What classifies failure in Visual Arts?

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Permalink Reply by Tracy Rapier on October 8, 2010 at 4:52am

You pretty much said most of what needs to be said about " failure " . The word failure is negative , and I dont use it . As you said , it's a state of mind dealing with a 100% subjective profession . Art evolves . Its like the use of language , what the starch collar, square britches say is the official and correct way and the contemporary the incorrect way is an incorrect statement . The contemporary becomes the correct way if the people speaking and writing it use it . To prove my point , find an english dictionary from the early 1970's and compare it with one today . You will be surprised to find how many new words there are now and even the definitions of old word usage . What was originally slang are now official words . I read a very interesting article of the fact that British english is considered the correct form but almost all foreign nations today that hire educators to teach english abroad to their children specifically ask that American english be taught .Art like the artist evolves ( or at least should ), there is no failure simply a path of understanding your abilities and what direction you need to go in order to make yourself better . Look at a painting you did at age 14 and compare it to one you have done recently or many years past that age . Your old painting is not crude or a failure ,its where you were then and a measure of how much you have successfully grown . You have to crawl before you can walk as they say . When I " fail " , I say to myself " well at least I learned something " that something that may help you later on .

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Permalink Reply by Yevgeny Shnaper on October 8, 2010 at 6:37am

Great points, Tracy

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Permalink Reply by Greef on October 8, 2010 at 8:18am

I think the only time the word 'failure' should be used in visual artists is when an artist 'fails' to get his message across in his work... but that is dependent on if the artist has a message to convey! A lot of people don't, for many it is all about the visuals!

It's all a game of trial and error and solving the visual jigsaw puzzle...just got to keep moving the pieces around until it fits together! Failure is not an option!

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Permalink Reply by Brian on October 11, 2010 at 1:32am

failure in anything is giving up or not willing to try to push what you know. Doesn't matter if it's the visual arts, accounting, garbage collecting, etc. The willingness to learn from mistakes, grow in knowledge and wisdom and develop as a person is why progress is associated with failure. In visual arts you see many people who have only partial knowledge of how to go out into the world and make a living as an artist fail because when it comes right down to it ... they give up. A good analogy would be a person knowing how to cut stuff with a handsaw, he/she picks up a chainsaw and thinks they know how to cut trees down for a living. Same is true for artists ... in todays market you need to know more than just how to draw/paint/sculpt/etc, you need to know business skills, time management skills, marketing skills, etc. Most don't want to know or think they have to know anything about that and that if they paint well the people and sales will come to them ... and they don't ... after a while they give up and fade away in the art world ... which is why there is a 94% rate of artists who stop doing art for a living within 5 years. 3% go into the applied arts (silk screening, sign businesses, graphic design, air brushing, etc) 2% go into teaching (that broken down is 75% in kindergarden to 12th grade and 25% into the college system) leaving 1% that actually stay a working artist in the world after 5 years. Not to say that the 94% that quit are failures ... i know alot of people that are still trying to grow, trying to learn and trying to push themselves for the day when they can go back into art and leave their construction/barista/retail/cubical jobs and try to make it on what they are passionate about. I myself fall into the 3 percent that went into the applied arts and even I hope to one day start making a living solely off of my art and ideas and not making art based on others ideas or needs.

And failed art pieces is pretty much the same ... unless a piece is completely unsalvagable (throwing on the wheel and flopping a pot, breaking a peice of stone in half and that half shatters, rip in the canvas, etc) the piece can still be worked on and made better or changed .... giving up is really the only failure. Failure on unsalvagable pieces would only be not learning from the mistake that happened.

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