What does it mean to be self taught?…. …. I have seen many artists over the years with BFA’s and an MFA’s who know very little about art, and their work is equally uninspiring…. in fact, when they are completed, they spend the first years of their career deconstructing some of what they have learned. This isn’t to say that there is no value in obtaining a degree in fine arts ….and for some, formal instruction I think is necessary as a building block towards being an autodidact….
When I look at my career as an artist I can say that my work is based on my life and all of the experiences I have gained along the way… from the people I have meet, artists I have worked with, techniques I have seen, the schools I have attended, what I have read, seen, and interacted with….. each experience is a building block that adds to my foundation
One of my best experiences happened in the summer of 1987…. I was able to go to the Louvre Museum in Paris….. I remember showing up there and was completely in awe of everything I was seeing…. I was so energized by what I was seeing that I spent the next week going daily to the museum trying to study and learn about every painter and every sculpture, their life, their work… it was so electrifying that when I was done I was able to converse with any art historian with a great deal of certainty and detail about the works in the museum. Seeing these works of art in person, seeing their brush strokes, the detail, their size, really put the value into their significance in history..
So when you ask yourself are you self taught…….. ask if you are learning only from yourself and what you can draw from within, or are you learning from other people…teachers, writers, other artists both dead and alive, magazine resources, workshops on techniques, books, the successes of others, the mistakes of others, comments and critiques….. experimenting on what you have learned and shaping it into all that is you
for me its an easy answer… my art is the journey, my experiences are my building blocks, and it doesn’t end after the class is over….its just beginning…
have a great week everyone!
……peace
………..james