My art journey, one year on - a testimony

Exactly one year ago, when Singapore introduced a Circuit Breaker due to Covid-19. I picked up a marker and did my first drawing. If you read my very first post on this blog, you'll see it but anyway, here it is. As you can see, it's really quite crappy:

Since then, I've embarked on an art journey that completely took me by surprise. In the past year, I must have drawn or painted more than 150 pieces. I took on pet portrait commissions and sold my art, raising more than S$6,500 for charity. I started an Instagram account two months ago to showcase my art and currently have almost 2,000 followers. This was a commissioned piece I completed yesterday:

Many people have commented that I seem to have made remarkable progress for someone who's only been drawing a year. I usually tell them that God blesses and I steward the gift. I've blogged about how God guides me in my paintings but I thought I would expound on that a little more.

I understand that when people hear stuff like "all glory to God", there tends to be a lot of unspoken scepticism. Is the person just trying to sound pious? Or worse, is it some kind of superstition, like if they don't credit God, God might get angry and take away their wealth/health/gift/achievement/superpower (you fill in the blanks)?

It's not like that for me. I also don't mean it in a vague way like all gifts come from God (although they do). For me, God's collaboration with me is very personal. There were a couple of times when I actually felt God's presence very close to me, like He's right there helping me. But it doesn't mean that I go into a trance, He takes my pencil and magically draws something for me. God doesn't work that way. His preferred mode is working alongside people.

The best way I can explain it is like when a parent is helping a toddler to build a Lego house. The parent knows how to build it but he's not going to do it for the child. He might, however, pick up a piece and suggest to the kid, "Why don't you try this?" And the kid tries it, it works and he says, "look, I did it!"  Was it the parent or the child who built the Lego house? Both. The parent guided and the kid executed it.

That's what I mean when I say God's guiding hand is on mine. Very often, especially last year, it felt like all my art pieces were experiments. When I look at a reference photo and attempt to paint it, I'm usually overocme by indecision. What colour? Dark or light? Which pastels to use? How do I get this texture? Sometimes I go back and forth, trying different stuff as the painting progresses, even painting colour on top of colour as I change my mind. Unlike a professional artist, I frequently don't know what techniques will result in the outcome I want. 

First time drawing hands and still life with pastel pencils

And yet, more often than not, the painting turns out fine or at least passable. Certainly better than what you would expect from someone with no art training who has been painting for less than a year. Often, I rely on intuition. Sometimes, I mysteriously get a rash idea to try something and then it miraculously works. I've only spoilt like maybe 5 drawings out of the 150 or so, I think. The numbers and progress defy logic and that's why I'm convinced that it's only possible through God's strength. He's there gently planting ideas in my head that I wouldn't have thought of otherwise.

First time trying a black landscape with oil pastels

The question then is: what's God's plan for me in this art journey? I've asked Him many times, and each time God has been silent. I take this to mean that the time is not right for me to know, and I'm supposed to wait. So in the meantime, I'll just keep painting, improving and selling my art to raise funds. Who knows where this might go? It might take 1 year or 10 for something to happen, or maybe nothing will happen at all and this art journey is just for my own enjoyment. Even that would be a bonus as art has brought me so much joy. Whatever it is, where God leads, I'll follow.