art for all

36. My Name is Mud

June 14, 2021 Danny Gregory Season 2 Episode 36
art for all
36. My Name is Mud
Show Notes Transcript

Should you plan out your project? Or just improvise?



welcome to art for all, the at sketchbook school podcast, your host, Danny Gregory. I'm the author of a dozen or so books on art and creativity. And I'm a sketchbook artist. Alfred Hitchcock. He, he meticulously planned out every shot in his films long before he set foot on the set. And then he waddled on with these super precise storyboards, his angles, his lenses, his lighting directions. They were all completely worked out. Now. Most artists. Aren't so controlled. Many of us just sit down to a blank page with just only the vaguest inkling of what we're going to do with it. And then we lay down the first lines, the first words, the first notes, and we begin to play around while some novelists plot out their stories on index cards and detailed notes. Others just enjoy discovering where the plot will twist. They enjoyed as much as their readers do. There's a danger inherent in either approach for the planner. There's the danger of staleness of uninspired mechanical execution hitch found, shooting a film to be quite a bore. He was simply executing these comprehensive instructions that he'd already laid out for himself and his crew. And his films, mom, beautiful and gripping. They always have a certain cool detached artificial quality because of his iron grip. And he rarely got the best performances from his actors, but for the free spirit as quite another danger. And that's the descent into mud. You look out the window to see the sun is shining and the road is beckoning and you stride out sandwich and your pocket or a breeze in your hair off to look for adventure. But at some point in the journey, a storm might brew sky darkens. The horizon disappears behind clouds. The road fills with potholes and puddles and you. Still driven and unwitting plod on, and eventually you collapse dirty, wet, miserable, and lost of the colors of the spectrum. Merge the form clear, pure white light. But when you combine all the colors in your paint box, you always get that same kind of khaki Brown. Sometimes, particularly when I'm a painting, um, I'll get a picture to a certain point and then unhappy with the way that it looks. I'll go too far. I'll deepen the shadows, I'll strengthen the outlines. And then when I'm very desperate, I'll introduce some garish, bright color to distract the eyes. Vermilion skies, chartreuse skin. It never works painfully it's when I'm doing a commission or making a present for somebody that I'm most likely to encounter this problem. Some part of my brain will not let go. And it sits in the background, whining and harping and firing suggestions. Instead of letting the piece take its natural course. I tried to twist it in direction. It doesn't want to go. And the result is mud. I've seen this phenomenon in my career in advertising so many times, because the process requires the approval and opinion of so many different people and compromise is often the watch word of the day. We slept a lot of mud. How often I've been working with a composer on the score of a TV spot only to have a client weighed in with issues and suggestions and soon new layers of drums and strings and effects are thrown over the music. Until it's muffled and stifled under a blanket. The same happens with writing as adjectives and claims get inserted at the last minute, like tumors metastasizing on paragraphs that had been edited and polished until they were organic and easy on the ear. And so often the reason was stated, sure you understand it the way you written it. We understand it, but well, will the consumer understand it? Let's emphasize the main points more strongly. And so additional legs and wings and humps are sewn onto the monster. Not because anybody's gut instinct requires them, but because of second guessing and lack of vision, when my son was in preschool, there was one teacher whose class always did the most amazing paintings. Each one was clear and sharp and intelligent. Picasso's in a sea of muddy fingerprints. And I asked her what she taught her kids what she said to keep their visions so pure and clear. She replied, I don't tell him anything really. I just know. When to take their paper away. Thanks for joining me today. I'll create something new for you again next week until then I'm Danny Gregory.