Deliberate Focus in Art Study

As a creator whose aim is to master storytelling, I’ve taken a great effort to choose my artistic focus carefully in order to ensure that I reach my goal.

I have drawn for quite a while and I’ve consumed for even longer. My Pinterest‘ll prove it. In many years of practice and observation I’ve noticed a connective thread in the themes and styles that most deeply resonated with me.

I’ve now seen enough to have developed what I call…

The Core Tenets of My Style:

• Conceptual variety, interest, and execution
• Mood and atmosphere-based color choices in
• Interesting, unusual, odd-angled environmental compositions; usually architectural
• Characters that have human-like, lively, emotional expressions with contrasting design elements
• Compelling storytelling that will grab the viewer’s attention and keep it
• Emotional depth created by the contrast and juxtaposition of compositional elements

The above “tenets” may sound like nonsense to most, but it makes perfect sense to me. These are my guidelines as an artist. I’ve opted for an approach in which I deliberately focus on the few most effective elements to have in my arsenal.

For me, it’s not important that my work is drawn better than others, it’s that it feels better. It’s not the technical skill, but the conceptual execution. I’ll go into detail in a later post.

I have such a strong framework for what I want my art to look like, I decided that the only way for me to reach it would be to decide for sure what I want to focus on.

What it really boils down to is three things I want to master in my artwork:

• Human-like, expressive characters first and MOST importantly.
• Unusual environments composed of skewed angles & colors
• Emotionally impactful stories with strong characters and narrative

Starting to see a pattern?

From there, it sharpens into ONE point above all (and trust me, I’ve given this a lot of thought)

• I want to become a master of juxtaposing, layering and arranging these elements to create the most IMPACTFUL emotional effect.

This is my ultimate goal and I’ve layered my practice so that I can actually reach this one day. This is what I believe whole-heartedly will allow me to take storytelling to the next level.

The reason I boiled it down like this is because I came to terms with the fact that:

• I WON’T live forever
• I CAN’T be good at everything and…
• FOCUS works!

So I decided on the few most important things to hit HARD and EARLY on in my art and arranged them in order of most important to least in terms of creating an emotional impact.

By choosing the elements I’ve chosen, I’m deliberately shutting out other focuses that I don’t care nearly as much about. For example:

• Fuck animals
• Fuck mechanicals
• and fuck realism

That’s not to say I don’t love work that may include these things. Or to say that none of these may be necessary to use later on. They’re just not my FOCUS. 

It’s just as important to know what to focus on, as it is to know what not to focus on, and I’ve chosen what resonates with me the most from my favorite work, so I don’t waste time & energy trying to render the inside of a toaster.

There’s a lot to give up in order to specialize, but I believe the results will be worth it down the line.

Disclaimer: I DON’T recommended this for artists just starting, and I think it’s a natural process of elimination as you improve, anyway. I myself just want to be deliberate with it because it’s what that makes the most sense to ME.

The way I see it, those who specialize; those with a distinct hand are the often most successful. With a distinct style, no one can easily copy their work because they can’t replicate all the years it took to create their look. Their work becomes what’s called INIMITABLE:

Just look at any of your favorite artists. Do you like them because they draw just like someone else, or because they draw like no one else can? My favorite artists are guys like Tsutomu Nihei (BLAME!), Ryan Ottley (INVINCIBLE), or Eiichiro Oda (ONE PIECE).

No one can easily replace them, so with that, they become indispensable. A status that can’t be attained without time and focus on their strengths.

With all that said,

I’ve dedicated the next 4 years to a Deliberate Focus on my core skills an artist.

Starting from this year, I’ll be working on…

• Human Expressions (Year 1)
• Composition and Environment (Year 2)
• Color Theory (Year 3)
• Writing: Narrative and characters (Year 4 and beyond)

I’ve recently begun something I’d like to call the Expression challenge. A challenge in which every day for a year I will be drawing expressions starting from the eyes down to the entire body with the aim to have a solid foundation in human expression by the end of the year.

My drive to master human expression is a Deliberate Focus

Because I have at least the basics of art down, putting a laser-like focus on one area will likely get me the results I want before moving on to the next….in theory. I’ll use this year to test it, then compile my results for you to learn, too. You can check out my progress on my twitter here.

Now to you.

What are your greatest strengths as an artist, and what are the best aspects of your favorite work that you would like to see in your own?

‘Til next time,

– Ken