The Art of Practice

Horse star (Hippasteria phrygiana) study, Mike Palmer 2022. An unfinished sketch originating from a recent colored-pencil practice session.

I have a secret. I’m not a “practicing” artist. Or at least I haven’t been one. I’m not one of those artists carrying around a sketchbook and hiding away at every opportunity to sketch this, or paint that. I’m project oriented. When I sit down to work I focus on bringing projects from conception to completion, rarely deviating to explore new territory or simply sit and work on a technique.

When art became a profession I stopped practicing. As I’ve worked to grow this business, I’ve become hyper focussed on output production, requiring that I stick my head down and just get to work. I don’t sit and doodle or dawdle anymore. There just doesn't seem to be enough time, or at least that’s the excuse. When I was younger, that’s all art was about - killing time. There were endless opportunities to experiment, meander, and just be an art screw off. I didn’t care, and it didn't matter if something didn’t work out. There was no “fail” in my young vernacular - everything was practice.

Mindful practice of my art was left behind with the weight of responsibility to produce. The cost is that I lost the ability to explore new territory and risk pigeon-holing my art. Realizing this now, it’s something I’m trying to correct by forcing myself to take the time to just sit and practice the craft. It’s not a lot of time, maybe just 10 minutes on some days and an hour or more on others. Regardless of the time, the work is focussed on the exploration of technique, not on the quality of the final product. Maybe it’s sitting in the woods sketching a tree, or in the studio testing out new some new technique. Regardless, for this period of time I commit to not caring about the finished product and just focussing on the process of exploring.

I’m only a few weeks into this, but I’m finding that it’s giving my brain an opportunity to meander unconstrained - an unleashed dog led by its nose. It’s made me a better artist and opened up new avenues I wouldn’t have considered before. It’s even resulted in some unintentional completed pieces - practice exercises that found themselves “wall worthy”. While I’ve found this process immensely helpful, it is still a struggle to find the time, and when I do, to just let go. It seems practice requires practice, too.