if you're like me and you grew up posting and making art online, you're more than familiar with the feeling of wanting to improve as quickly as possible, even going as far as to mimic artists you think are cool. you want to be as good as those artists you look up to. with social media becoming ever popular, it's become something of a battlefield for attention and networking and ladder climbing to make a name for yourself. it's exhausting, and honestly more discouraging than helpful. it made me feel like giving up many times.
if i can't draw something people want to see, why bother? why do i exist? why am i even alive? i think stuff like that. heck, i still do.
i realized that the normalization of trying to build an audience and network as an artist is kind of a double-edged sword. if you can put up with it, it may work out in your favor, but i really wish people who offer advice would stop pretending everyone is the same, that everyone wants the same thing out of art. it's so misleading, especially if you're a beginner artist. you get stuck thinking you HAVE to make stuff that people will like. but, you don't. you don't have to do shit for anyone.
instead of thinking about what everyone else is doing with their art, focus on what YOU want out of art.
i personally don't feel comfortable drawing what's popular or what will get lots of views anymore. i just don't want to. i've started to hate it really (hyperbole but still).
it's just so exhausting that it's normal to feel like i wanna die just because i picked up a pencil one day and kept doodling on paper for years and years.
instead, i think i'm just gunna become an enigma who doodles more than i finish things again, drawing stuff that i wanna see. it's been real rough, and still is, to de-program myself to not think i have to match everyone else's level. i should just do what i'm comfortable with.
i can't tell everyone else to do the same of course, but this is what i want to do.
if i can't draw something people want to see, why bother? why do i exist? why am i even alive? i think stuff like that. heck, i still do.
i realized that the normalization of trying to build an audience and network as an artist is kind of a double-edged sword. if you can put up with it, it may work out in your favor, but i really wish people who offer advice would stop pretending everyone is the same, that everyone wants the same thing out of art. it's so misleading, especially if you're a beginner artist. you get stuck thinking you HAVE to make stuff that people will like. but, you don't. you don't have to do shit for anyone.
instead of thinking about what everyone else is doing with their art, focus on what YOU want out of art.
i personally don't feel comfortable drawing what's popular or what will get lots of views anymore. i just don't want to. i've started to hate it really (hyperbole but still).
it's just so exhausting that it's normal to feel like i wanna die just because i picked up a pencil one day and kept doodling on paper for years and years.
instead, i think i'm just gunna become an enigma who doodles more than i finish things again, drawing stuff that i wanna see. it's been real rough, and still is, to de-program myself to not think i have to match everyone else's level. i should just do what i'm comfortable with.
i can't tell everyone else to do the same of course, but this is what i want to do.