quillpunk | insert keysmash here (Reply)

It is fascinating to me that you can get better at art without, you know, doing the art.

About a week or so ago I painted for the first time in like a year (side-note; I'm legit worried about my paint... some of them are getting pretty old) and actually, that is hands down the best damn thing I've ever painted. In my life. Like, I painted another thing on the same day and that sucked, but that was less an art thing and more a blobbing paint on the board and seeing what turned up kind of thing.

Anyway! I painted an ocean with a sky, and I had a pretty good idea in my head of what it should look like. I gave up on the sky pretty quickly—while it was also probably the best sky I've ever painted, it's not what it looks like in my head and I got tired of making it worse. But the sea. My friends, I am in awe. Objectively, is it good? I could not care less. There is actual movement. There is perspective. There are waves in the water. I have never painted anything as good as this in my life.

And it's just very cool that despite not painting for so long, and barely doing any drawing beside that, not only do art skills stick with you, but they can improve. It's such an internal process, so much "oh that's a cool cloud" and "the way the sunshine glitters sure is pretty".

Art is so cool!