For beginning artists. What, how and why to draw.

What to draw. In different types of art the answer will sound differently, although it seems obvious. But sometimes confusion occurs that people confuse the types and genres themselves. For example, painting and decoration. Or graphics and design. Or architecture and portrait. And to accurately determine “What to draw,” you must first determine exactly what type of fine art is being considered or meant. This is especially important for beginning artists, since they often cannot decide what type of work their work belongs to.

For example, let's take those who seek to sell their paintings (I mean novice artists). The fastest and largest sales can be noted in the field of decorative images, which are used to decorate unpretentious interiors, the so-called mass sales. The answer to the question “What to draw” in this case is the topic “Abstraction”. Just large spots of color symbolizing masses, spaces and energies. This “What” is best perceived and accepted by an inexperienced viewer and buyer.

If we are talking about paintings in which a novice author strives for self-expression and spiritual growth, then the most accurate answer to the question “What” was given by the artist Svetlana Bakshaeva. One day I was in the open air with her. After about an hour of work, she looked at what I was drawing (and it was a Ural landscape) and said in surprise, “Are you drawing what’s outside?” Here it was my turn to be surprised. “What should you draw?” “What, you need to draw what’s inside!” she said. And this is the most direct answer to the question “What to draw” for someone who does not work for profit.

This may sound a little abstruse, but it definitely answers the “What” question. If we turn this answer into a more digestible one, it means the following. There is no need to draw, write an OBJECT - a vase, a flower, a tree, a house (or the environment where all this is located) or even a person. You must try to catch your reaction to this OBJECT, and express it, draw it, write it. In design or architecture, the task is to depict exactly the OBJECT, or at least add the environment in which it is located. And often architects and designers who switched to painting or graphics are guilty of this very thing. They try to depict the OBJECT, since that is what is most familiar to them. Therefore, their paintings turn out to be more correct, but at the same time colder emotionally and inexpressive; they do not touch the viewer.

But just an emotional reaction to an OBJECT is too little for an artist. It would be better to call this the word  STATE. And this is a more complex phenomenon, which includes not only the immediate emotional reaction to the OBJECT, but also the “Why”  of the artist, which, to be honest, should be determined before starting the painting or, in general, to artistic activity. The STATE can include not only a reaction to an object and “Why,” but even a temporary spontaneous emotional reaction to life in general. For example, a still life painted in gloomy, rainy weather will be very different from a still life painted in warm, soft sunny weather. Or rather, it should be different. If not, then the emotional component of the STATE will not be expressed. Accordingly, the picture will not be brightly individual.

  Probably, many aspiring artists are embarrassed to express such temporary spontaneous emotions in their paintings. But this is a very important part of painting and art in general.