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Repetition is the key to success. I am sure that you have heard that many times before, but what does it mean to you? May I share with you what that statement means to me?

When I think about the many hundreds of paintings that I have created in the last 20+ years, I think about how I have painted some topics over and over again to try to get something right.  Sometimes I paint a variation of the same painting, changing a vertical format to a horizontal one, for example, to see if I can make it more dynamic.  With some still life paintings, I will change the background or rearrange the items to see if the painting works better in a different arrangement. After all, how many haystacks did Monet paint? If he can do it, I can do it.

Once I started selling paintings, I realized that I should keep some of them as a reminder of where I had been to compare to where I was going in my Great Art Adventure. That’s how I think about this whole process of creating my art, as  a great adventure.

When I teach painting, I tell my students to not worry about making the perfect painting, but to think of it as practicing. That approach takes the pressure off from feeling the need to make each painting turn out “right”. With every painting that I create, some part of it is new. It might be a big thing like a new concept, or a small thing like a new color. With the appropriate attitude, intimidation recedes.

A few years ago, I had a junior high student ask me how I got to be such a great painter [his words, not mine!]  I told him I practiced a lot. He was a basketball player, so I made the following analogy. If players only shot free throws at their scheduled practices, their shots at game time wouldn’t be reliable. If they practiced 50 free throws a week, they would be better. But if they practiced 100 shots a day, they would most likely be able to depend on making their free throws at the game. Years later, after he graduated, some sophomores were talking about him, saying how awesome he was at free throws. One of the boys explained to the others that it was because that guy always threw 100 free throws after every practice. The entire time he was in school, I never knew that my words had affected him that way. Practice seems so obvious as the key to success, but some people don’t want to make themselves push their limits. He did.

When I was at a workshop in Wisconsin many years ago, a student was complaining that she wasn’t getting any better at painting. The instructor asked her how often she painted and she replied that she hadn’t painted since last year’s workshop! That was another epiphany moment, obvious to me now, but new to me then. Art was going to be practice, practice, PRACTICE. When I thought I had done enough, I would create more. I would have to have the intrinsic motivation to make myself paint, no matter what, no excuses! Since I was practicing, every painting was an opportunity to learn more, a chance for evaluation.

The brain is wired in a curious way. It can have synapses already in place, which gives you your “natural ability”. However, it will make new pathways as you learn new things. Practice is what makes those pathways firm.  A concert pianist practices countless hours a day. Pro players or Olympiads in any sport practice countless hours a day. I want to be the best I can be as an artist, so I must practice countless hours a day.  Summer’s first is not my first tomato painting, and I am sure it will not be my last.