6 WAYS TO MAKE WRITING ABOUT YOUR ART EASIER
6 WAYS TO MAKE WRITING ABOUT YOUR ART EASIER
ALLOW THE WORDS TO FLOW JUST LIKE YOUR PAINT
I know you love it. You’re an artist, not a writer. It’s the reason you loved art so much, drawing came so much more naturally than stringing well-crafted sentences together.
But words are still a part of what you do. As not only an artist, but artist in business, you must combine your art with words to articulate what your art can’t say and communicate what your audience needs to know. Be it in your newsletters, your social media captions, on your website or in submission forms. Here are 6 practical tips to help the words flow more easily.
One Big Mind Map1. Make a Mind Map of Your Thoughts and Ideas
If you’ve always really struggled with articulating your ideas, especially in writing, a mind map will be the best place for you to start. You can create a mind map for one particular art piece, or even a mind map for your inspirations, the theme you’re currently exploring or any idea you want to write about. Mind maps are a brilliant way to get all your thoughts out without the pressure of trying to sound good or even make sense. Once you have a full map of ideas around one topic, you can connect the dots and begin to formulate sentences based on words or phrases you’ve written that meld well together. Bonus tip: numbering the points can help with creating sentences and paragraphs that flow and have a coherent structure.
Two Sentences2. Aim For Two Sentences Only
Let’s say you have a Friday late afternoon free. You’ve had your morning painting session, you’ve prepped dinner early for this evening and you still have 40 minutes before you need to get ready for dinner with the girls. You could lounge for a bit, or you could do a bit of work on the business. So why procrastinate (you ask yourself)? If you’re dreading trying (and possibly failing) to come up with something poetic, philosophical and coherent to say about your latest art making - just write two sentences. Say, you’ll only write two sentences, then you’ll put the pen down. Even a little something is better than nothing?
Three Fun Things3. Make The Text Look Cool with Colour, Font and Size
This tip may sound silly to some, and others of you might strongly relate! When I’m writing on the computer I often feel uncomfortable writing in Arial with the spacing very close to each other, so sometimes I will spend a couple minutes (or ten!) before I start typing to adjust the font, the size/spacing and sometimes the colour of the text, to make typing just that little bit more enjoyable and pleasing. If you need to write up some copy using your laptop or computer but you feel like it’s a drag and a bore, spice it up, and make your text more exciting. If it makes writing more fun, enjoyable and easier, it will be well worth the 10 minutes.
Four Parts4. Break It Down Into Parts
Origins Story. Inspiration. Exploration. Process. If you are trying to write about a particular artwork but you don’t know where to begin, follow this structure. Start by introducing the origins of the piece, tell your audience where and when the idea for this piece was born. Then move onto the inspiration or inspirations, go into more depth about what person/people, place, thing, concept or thought inspired the work. The next point is optional, but you can address what you hoped, intended or managed to explore through this piece. Then finally, explain the process to your readers so they get a bit of an insight into how you made this incredible piece of work.
ADDITIONAL READ: Questions to Help You Talk About Your Art Pieces
Add Five Minutes5. Take 5 minutes to Make Notes After Every Painting (Art) Session
If you’ve ever come across or read Atomic Habits by James Clear, then it’s likely you’ve heard of ‘habit stacking’. If you don’t know what that is, habit stacking is where you pair a habit you already do consistently, such as preparing your morning coffee, with a brand new one you want to introduce, such as listening to a podcast. Whether it is immediately after or during, you’re making sure you combine a new habit with one you don’t have to think about doing, therefore making it more convenient and (slightly more) effortless to add to your routine. Given you’re so often at the easel, you too can use habit stacking to start writing about your art more. Just start with 5 minutes at the very end of each painting or drawing session, and before your know you’ll have tonnes of ideas on paper to use.
Show Your Uniqueness6. Imagine You Are An Artist Fan
One of the best ways to get writing about your work is to imagine you have to chance to read the diary of your favourite artist or listen to them talk on a podcast and ask: What Would I Like to Know? Vividly imagine yourself having the rare and precious opportunity to ask that artist your most burning questions. To help you, you can even write these questions out as they come to you. Feel the excitement of what it would be like to get to know the answers to these questions. Then imagine this is how your art lovers and followers feel. Go ahead and flip those questions you wrote down on yourself and answer them. Because your fans are just as eager to hear the answers from you.
If this blog post helped you, feel free to check out the blog post we mentioned earlier as well as The Artist Companion, a workbook we compiled full of copy prompts and writing tips and guides to help you write the most informative and compelling content for your website.
As ever, if you want help with building or revamping your Squarespace art website, don’t hesitate to get in touch. We’d love to hear from you!
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