Cover Photo by Motion Lady on Unsplash
From the outside, our motivations to create art might look identical. The onlookers don’t see the internal forces that drives us, as artists.
I’ve decided to once again jump into @pencilcats’ 30 Days of Art Improvement Hell challenge. I’ve approached it many times in the past (and honestly, have yet to complete all 30 days of exercises it offers).
Now, some might think this is hypocritical of me, to speak to valuing ‘bad art’, making ‘bad art’, and then wanting to ‘improve’ my art. There is this projection from folks who can’t see outside of a binary lens, onto The Bad Art Teacher philosophies. These binary-trapped individuals think that either you accept your art as-is (and therefore never seek growth), or you seek growth (which means you secretly haven’t accepted your art).
But what I’m pointing at is a not-so-secret third thing: motivation as the variable that matters, not activity.
Approaching 30 Days of Art Improvement Hell (or AIH as I’ll refer to it from here on out) this time feels incredibly different than in years past; those years before I adopted the philosophies of joyously making bad art. I’ve previously stepped into AIH when my full perfectionist self was at the helm. I’ve also started the challenge when I was starting to shed those perfectionist + masking layers of past versions of me, but when I still didn’t embrace the ‘bad’ like I do now.
Similarly to why Eleanor in The Good Place…
[———S1E11 Spoilers Ahead———]
…could not earn enough points to stay in The Good Place because her motivation changes to self-preservation, so all of the nice things she does for the neighbourhood had no real moral value—my motivation to approach the AIH challenge this time has changed. But unlike Eleanor, not to self-preservation.
[———Spoilers end here———]I feel like I’m starting AIH this time with more lightness. If my technical skill improves, that would be cool I guess, but is not my motivation for doing so. I love to learn and to challenge myself for fun, and I know this challenge will do just that. And I can choose to do it ‘badly’, on purpose, if and when I want. There are no rules. This time, it feels like my motivation is full of play and curiosity. What will I create? Will I complete all 30 days, and does it really matter if I don’t? What might shift for me? And what do I stand to learn—about my practice, and as always, about myself?
This time I’m not doing a challenge called Art Improvement Hell because I feel I need to get better, or that deep down I’m unworthy if I’m not as skilled as I could be.
Is that easy enough to say and not really mean? Or could it be conditioning talking, without my full conscious awareness?
Those questions all need to be answered by only ourselves, as the individual.
Like I said at the start, to everyone else on the outside, it looks the same: it’s hours invested into sketching in a book; they don’t know your true motivation. But you can learn yours, with a bit of awareness, self-inquiry, and self-reflection.
Start by questioning the surface of why you want to improve.
Then ask yourself: what’s the why under that why? And the why beneath that? Keep going as far as you can, seeking the deeper why. It’s up to you to catch whether the story running underneath “I want to improve” is “I’m not enough yet” or “this is delicious and I want more of it.” And hey, maybe it’s some of both. I would guess it’s rarely black and white ;)
For some people “I just like challenging myself” will be the conditioning wearing a costume. And if you’re not sure what your motivation is, or you can’t quite see/hear/feel/understand/connect to the story underneath, I invite you to ask yourself during or after your improvement practice: “Does/did this feel like yearning or like play?” “Does/did it feel more like fun, or more like hard-work?”
For me, now that I’ve asked myself the questions, I can feel the difference between me undertaking the Art Improvement Hell challenge now, with less yearning to actually improve. I just want to do it to play, and have some structure to lean on whilst I have fun!
If your desire to improve is rooted in a feeling of “yes, yum, more of this please!” because it’s pleasurable for you to do a challenge like this, then I encourage you to seek out to “improve”!
You could label it as “pleasurable” instead of “improvement” directly.
Don’t let the binary-thinkers allow you for one more second to believe that making bad art means never “improving”, or that accepting your current creations as they are means you’ll never seek growth.
And if your improvement is rooted in feelings of not being enough— I want to offer you this: You are infinitely special, and perfect just as you are. Every being is born with an innate preciousness, and you are invaluable; absolutely priceless. I know that when we feel like we’re not enough, it can be hard to just let loose and accept what comes. I want you to know that, play is the way. You’re safe to be you as you are, right now, and have a little more fun instead of trying to optimize these aspects of your life. I see you.
I’m not writing any of this to challenge the projections of the binary-thinkers I mentioned near the start, I don’t need to a win an argument with them.
I’m writing this so the people caught in that very binary can put it down.
You don’t need my permission, but if it helps:
You don't have to choose between loving your bad art and wanting to grow. They were never opposites — only the why underneath ever mattered.