I have to write a post about how much I truly love skateboarding and everything that it has taught me. I'll preface by saying that I'm not a great skateboarder by any means. I have the basic tricks down, but I'm far from an expert. I've loved skateboarding for a long time, but it's this naivety that allows me to be so happy if I land a trick.
I went skating today down my local street and ran into a friend who also skates. We're about equal in skill level so we tried to jump (ollie) over some curbs. The curb in the video below was fairly high and had a patch of grass that we were trying to land on. I kept rolling up to it, trying to ollie onto the grass, but I couldn't commit to the jump. In skateboarding of any level, it's all about psychological commitment. There's a moment right before you do something where you say: "I'm going to land this or I'm going to bail." And this moment of clarity is extremely zen. It took me a while to build up the guts to jump over the curb. And when I finally landed one, I realized that I could roll through the grass onto the sidewalk. Also, once you land a trick, it's as if a switch is turned in your brain and you feel like you could land it anytime you want. The satisfaction that consumes me when I land a trick is based on the fact that skateboarding is scary. Even doing a small trick like this one in the video is terrifying. There's something so rewarding about conquering small fears. I also feel it more deeply because I'm at a low level of skill with skateboarding. As for painting, I still find satisfaction in my work, but it's harder and harder to come by. And with painting, it's also more of a drawn out process with no physical prowess involved. For a guy like me, I need the yin and yang balance between skateboarding and the sedentary pose of painting. In some ways I learn more about painting by skateboarding and more about skateboarding by painting. I hope to do both for a long time.
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The more I paint and draw, the more I realize the limitation of the media. This is sometimes discouraging when the natural world produces lights that are far brighter than the white on my palette. But having knowledge of what painting can and can't do is what makes a great painting. The limit itself of paint can be bent by knowing techniques that allow for it to bend. And that is what excites me about painting: using color, value and composition to create an image that is more than any photograph could ever be. The rest of it all doesn't really matter which is why I included some pictures of my palette and paint box. I use very rough bristle brushes, a basic turp and copal medium and a standard academic palette ranging (all of it constantly changing and evolving). Another thing that really gets me going is the fact that these pixels on your screen right now can never accurately produce the pigments of a painting. The airy, sometimes smoky quality of paint is really impossible to produce, which is why galleries and museums are a necessity. To be a supreme manipulator of paint just as a pro skateboarder can manipulate a piece of wood with wheels is the goal. And as a skateboarder knows the limits of gravity, concrete, they also know that practice is the crucial element. Preferences may exist and slightly affect a level of comfort, but a good painter can paint with horrible materials, just as a skateboarder can kickflip with a terrible board. Practice to look beyond the medium. I remember a story about the great artist Frank Frazetta that an amateur admirer loved his watercolors and wanted to know his secret technique. So Frazetta pulled out a Mickey Mouse watercolor set and showed him how he did it. It was Frazetta's skill level that bent the limits, not the watercolor set. When I look back on my own pieces, after a few years time, and I see something that I like, I sometimes try and re-create the way I did it. And what I find time and time again is not some kind of secret element, but rather, a standard academic approach that I keep refining and expanding by learning. Find what works for you and you'll reach success. amateurs go for subtle extremes, pros go for extreme subtlety -keep practicing What works for me, may not for you. Steeze is a term used in skateboarding referring to style + ease. It can't be taught, but only be improved by practice. Skateboarders all have a certain way of skating and landing tricks, and there isn't too much concern for copying anyone else style. It's all derived from experience, body type and how you like to skateboard. The same perspective isn't true of the art world. It's rather easy to fall under the spell of another artist. I fell under the spell of many artists and formed artistic crushes that taught me a large amount, while hindering me at the same time. This unfinished portrait to the left is a picture I took of my self portrait from 2011 as it was in progress. I would say this painting was full of my own steeze, which is why I love it to this day. I didn't particularly care about what colors I was using or technique. I was trying to paint a self portrait, plain and simple. I learned a great amount about techniques, mediums, and colors since I painted this when I was 19, but it is now time to hone my own steeze. I have been tip-toeing the line between imitation and finding my own path and it's impacting my work. I firmly believe that I will only create paintings that satisfy me when I walk my own way. But the hardest person to be often times is yourself. "It is better to fail in originality, than to succeed in imitation. He who has never failed somewhere, that man can not be great. Failure is the true test of greatness."- Herman Melville As the weather becomes nicer, I am led outside more evenings to practice skateboarding under the streetlights. There is a reason why I am writing about the parallels of skateboarding and the creation of a painting and I will discuss some of them in this post.
I am by no means a proficient skater, but this is perhaps why I feel such excitement in the early stages. Similar to the early goings of painting, I felt that even the small steps forward were great leaps. And there is an element of the duality of my activities, a stationary activity of painting with mental strain, versus a physical activity that involves real danger as opposed to psychological fear. The fear of both are interesting to compare also, but it really is a breakdown of practice and mental preparation. The fear I have of making a "bad" painting though, is my greatest fear. But I wont lie, rolling quickly and jumping over a curb puts a living scare into me. In skating, if I decide to jump over an object or do a series of movement, it all as to be plotted out beforehand and I must get a feel for the object that I am jumping over. So, this feeling, I think comes from practice; many hours on the board or with a brush in the hand in order to execute the objective that I have in my mind. So I muse a lot while I am alone skateboarding and painting. As a transportational medium, skating allows me to ride up and down the street on a basic level, and jump over a curb on the next level. So I must conquer my fear of falling and practice enough to be able to jump over a curb so that I can travel to more places with ease and attain higher levels. Not over-thinking is another element in both these activities. It is a brush and colored dirt with various media, just as a skateboard is a piece of wood with four wheels, yet both can provide so much joy. But it's not easy to clear my mind, as I ask myself ,"what if I fall?" The creativity of both activities is another element which attracts me. With practice, I can paint anything I can imagine. And with practice, I can turn the street into an analyzed area to test my limits. And I think that that is what it's all about. Testing limits. I hope you all have some activities that exercise your minds in different ways and keep you physically active. Testing limits in the gym/painting/and falling on my ass on a skateboard. That's the other thing, I fall a lot while skating, but I know it's the only way to improve. So I know I will make a terrible painting many times before I get back up and try it again. |
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