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Depression or years-long-art-block?

3 months ago · 2 · Stress, +2


132

Advice is always like ‘do something easy!’ ‘be creative!’ ‘don’t let go of your hobbies!’

Well. Uh.

I’ve completely lost the ability to draw/paint.

Used to be able to, breaking stuff down into shapes, figuring out lighting, making it all feel alive…but for the last few years, I just can’t. There’s no skill, no talent underneath it, it’s like a kid learning for the first time every time (but without the ambition). I can trace photos and then do decent shading on top, but that’s it. Everything else is just gone. Things don’t blend together, it’s all disjointed - like a badly photoshopped picture, rather than something that took days. I have tons of ideas and a lot of them are meaningful, but I can’t get them out.

I know exactly what I’d say to someone else in this situation - take a break, then back to basics, warm-up shapes, keep going over anatomy and poses and lighting and composition until it’s second nature.

I tried. I had so many ideas rattling around, it got frustrating not being able to express them, so I went back to basics. Warm-up circles. None of them even look round, how is that possible? Maybe it’s too boring, I’m just not motivated - let’s try one of the simpler ideas, just to get that out of the way. A little comic, sketchy style, doesn’t have to be accurate.

I kept trying for three hours. Three hours of drawing stupid little shapes, checking references, even tracing over them and still having it turn out wrong.

Eventually, I just grabbed all the paper off the table and put it in the recycling bin. Including the jotted-down ideas. There’s no point in pretending I’ll get round to it eventually, it’s just not gonna happen. Hobbies are supposed to be fun, and this hasn’t ever really felt fun - an obsession, maybe, but that’s all.

The table doesn’t look tidier. It’s messy and empty at the same time.

What a waste.

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  • Novni Guest · 3 months ago

    as someone who has experience such a similar depression art block, it sucked, god i remember every moment just staring at pinterest trying to find some kind of inspiration. im not gonna tell you what to do, but this is just my idea. why dont you try abstract art? no one can fail at that. love you. keep going.

    Reply
  • cry_baby · 3 months ago

    yeah abstract is a rly good idea... also there is no "messing up" in art. as an artist, yeah i have definitely had art block. im still tryna get back into it, but its getting better and it just takes time. you can start by devoting a little bit of time each day to simply drawing, even if that means starting out with the easy stuff. have you tried drawing art based off of anime or manga? you can google some less complex ones, and you can also maybe look up some step by step ones. best of luck !!!

    Reply

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