Blog

If you follow me on Instagram, you’ve noticed I participated in Strada’s January Challenge where I painted (or drew) from observation every single day in the month of January.  Challenges are a great way to build a new habit, explore something new, push yourself out of block, strengthen your skills and add fun to your practice.

Painting challenges  range from short themes, like a 14-day sketchbook challenge to more product-oriented ‘100 painting’ challenges. I have several friends regularly using this motivating strategy of accountability to help propel them forward in an aspect of their practice.

Having done several myself, there are a few approaches and tips I’ve found helpful to consider when you’re committing to one.

Identify a goal or focus for the challenge.

 This will help you narrow down the decisions you’ll need to make surrounding what to paint, what medium will you use, how long to spend on today’s painting.

For this January, I knew I would mostly be working in the studio within a still life genre. So I did some brainstorming ahead of time about some of the things I would like to include in still lifes this month.

In 2023, where my focus was centered around a specific medium (ink and wash), I made a prompt list for each day, assigning myself what would be the daily subject theme. Kitchen and dining themes with cutlery, teacups, china, teapots, etc were chosen for my prompt list before I began. This helps eliminate wasted time and valuable creative energy deciding and thinking about what to paint!

Consider your intentions for the finished pieces.

Aside from your previous identified main goal that might center around a medium, a subject, or a way of working . . . do you have intentions for the final pieces you’re about to create? This could be simply an intention to add to or kickstart a sketchbook practice. Or an intention of familiarizing yourself with a particular subject in more depth . . . painting studies of trees in different lighting conditions, color schemes or value ranges. Practicing purposeful brushwork where each painting consists of only 40 brushstrokes to help me strengthen my  stroke practice.

In this month’s challenge, one intention was to create paintings that could be used for making prints. I’m hoping to be able to offer collectors alternative options to purchasing an original oil painting.

Set the limit or structure on your painting time.

Knowing what you expect from yourself for the challenge, helps you manage your time and meet expectations. This could be at little as 15 minutes spent building a sketchbook habit to as much as 2 hours devoted to an alla prima painting.

This challenge I knew I would likely have between 30 minutes – 2 hours most days to spend building up a body of work.

Expect and have a contingency plan for days you find it difficult to show up.

 There will be days when it’s difficult to fit in 15 minutes for so many reasons. A busy day, life stress, perfectionism, comparison, low energy are all contributors that can and will block your creativity. So . .  what can you make despite them? What’s the smallest amount of effort you can put in to meet the challenge and make it a little easier on yourself for a difficult day?

This month I had several days traveling where I didn’t want my day to revolve around getting in my daily painting, but I still wanted to show up for the commitment I made to myself. These are days I usually switch mediums and paint simple – fruit, art supplies or a drawing at a café. Challenges aren’t made to torture you, and your motivation levels are going to vary from day to day!

Challenge yourself. Literally.

This is obviously implied, but often, if we’re posting or sharing our work there’s a tendency to stay in a safe zone. Keeping your focus and intention in mind, is there a way you can challenge yourself or push yourself a little further? The momentum of a challenge and developing the repeated practice is an excellent way to make your practice muscle memory. This is a great time to push yourself a bit further with a new subject, concepts such as value distribution, and transposing keys.

In my recent challenge, I completed a few white studies, aiming to restrain the temperature variation I see so that it still reads as white. I also completed studies with several yellow subjects in light and shadow, which is a difficult pigment to translate into paint.

Build community.

Invite or encourage your friends to participate with you. Community can be wonderful, even if you enjoy creating alone. One of the benefits of a challenge, often, if you’re posting on social media with the challenge hashtag, you’ll be visible to other artists participating and vice versa. This is a great way to expand your online community and engage with others learning, growing and painting alongside you. I always feel comradery and extra motivation knowing I’m not working alone. Your friends or fellow participant's encouragement will carry you far on those difficult days!

Consider these topics and ask yourself how this challenge will help your development. What would you like to hold yourself accountable for? I have certainly been so excited and motivated to participate in a challenge - only to realize, this is not helping my practice or painting goals. This is a distraction. First organizing my ideas and goals before participation in the challenge brought much more benefit from growth. Building toward something I wanted to create for myself, that had personal value was a better approach. I hope this is helpful if you decide to take one on in the future! Another Strada Challenge takes place in September if you're up for it!