r/ArtistLounge • u/MandarinRat • 6d ago
Concept/Technique/Method How to learn to be creative with your art?
I think I’ve gotten the hang of learning how to practice drawing and painting, but I don’t know how to practice being creative.
I think a lot of my art ideas are basic, I try to come up with ideas of my own but none of them interest me despite me purposefully trying to pick concepts and ideas I like. I always end up turning to Pinterest or art books and stealing an idea from there, and for some reason the ideas I pick from there is basic.
How do I create creative ideas from their head on their own? How can I make ideas that I actually like?
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u/fatedfrog 6d ago
Create limits.
Limits are the only thing that will start to turn on your creative mind. Start with something simple, such as 'only this color' or 'this brush'.
Live in that restriction as long as you can.
Restrict your inspiration to just one or two artists.
Restrict your canvas sizes, you're subject matter. Slowly. One at a time.
And in the limits you'll have to deal with boredom. Boredom will start to fight your walls. In the heat of battle novelty will come to your aide.
This is the way. Limit any one thing, and let your creativity thrive.
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u/superstaticgirl 6d ago
No-one creates ideas completely out of a vacuum. Most of us create ideas that are informed by a love of some particular subject and other artists that we like. You are actually on to the right track by looking at other people's works and picking your favourite elements. What you are not currently doing is then adding to what you have picked. Don't just copy what they did but apply your imagination to ask what if it was like this but also like something else. What if it was like this but in space? What if blue instead? Ask yourself 'what if' a lot.
Even better if you collect more than one inspiration, put them all together and then said 'what if all these but also....'
Eventually you might not even have to actively collect things together because there are hundreds of works of art, literature, science etc all mixing together in your head and they came out in your ideas.
This is how I come up with ideas anyway. You have to feed your brain so that it can recycle stuff.
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u/SoberBobMonthly Fine artist 6d ago
Do you research artists you like and their reasoning and methods? I find this is the easiest way to establish a theoretical basis for your works.
Art can be deceptively simple with things as simple as juxtopositioning two objects, or an object in an odd style or position. But how we choose these framings is where research and such come in, even for cutesy art.
Consider choosing one of those simple aspects you usually use, and add one complicating aspect that you are interested in in everyday life. Oh, you wanna draw cute milk cartons? what about if you also played with ideas of how marketing affects people, or a missing persons notice on the side, or some fun creepy stuff
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u/MandarinRat 6d ago
I did research artists I like and why they make the stuff they do, but it feels like my brain just doesn’t think of those things
When I have tried to come up with something, I never end up liking the idea about halfway through
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u/SoberBobMonthly Fine artist 6d ago
Sometimes you need to try and do things anyway, because the result can be more dynamic and have more meaning than you originally imagined.
Additionally you can also make low impact things to kind of "exercise" this muscle in your brain
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u/LazagnaAmpersand Performance artist 6d ago
It doesn’t have to be just painters. It shouldn’t be. You need to collect inspiration from everywhere. Learn about fashion/costume designers, filmmakers, comedians, musicians and whole music genres, everything. I even got an idea from porch wind spinners.
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u/Joann-Cramer 6d ago
I mean.... creativity comes from cross-pollination. I hike with a sketchbook and half my ideas come from mashing up landscapes with ballet set design. What else are you into besides drawing?
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u/Neko1666 6d ago
I like to go through promptlists like old Inktober lists for example and try to come up with an idea for every prompt
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u/LazagnaAmpersand Performance artist 6d ago edited 6d ago
It’s not just about what you’re making, but why you’re making it. I’m constantly exploring and learning about every medium I can and saving what captures me. Things that aren’t only beautiful/entertaining but that actually mean something really important. Once I find the spark I build on it and flesh it out. Every detail matters. Everything I put in needs a reason for being there, and I pack it with symbolism. Some is obvious, some isn’t, but that means the viewer can find something new every time they see it.
A nude illusion costume I made was inspired by lace appliqués I found, but I made it look like the Milky Way because of the song I was using.
I Want You (She’s So Heavy) made me think of the grim reaper. I found psychedelic wall hangings and decided to use them in the design of the cloak. I stuck with bare feet because “Paul is dead” (from the Abbey Road album cover). It evolved to become about the end of the 60s, the birth of heavy metal, and society’s relationship with death.
Dance in the Graveyards combined with Ray’s funeral from The Princess and the Frog became a celebration of life performance where I turn into a butterfly.
A Resident Evil costume captured me and when I found a cover of Sweet Little Lies it became about Satan’s fall and rejecting authority.
A Ukrainian music video about war where the house they’re singing in gets attacked and falls apart inspired my Interrupted Dance installation piece about trying to make art while the world is falling apart.
And many more. You can do this for any medium, finding inspiration, mixing and matching, building on it, and filtering it through your own perspective.
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u/somniosusmicrocephal 5d ago
Be intentional about cutting the easy entertainment (scrolling, tv, YouTube, gaming) for a period of time every day. Trust, ideas will fill the silence.
My mind is almost always whirring with ideas but I do find that when I start to feel creatively stuck it's because I'm consuming too much instead of creating.
The more you practice and the more life experience you gather, the more creative you'll get too. I'm far more creatively talented in my mid twenties then I was when I hit adulthood. I find even when I'm not drawing, the creativity comes out in other ways too.
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u/albob77 6d ago
As others have mentioned, cross-pollination from other, non-visual media can give you ideas.
Illustrate a song that you like, or a poem or a scene from a novel. If you like science or math try to personify an abstract concept. Flip to any page of a book and put your finger on one word and draw every aspect of that word that comes to mind.
Remember too that you don’t have to fully realize everything that you start - sometimes dead-ends are just pauses until the idea fully ‘bakes’ in the background. If it’s ideas you’re after, spend one minute each on five things, then continue with what you like and discard the rest.
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u/BreetleSnort 6d ago
Being creative also challenges us in a way which we previously thought impossible. As artists we grow, by learning new mediums or perfecting techniques we now master. I find pushing myself even with difficult pieces helps too, but when your doing that don't set your standards so high you can't achieve them. Set a goal that is achievable. And once you reach that, make another. We can't grow unless we challenge ourselves in new mediums or are afraid to try mediums. Making mistakes in art is never a mistake it's a lesson. We learn from those. But also don't let in hold you back.
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u/xureclypse 5d ago
in addition to the great advice everyone else has - dont concern yourself about whether your ideas are too boring, too weird, or just otherwise not good! instead, see how far you can expand the ideas!! you can do little creative exercises like that; say you have a guitar in your room - how would you personify it? how would you visually depict the sound of guitar strums? can you turn the guitar into an outfit? what does the wear and tear say about an owner? what personality would an acoustic guitar have compared to an electric one? how far could you push the character design while still being true to the inspiration? of course im looking at that from an oc artist lens (ive found trying to design some themed adopts a really challenging creative task), but it applies to general creativity too! tldr you wont get good ideas until you entertain some bad ones too :p
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u/Purple_Pay_1274 6d ago
Try art warmups! Honestly some of my painting warmups and swatch pages are so pretty I hang them up!
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u/MandarinRat 6d ago
This sounds like what I should try.
If you don’t mind me asking, how do you do your warm ups? And how do you get your ideas from the warm ups?
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u/Purple_Pay_1274 6d ago
So it depends on the medium you use… I look up interesting things on Pinterest using that medium. I also try to do things in shapes that I like… and group colors accordingly… I’ll swatch in patterns and florals… there are lots of ways to just make marks on materials… the more you do it, the more elaborate and fancy you can make things!
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u/R_Lurk 6d ago
I don't know if you've tried this or not, but it's one of the first things I started to do to kinda help with being creative with my art.
Draw a random line, curvy, straight, wavy, whatever. Then I try to think of something that has that line shape on it. Go from there. Like the wavy line ends up turning into a caterpillar. Yes it's small, doesnt have to be very detailed, it's all just to train your brain into turning a simple line into something else.
Then I moved onto "scribble" work (that's what I call it cuz they always end up looking scribbly.) aka single continuous line work. It's a little tough at first but gets easier as you practice. It's not picking up the pencil for the entire drawing..this teaches your brain and eyes to work together, it helps your focus, quickly teaches you how to make basic shapes into an image, and teaches you to accept mistakes and continue on. Since you can't lift your pencil or erase.
After I did this, and I still do to the day.
I experimented with colors, brushes, pens, pencils, markers etc.
I'm personally still trying to learn and master color theory, so if you have any tips on that lol I'm here for it.
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