There is nothing more exciting than having a blank canvas in front of you, or drawing board.

Every artist goes through a period of time where they just do not get the results that they want. You may have been drawing for years, but you are still searching for tips and tricks to help improve your craft. The answer is out there, and you can find it if you put in the time and effort required to improve.

A blog about tips and techniques for painters, sketchers, and others.

Are you a beginner looking to improve your art? Advanced and professional artists are welcome too. The blog covers painting, sketching, drawing, and anything else related to visual arts.

I’m an artist with an MFA in Painting who is also a writer. I’ve been teaching online since 2007 and have helped many students become skilled artists. I also enjoy blogging about art-related topics such as painting, drawing, art supplies, and so on.

Traditional Art Blog is about painting and drawing. It is also about the people who create art. I’ve spent a lot of time in galleries, museums, and studios. I’ve seen a lot of great art, and a lot of bad art. This blog will focus on what makes good art good.

Tutorials and advice from a professional artist who has been drawing for over 20 years. These tutorials range from basic to advanced level. Most of them will be easy enough for the beginner to understand, but not all of them are appropriate for the beginner. There are also many useful links to other sites that offer tips and techniques on various subjects related to art.

Also included in each post will be links to pictures by other artists, things that I have created during my sketchbook sessions, and just random stuff that inspires me in one way or another.

I hope you enjoy my blog! Thank you for stopping by!

This is going to be an awesome adventure!**

The artists I have been working with have a tendency to paint without looking at their reference photo, but rather “just look” at the canvas and paint what they see.

Well, that’s not exactly what I say. What I say is that you need to know the subject matter you are painting. Some subjects are easier to paint than others (a birch tree is easier than a pine tree, for example). The “just look” method works great when it comes to things like trees, houses and people because they are easy to visualize.

But when it comes to texture or something like that, some more advance looking is required. Texture needs more time and scrutiny in order for us to better understand how light interacts with an object.

If you want to paint a glass of water on a table, then just look at the glass of water on the table and start painting! But if you want to paint a stone wall, it would be better to draw it first in perspective so you can better understand its shape. And if you want to create a realistic picture of skin or hair, then you will need something much more advanced like photos or even videos of reference material.

This blog is about helping you learn to draw better, whether it be from imagination, or from reference. I will also be sharing with you some of my own work, as well as that of artists I like.

I am an artist and teacher, living in Franklin Tennessee. In the past I have worked out of New York City and San Francisco, and traveled extensively throughout the world. I have exhibited my paintings in many galleries and museums in the United States, Europe and Asia, including the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco, the Detroit Institute of Arts, the Smithsonian Institution in Washington D.C., the Norton Museum of Art in West Palm Beach Florida, The Musee d’art Contemporain in Montreal Quebec Canada …..

I teach workshops at a variety of venues around the country on drawing and painting. I also make custom paintings for decorating interiors of homes.

My blog offers tips designed to improve your skill at drawing anything from still life’s to landscapes to people. It also features discussions about artistic technique for specific media such as watercolor painting or charcoal drawing and is meant to help artists become more successful at their work. It features both inspirational material as well as instructional topics for serious art students and professionals.

A new year often brings with it the hope for a fresh start. A chance to do it better this time around, or at least learn from your mistakes from last year. I’ve been meaning to write this blog post for over a year now, and it’s a good time to finally get off my duff and get it done.

This post is not going to be anything you haven’t heard before, but hopefully I can give some perspective on it based on my own experience. Mainly, I want this post to serve as a reminder to myself, and hopefully you will find something here that will help you too.

As always, if you have any questions or comments please let me know!

So here we go…

I am going to divide this into two categories: The things that have worked for me and the things that have not worked for me. We will keep with tradition (ha!) and start with the latter. What has not worked:

1) Reading Art Books (or any book for that matter). Some of you may gasp in shock, but there it is. While I am certain there is some great insight into drawing out there in the books I read over the years, I never found them because I