A Guide to Self-Evaluation
Evaluating your own artwork is a crucial skill for any artist, whether you’re sketching bustling city scenes or painting tranquil landscapes. It helps refine your technique, develop your artistic voice, and communicate more effectively through your art.
This comprehensive guide delves into practical and simple methods to assess your work, with special insights from our urban sketching community.
Setting the Stage for Self-Evaluation
Before diving into the specifics of evaluating your artwork, it’s important to establish a baseline for what makes a piece successful. This involves defining your artistic goals and understanding the criteria that will guide your evaluation process.
Are you aiming to capture the dynamism of urban environments, or are you more focused on mastering the use of light and shadow? Knowing your objectives will help you gauge whether your artwork meets the intended mark.
At the end of every one of Ian Fennelly’s sketching retreats, he asks the sketchers a simple but effective question:
“What is your favourite sketch created this week, and why?”
He tells the sketchers that their reasons can vary widely, including technical skill, artistic challenges, or personal enjoyment, as we all appreciate different aspects of art. Here are just a few ideas:
- A sketch that you enjoyed creating
- A sketch that you’re proud of
- A sketch that holds special memories for you
- A sketch that helped you progress
Exploring the reasons
During our 2024 sketching retreat, participants shared their favorite sketches and the reasons why. Click the images below to see their reasons why:
Reflecting on Growth and Setting New Goals
Effective evaluation of your artwork should also focus on reflection and forward planning. Reflect on the progress you have made over time and the specific areas where you have seen improvement. Use this reflection to set new, challenging goals for your artistic development.
Consider keeping an art journal where you not only store your finished pieces but also note your thoughts and the feedback you received on each. This journal can be a powerful tool for tracking your growth as an artist and adjusting your evaluation criteria as your skills evolve.
By incorporating these techniques and approaches into your routine, you’ll not only enhance your ability to self-critique but also accelerate your growth as an artist. Whether you’re an aspiring urban sketcher or a seasoned painter, continuous self-evaluation is key to mastering your craft.
Students in the daily throw down evaluating their work.
The Role of Critiques and Artistic Communities
Engaging with a community and sharing your sketches can significantly enhance your ability to evaluate your own work. Artistic communities, whether online or in person, provide a platform for sharing work and receiving constructive feedback. Consider participating in a critique session where you can present your work and receive feedback.
This interaction not only helps you understand common pitfalls but also highlights successful techniques you might not be utilizing.
Sketch critiques are an invaluable tool for gaining insight into your sketching process and identifying specific areas for improvement.
Sure, it can take a bit of courage to share your sketch initially, but our monthly sketch critiques with Ian Fennelly always focus on the positives and celebrate your artwork. However, Ian’s constructive feedback can propel your sketching skills forward, allowing you to observe previously unnoticed aspects and achieve significant improvements.
These improvements can be carried over when working on your next sketch and incorporated into your ongoing sketching practice.
Let’s take a look at a sketch submitted by student Pam, review some of Ian’s suggestions, and see how Pam applied this advice to enhance her work and learn tools for evaluating her work in the future.
This is gorgeous and is a really hard scene to do as there’s not many distinct structures. There’s such a great range of foliage, bushes, trees and wonderful variety of technique and space. There’s so many readable textures in the foliage and wall but I would consider using more textures on the ground, on the pathways and at the front of the sketch. This could be contour lines, cracks, larger stones, or more variety in the stone shapes. I’d also consider looking at the canopy of leaves across the top, it’s currently not as clear and sharp as the gate. Look at adding some sharper and clearer leaf shapes to balance your sketch and to tie it back with the other strong leaf shapes and strong lines of the gate.
The differences are subtle, and yet so effective! And all of these suggestions helped Pam to recognise where she may have needed help in evaluating her work. See how the sketch is more grounded, more well balanced and leads you into the scene?
Pam said:
“Based on Ian’s suggestions I have added to my sketch accordingly. I feel more confident about the more distant trees and the path now and will take these ideas forward. Thanks so much Ian.”
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