Get creative tips, insight, art advice, and opinion from your peers.

 Artists from all over the world have written in to share their thoughts on art, beauty, and living your best artist life. You might not agree with everything you read, but that's OK—it'll be sure to make you think!

Read all our art opinion articles below:

Painting of a courtyard surrounded by foliage and flowers
I am a recent orphan from Vango gallery, which went out of business last year. The only website I had was through Vango. . . I was with them for two years, and sold several paintings through their platform (including the three in this post). I’m glad I sent my contact information on a thank-you card when I shipped those paintings, in case the buyers...
Close-up photo of a hand holding an artist's brush, painting a small watercolor scene with trees and buildings.
I’ve heard opinions about “natural artistic talent” more than once recently. Usually it’s people saying that natural talent is a myth; that it doesn’t exist at...
When I first started thinking about becoming a professional artist (and by “professional,” I mean an artist who creates art to earn a living) doing cloud portraits most certainly was NOT what I was considering. Horses were my passion and horse portraits were my goal. My big dream was making a good living from portrait work, and being able to travel the country (yes, even...
Every now and again I like to check the list of search engine terms and phrases that brought readers to my blog. Given that my focus is teaching colored pencil, you’d expect the usual things such as “blending colored pencils,” “drawing with colored pencil,” and so on. And generally, those ARE the kind of searches I see. However, one slightly more unusual search term has...
Several weeks ago I suggested a few questions artists should ask themselves if they’re trying to decide whether or not gallery representation is for them. Basically, it came down to knowing why you create art and what you hope to accomplish with it. Since then I’ve had a few more thoughts that I’d like to share: On paying gallery fees. . . As a former...
Should artists give away their time and talent? Unfortunately in this case, there’ isn’t a one-size-fits-all answer. Certainly there will always be charitable organizations and other groups and individuals more than happy to use contributed artwork for fundraising purposes. So the opportunity is always there, and it’s a question that comes up quite often. Some time ago, I wrote an article sharing two questions every...
Every year around December, business people of all types are busy evaluating the success of the past year’s goals and thinking about goals for the next...
One of the most challenging aspects of being an artist is finding the time, space and peace you need to conjure your creativity and produce your art. Even if you have designated studio space in your home, it can be tough to devote 100% of your focus to your work when real-life responsibilities and distractions lie just on the other side of the door. Sometimes...
This is what happens if you’re a man. . . You decide you want to do a bit of open air painting or drawing, so you get up, throw on your old work clothes, gather together your painting kit and off you go. Whether it’s the town or country, you find yourself a good spot, get settled in, and get on with it. And while...