Mark E Shellshear.

You must understand you do not have to paint a masterpiece every time you pick up the brush. So many Artists place themselves under so much pressure by doing this, because the fear in us wants us to never try and do anything challenging, different or outside the box, it wants us to be safe, quiet and average, so the best way to get you to do that is to tell you that you must make every painting a masterpiece. If you do that you will put yourself under so much pressure that you will become so discouraged at not being able to produce a masterpiece or the perfect painting, that you will eventually find every time you go to paint you will get painters block or the fear of the white canvas and you will stand and tell yourself, I don’t know what to paint? So never try to paint your masterpiece or the perfect painting, but make all your paintings over your lifetime your masterpiece, that’s your contribution to Art history and take the pressure off yourself. Be grateful that you a...

  Getting great ideas on how to market your Art is not the issue as we all have good ideas and we might believe in them, but the big challenge for many Artists is acting on those good ideas to make them a reality. Otherwise they are just good intentions, day dreams. Faith without works is dead. * . . * James 2:26.

When we take the time to take a look around, we see that most people are nice. Most people are kind and friendly. Most people are caring. Most people are generous. These are the correct character attributes, yes you may not get rich doing them, but you will grow a lot of good fruit on other people and be a wonderful blessing to them. When we help others, we help ourselves. When we love others, we are loving ourselves. Giving of ourselves, our time and our money is far more important than taking. Take a little time today to think about how you define true success for yourself? Give expecting nothing in return, that’s wisdom applied. Give and it shall be given to you. .

When things are going well and the Art sales are coming in, it is so easy to be positive and enthusiastic, but it is in the down times, the quiet times of slow sales, everything you do seems to be so hard that questions come up and you think it would be so easy to give up and you already have the excuses ready in your head, this is when it matters what you do. In difficult times, use this time to look for new opportunities in new places because how you react in these hard times often determines how long they last, opportunities are often wrapped in difficulty. Good times don’t last forever and bad times don’t last forever. Accumulate in the good times and look for new opportunities in the bad times. .

Fault finders and critical people say more about themselves when they find fault, than the people they find fault with and reveal more about their own character, than the people they criticise. People reveal their character and their inner flaws by their words. Negative influence is not good for you or your Art and will bring you down, learn to walk away, better run away from these people. Be wise in learning and realise that sometimes for the your own Art career and positive outlook, you just have to cut off some relationships. If every Artist would strive to be positive and encouraging and make the necessary personal changes for personal improvement, we would change our world. . *Mathew 12:34.

It is in these times, the seemingly endless times that opportunity comes and is usually disguised in difficulty, if we are ready to give up we will miss it, but if are determined to never give up then we will see the opportunity because we are looking for it not for a way out.   Giving up is never an option, it’s to easy to do, but if you need a couple of days off then do that, but don’t give up, what if tomorrow the breakthrough comes? You see life has taught me that this too shall pass, be it in a week from now or a month from now, it will turn around, day always follows night. .

Doing your Art is more important than waiting for a good idea or inspiration. If you truly believe you can do more, you will. If you truly believe you will accomplish your goals, you will work hard to see them become reality. You see if you do the challenging work, most times it will workout for you, but if you don’t do it, you are just be playing it safe and listening to the fear. Don’t hesitate and don’t run to that safe place, because that is not where the magic of creativity happens. To do magic you cannot hesitate, it is in your imagination where magic happens. Your are more creative than you can ever imagine. .

I am always amazed how many talented artists play it safe and are afraid to push themselves to do new exciting work. I know if you are painting something that is very new and different and it has never been seen before, that it might not be accepted and the fear does not want this, it says to wait until you are ready to do new work, it wants safe, comfortable and predictable and be like everyone else in the crowd . D on’t wait until you feel ready, d o it now, b e original, be yourself, d are to walk against the fear and live in the scary . Work on paintings that will excite you, paintings that will set you apart from others, yes it may be scary to do, but the joy of accomplishment out weights the risk of being invisible lost in the crowd . The scary is risky and gets attention and we want attention to get known. .

Learn how not to treat people and what not to do, there is always a lesson to learn.. That may not be what people want to hear, but we must dig through the dirt to get to the gold. We know how we want to be treated and how we want to be taught. So now we must treat others as we want to be treated. We must teach others as we wanted to be taught. Give unto others as we would want them to give unto us. Care about others as we would want them to care about us. Encourage others as we would want to be encouraged. Bad teachers do not define us, forgive and move on and put them where they belong in the past. Be a leader and inspire others by your actions and attitude. .

If you see yourself as a Professional Artist you are going to approach your work very differently. You will turn up and work, no excuses. You will need then to consider who are your target market is and how do you reach them, through videos, blogs, emails and story tell your Art, because these are the strangers who are going to make your career successful. Getting your work in front of these people will become your priority. This will require personal change and self discipline.

Every Artist has the potential to be a financially successful Artist, but not all want to do the work and pay the cost to accomplish that, because more often than not the cost is far higher than we think. Most want to be successful but it is hard work, not just creating Art but also working on your personal life, learning about selling and your building Art business through videos. Everyone wants to be a successful Artist and I believe that most do, but something holds them back from achieving that. They know what to do, but they just don’t do it. A good idea is great and getting all the information is essential, but if there is no action taken, then nothing changes.

You are unique and original, so put that into your Art and through you doing that and listening to your Muse you will reveal your inner creative self and inspire others. Allow the Muse to lead you and take in her direction and create wonderful original work. Always be the best Artist and best person you can be, because people are looking for someone to inspire them and encourage them. Listen to your Muse and be the inspiration you want to see. .

To be a successful Artist you will face setbacks a number of times it is just part of the process, learn from setbacks, understand how it happened and then how to not do that again and to make whatever personal changes need to be made. Often it is out of these setbacks that our greatest successes come, because it gives us the determination to never let that happen again and the desire to be better at what we do. Learn well from setbacks and make the necessary personal changes and even while experiencing setbacks determine to always be the best Artist and the best person you can be. .

One of the most important things that you can do is to learn to accept that your collectors do not see your failings, they only see you the talented Artist. We need also to see ourselves as the Artist and not see all our failings and weaknesses, because if we are wise we will be working on them and overcoming those issues and be improving each day. Accepting the fact that you are a gifted Artist will make such a big difference the next time you are approached by a collector or buyer. Your attitude about yourself is reflected in how you respond to those who admire your work, do not be to humble and say it is nothing and even joke about it. When someone says that your work is wonderful, say thank you and look them in the eye as you say it and take that as permission to talk about your work, b eing s elf confiden t and being self assured is a good thing. Welcome complements, you deserve them, you work hard and your paintings reflects your dedication to your Art business.

The reality is that it does not matter how marvellous your paintings are, how many hours it took to paint them, whether it is oil or acrylic, or how much your work is worth, sadly if you are unknown then you will need to convince strangers that your work is good enough to buy from an unknown Artist. Once you can accept that the reason you are not selling has nothing to do with your paintings, you can then concentrate on what you have to do and that is to go from unknown to known. This is the hard work, getting the attention of strangers and convincing them that they should take the time to look at your work and to even consider investing in it. The problem is not what price should I sell my painting for, it is how do I get the attention of strangers?

These are the things I always encourage Artists to do. Talk to strangers. Get name and face recognition. Sell you and your Art. Make talking videos. Why? Because this is what most Artists don’t do. They have already seen themselves failing at doing it in their mind, imagination and it becomes their reality. People think about things and then make it their reality, positive or negative. Our mind completes the picture we put into it. If you think people will criticise you or laugh at you, if you make a video or give a speech? Your mind completes the picture you paint in it and your fear is very real and you will not do it. What we have to do is practice imagining ourselves doing the thing that we fear doing and seeing ourselves doing it and seeing others congratulating us on our accomplishment. It is important that you imagine family and friends coming up to you and talking to you and congratulating you on your success. .

You must take the Art Business very seriously and build your name and reputation. Remember your good name, so always full fill all your commitments according to your word, if you say you will be there Tuesday at 10am, be there at 10 am or earlier, 11am is late and then the question is will we believe that you will be good to your word next time? A good name is so important, so work hard on building it and harder on keeping it, cherish it and protect it. Be determined to go the distance against all odds, the rewards for those who persevere are wonderful, never give up on your dreams or yourself. You must work hard on you to become better, because then your whole world will get better. .

Self confidence is built upon the small successes that we have each day as well as the big successes of life. Often we procrastinate on the small things of our Art practice that we know we should do but just don’t seem to get around to doing them. Two obstacles to being a successful Artist are fear and procrastination. Fear is what paralyses people and procrastination reinforces this so that we do nothing, we can recognise this in ourselves because we then make excuses why we cannot do it. Excuses are giving yourself permission not to do what you know you should be doing, non action using excuses is most often steeped in fear. The excuse sounds true, but a deeper look reveals fear is at the root. Do not let fear control your life, deal with fear by hearing what it says and then doing the opposite to what it says. Each time you walk against fear, you weaken it’s power in that area and it get quieter and quieter each time you do that task.

When you see another Artist getting great sales and enjoying success, rejoice with them and be grateful that Art is selling and remind yourself you are in the same line and your success is coming. Have an attitude of gratitude, be grateful for what is happening in your life for the Art successes you have had even if they are small, because gratitude attracts, criticism repels. Remove criticism from your life and replace it with gratitude and rejoice with the successful Artist and say to yourself, I am in the same line. .

People conform because that is what we have been taught to do. Conformity is safe, fear will be quiet when you conform because it has nothing to be concerned about. Conformity is average, it is being invisible, it is being a part of the crowd, it’s safe and comfortable. Now if you are to make a difference as an Artist then you cannot conform, because the Muse cannot conform to hard and fast rules it must be allowed to run free and break with traditions, force us out of our comfort zones and place us in scary situations. It is in the scary that great Artistic things happen, the place where you realise, I haven’t done this before, what will happen if I do this? So often it’s not that someone cannot do something, it is that they are just scared to do it and afraid of what others might say and then make excuses and procrastinate. The major hurdle for creativity is not coming up with something new, that’s the easy part. The hard part is overcoming the fear that stops us fro...

In the beginning or if you are unknown always price you Art works so that they represent good value to your potential customers. When you are starting out the most important thing is getting your paintings onto the walls of strangers and getting known and liked by them. As your Art works sell and becomes popular, so your prices will rise, be patient. Because you are selling, you will be noticed and you will begin to be taken seriously by collectors, it takes time. Work hard at your Art business, because it is a business and learn all you can about selling and marketing. Believe in yourself, do not be overly romantic about being an Artist, leave that to those who love you, your fans and collectors. You must take the Art business very seriously and get known and build your name and reputation.