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One becomes a painter
by painting.
Vincent Van Gogh

I know I repeat myself a lot when I say, writer’s write.  But here we have a Master saying the same thing about painting.  How does one become a painter?  By painting.

It really is that simple.  In order to create a masterpiece, one first needs to pick up the paintbrush or the pen or the scissors or the mouse. You don’t create a masterpiece the first time you fall out of bed to create something.  It takes time.  It takes practice.

How Long Does Practice Take?

When Van Gogh first started out as an artist, he painted in the style of the old Dutch masters, dark, sooty greys as depicted in The Potato Eaters.  How does one move from that to his Sunflowers painting?  Practice.

Last year I painted almost nothing but flowers
to accustom myself to a colour other than grey,
that’s to say pink, soft or bright green, light blue, violet, yellow, orange, fine red.
And when I painted landscape in Asnieres this summer
I saw more colour in it than before. 
I’m studying this now in portraits.

Vincent Van Gogh (10/1887)

A year.  Van Gogh spent a year studying color.  It’s not easy, but to get better at your craft, you must practice.  Even the great Masters did.  How does one become a painter?  By practicing.  So how much practice time will you put into your work?

 

How Does One Become A Painter? By painting. Take that from Vincent Van Gogh who understood that practice is important to art. #painterspaint #writerswrite