Talent or no talent…

by Erik · July 30, 2020

One of the most common statements I hear in my courses is: “I can not draw”. Then I usually ask “how often do you draw?” the answer is always the same: Never.

No one believes that a long-distance runner is good at running without training, no one believes that an engineer can do what he or she can without acquiring knowledge, but art is another matter. I often see statements like “Yuja Wang has SO much talent” or “Stevie Ray Vaughan has a god-given talent” as if they were born with their ability. Thousands of hours of hard work do not matter, it is talent,

I do not believe in talent, I believe in training. You become good at something if you have spent all your time on your passion from an early age, regardless of whether it is art, music, running or astronomy.

Talent, if it even exists, is nothing compared to hard work.

So the next time you complain “I’ll never get better at watercolor painting” ask yourself how much you paint, If you do not spend a few hours a day painting, If you are not curious and constantly exploring new techniques, colors, paper, if you not constantly studying and improving, maybe you should accept that you do not get better than this, and be happy with it.

There are no shortcuts, or talent. Just hard work! Therefore: paint all the time!