On originality and finding your "voice" - Part 1: What's all the fuss about originality?

In this series, I hope to chase down the bugaboo of "voice." What is it? Is it natural or nurtured? How does it figure into our understanding and experience of art?

This article is illustrated with my own work, showing variations as I struggled to take an idea from rough sketch to finished work. The topic is, roughly, confrontation, inspired during the last US election cycle. Seems not much has changed this time ‘round. Or has it?

Tackling the topic of originality is inspired by Jason Chadwick's excellent post on Process Junkie about his visit with illustrator Edward Sorel. After looking through what Jason himself described as his dumpster fire of a portfolio, Sorel asked him, "How do you decide who you are going to be in the morning?" a question that struck home for me. Ouch! (Thank you Jason for taking us up that amazing elevator with you.)

Part 1: Why originality is important.

Sometime after I went to art school¹ and had been out in the world for a few years struggling to find my creative “voice,” I thought to myself (a bit resentfully perhaps) that art school could have helped more if they had just been up front about the importance of originality. Just give students an assignment to come up with some original styles, evaluate, choose one, and run with it. How hard could it be?²

In art school I learned that originality was an important part of the game in art, aligning somewhat obliquely with, or underlying, all important avant-gardism.

One person hysterical and one person calm seemed too black and white, if you will. In reality, both sides play both ways, friendly one minute, angry the next. It’s kind of schizophrenic. Hence this second effort.

In those days (early 1980s) the history of art, particularly 20th C art, was taught in terms of innovation — it goes, very roughly, like this: symbolism begot impressionism begot post-impressionism begot expressionism begot cubism begot abstract expressionism begot pop art begot minimalism — all critters in a evolutionary chain called modernism, until it seemed (to me at that time) that the teleological end of art had been achieved and there was literally nothing left to be done. [sad face emoji]

But then, along came conceptualism. [sigh of relief]. The notion of art as idea made everything new again. Anything was possible, it just depended on how you looked at it: postmodernism was born.

It wasn’t really a new world of course, one had always been able to bring originality to the artistic tableau, painting conventional pictures of reality but with a distinctive way of handling paint, and taking a different approach to subject matter. Of that time, Alec Katz comes to mind. Or Wayne Thiebaud. Or Lucien Freud. Chris Hunt has provided a terrific synopsis of Freud’s work, with a ton of illustrations, on his substack Readymades.

Trying to finish a drawing, like by inking it, is an excruciating process for some of us. Heck, in the comics and animation biz they have people just for inking. Or used to. Today, is AI is doing the tweening and polishing? With this drawing, I tried an end run, skipping around inking and dropping colour in using Photoshop.

Throughout history, artists have worked within accepted conventions. In the Renaissance, the “master” often had studio assistants who painted along side or made copies of works in demand. Yet art historians have taken great pains to distinguish one artist from the other. Certain approaches to subject matter, composition, pigments and brushstrokes help trace the work to the individual creator. Much like a finger print left at the scene of a crime leads to the criminal, we might note.

Thus, originality plays an important part in how we “see”, and value, a work of art: a good piece of art is not only well-conceived and well-rendered, it is uniquely identifiable with its creator.

Originality in doubt

The intellectual world is sceptical about originality. BrainyQuote suggests the verdict is still out on the merit of self-consciously thinking about originality.

There is something “weird” about originality that cleverness can’t resist poking fun at, e.g., this famous quote (by a Canadian no less): “Originality is the fine art of remembering what you hear and forgetting where you heard it.” - Lawrence J. Peter (a very clever educator who invented discovered the Peter Principle:)

These days innovation is also starting to feel less important or dated, more of a 20th C thing. Avant gardes ruled the world then (from the late 1800s to about the 1980s I’d say) until post-modernism upset the teleological apple cart. Everything and nothing’s been the same since. But that’s a topic for another day….

I don’t agree with the idea that there’s no such thing as originality, it’s all been done before or there’s nothing new under the sun. That’s like saying…. [insert original metaphor here].

Try again. The schizo thing was heading somewhere else, so I went back to hysteria vs. calmness. Both figures gained some “style” compared to the original sketch.

Originality is to creativity what location is to real estate

Like location in the real estate business, originality is the essential ingredient in all creative work.

Of course effort counts: crappy ideas and laziness show. (Mea culpa) Something could be said here about skill or craft, knowing your way around a pencil, pen and paints, but I’m not the one to say it. As far as I’m concerned, if you can hold a pen, you’re good.

And innovation also counts: working in old fashioned ways with tired subject matter and familiar techniques is not that interesting. So by all means, look around you, keep up.

But working hard and staying in step are not going to make your work as good as it might be; originality shows. In a way, I think all artists are seeking integration; you and your work integrated to the point of being equivalent and inseparable.

But, character, what makes you you is not something one can affect. Fortunately, it’s something we all have, sometimes you just have to dig for it.

This three part series

There’s a lot to say about style and originality that’s not about creating a market niche and developing an audience (as important as those may feel in these days of heart emojis and followers). In this Part 1, I’ve tried to lay some general groundwork, musing if you will about where I see originality coming from.

Next time, I’m going to look at a few examples of other people’s work (for a change), things of outstanding originality (imho) that I love.

Conclusion

Originality is important.³ Sometimes it derives from the artist’s unself-conscious, unique (or eccentric) way of doing things.

Originality is comprised of both the approach to subject matter and how materials are handled.

Sometimes, originality is tied up with innovation, like when an artist comes up with an entirely new approach to making art.

Personally, I’m trying to listen to Jason Chatfield’s advice following his session with Ed Sorel, stop worrying about what other people think, what will or won’t sell, and draw for yourself. Let the pencil shavings fall where they may.

Dropping in colour with more effort produced a more finished drawing but the pencil line is still weak, especially in the calm figure. And the angry man has oddly become more jester like.

1. Briefly, I have spent an inordinate amount of time in school. Really, years and years. Art school (1978-82) was an important part of that, including an MFA from the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design (1985).

2. This idea is in line with the perennial complaint students have about art school not teaching them how to make a living as an artist. It’s not like these things are unteachable, but studio practice and marketing are arguably less than interesting, hardly rocket science, and certainly not mind expanding in the way liberal arts education is intended to be.

3. One of the great weaknesses of conventional, realist type drawing, in the style of the Old Masters for example, is the lack of any trace of the personality or character of the artist. The technique, and usually the subject matter, no matter the skill of the artist, are moribund because they lack originality.