know from experience how horrible artist block can be, having suffered from it for well over a year and I am still recovering. I have painted for practically all my life, as long as I can remember. My artistic life suddenly became stilted and hard to free up. I had forgotten to nurture myself; I had lost the ability to play, so art become a ritual and a chore. My artist’s palette remained where I had left it, splodged oil paint left drying beside an empty canvas. I stopped posting on social media, my website was left without updating.
Trying to overcome artist block is not as easy as you might think. To bring creativity back into my life has been hard and required a lot of persistence and a willingness on my part to get fun back into my practice. The only thing that helped, was making myself create art in a different way, by doing less arduous tasks.
I started to do creative exercises, took a workshop, travelled, started a new writing project. I read some books: The Artist’s Way, by Julia Cameron, recommended by a friend years ago. It is a spiritual book and involves daily exercises like writing Morning Pages and having an Artist’s Date once a week, to create. Another book which helped was Conscious Creativity: The Workbook by Phillipa Stanton, whereby you experiment, explore, and create to free up creative movement in a safe space.
I took time to daydream, on my walks in nature to find items to bring back and paint. I made space to create, my own safe place. Practiced meditation, yoga, connected with people who supported me, took time to have coffee, to go and visit somewhere lovely. These have all helped recovery and to give my creativity time to develop again. Mindful journaling and daily sketching of anything that inspires and above all, giving myself permission to create rubbish and scribbles in my sketching and painting.
Creativity is all about innovation, productivity, and finding the joy in creating. It gives meaning to life but must not become a chore. When it is fun, it improves our mood, happiness, and satisfaction in achieving so that it remains joyful, inspiring, magical and above all good for our soul.
‘Love, Joy, Create’ Blog – Please follow along with me and create your own inspiration for your art by learning about nature and the world around is art@patriciajvalentiart.com .
Patricia Valenti is a representational contemporary fine artist and life-long painter, based in Kent in the UK. Patricia began her artistic studies as a young girl. Her passion for nature and the beauty of animals and wildlife can be seen through her work, transforming familiar animals and wildlife into stunning, realistic interpretations with emotional impact. Her walks around the surrounding countryside near her home inspire her work.