No Artistic rock left unturned.

This is  week six for the new blog.  I think it's becoming a habit!

The cellist Pablo Casals was known for his rigorous practice schedule. Even well into his nineties, he practiced four to five hours a day. When asked why he still did this, he simply said, "Because I think I'm making progress."

I've always liked that story. It resonates very strongly with me. I think any serious creative endeavor is on a lifetime arc of slow but measurable improvement. There are, of course, moments when it all works, and you suddenly level up, but I think that is merely the moment you or somebody else notices the improvement. It's really the months or years of adding miles to your brush. When we overcome a challenge and then repeat it, we absorb that new knowledge and grow as artists.

Just like all of my students, I am practicing and taking every opportunity to keep learning and improving. I think if I felt like I had topped out and couldn't learn, grow, or expand what I am doing, I would shortly lose interest and move on to something else. But being in my twenty-fifth year of painting, I suspect I will be at this for as long as I am on this Earth. You might ask yourself what an artist who teaches 3-4 classes a week and averages 4-5 paintings a week does when he's not working. It's the same as anybody else. I look for chances to learn and grow. I watch a lot of painting content on the internet. Almost every video I watch, I learn something. As I've grown over the years, I seek out artists who really impress me to learn from. Last year, it was the mentorship program with Thomas Schaller, which was life-changing. I watch a lot of videos from Paintable TV as well. They are not cheap but full of great information. This weekend was my favorite kind of thing: an in-person workshop with a great artist teaching a medium that I am just beginning to get comfortable with. This workshop was in watercolor pencil with the great Fernando Porras up in Jupiter at the New Studio for the Visual Arts. Workshops help me advance in a medium quickly, but more importantly, they recharge my artistic batteries and give me new tools I can share with my students. Below are a few photos from this weekend.  What creative pursuit really gets your juices flowing and has gotten under your skin to keep getting better at it.