Practice, in practice

One of my greatest challenges is practice.

There is so much I want to do. So many ideas I want to explore. So many inspirations I want to capture. But quite often my ideas are most ripe when I am not in a position to act on them. Then I get the time to go to my studio and I can't capture it – or sometimes I can't even remember it in spite of the notes and the scribble drawings. I can't remember quite what the “how” was.

And then there is the frustration of lack of practice. I know what I want to make, but my skills are not quite there yet. I can make a thing, but it doesn't come out right. I haven't quite got it. Simple, right? Try again. Practice.

This can be more challenging to follow through on – you look at the product of your efforts and can't see your way to the thing that was in your head. It is discouraging. You lose faith that the thing that is in your head can ever come out of your hands. It is hard not to see the materials as wasted. Hard not to see the time spent as fruitless.

This has always been a challenge...there is nothing new here. It is something we all have to face, and if we want to succeed we have to choose to overcome.

The way I work often makes it particularly challenging – I don't generally do layout drawings or plans, or step-by-step outlines. Probably I should. And sometimes it is something I don't do consciously, but I certainly do. For example, if I am making something more mundane, like tent pegs I know my order of operations. I had to learn it, but having that information leads to greater success in such items. The first time, when I'm figuring it out I will usually write it down – make notes. Often, half way through the process I'll realize that it would have been easier if I'd done C before I did A. So, I make the note, so that I remember next time.

But what about the more artistic things? When I'm at the forge I often just have an idea of the thing I want to make, and start to work. Particularly if it is something like a mask or a pendant I have a thought about proportions and then I just follow the metal where it leads me. But unconsciously I've developed something of an order of operations for that. If I'm trying for a different effect I may try switching it up to see where the new perspective will take me. All of that came through practice. Through doing it.

I may not have been very pleased with my first result, but I learned from it – both my brain and my hands learned. It is crucial to remember that. And remembering that is hard. Giving that the credence it deserves is even harder.

One of the best ways I've found to remind myself is in drawing. I am by no means good at making drawings. My attempts at technical drawing are even worse than my attempts at artistic rendering. However, there are some things that I have to draw first. If I am doing a pewter pattern I have to sketch it first. If I can't draw it, I can't carve it. That is how I see it....that isn't something that would hold true for everyone. If I can draw it, then I can carve it (at least most of the time. I've had more than a few failures.) I also have to be able to draw it to the approximate scale I need it to be – and that has shelved more than one project!

For a lot of things it is still 1 in 10 – out of 10 attempts there is 1 that is reasonable. I have improved with some things – there are some things that I might get 1 for every 3. What is nice is seeing the progress – flipping through a sketchbook and seeing where the successful bits are – seeing how much better some sketches get.

There are still a lot of things – like my current work on a sketch for a pewter – where I will make 20 or 30 renderings and not one of them is right. There will be elements of this one or that one that are not bad, but trying to pull those elements and make them work in another sketch, and getting the rest of the elements correct...well, those are the times where you have to have a real passion, or a real reason to keep going.

The thing that is harder (for me) is doing that with the ones that take a lot more materials, time and energy than the sketches. It's not giving up and writing myself off, but trying it again. And again, and again. With the more mundane stuff, it isn't so hard. With the more creative stuff it can be hard not to lose sight of that original inspiration. Looking at what you made can make it hard to see what that original thing in your head actually looked like. And the more time between attempts, the harder it can be to see.

So one of the big things on the calendar for this year for me is the practice of practice. Doing the work in spite of not being able to see the forest for the trees anymore. Learning how to step back and close my eyes before I try for another look, another view, another perspective. And more practice.