Questions answered (First attempt)

What are my strengths?

Drawing abilities (detailed,meticulous)

Mark making

Research (adapting research into own knowledge/work)

Problem solving

Patience

Work ethic

What are my weaknesses?

Painting abilities (technical aspects of painting, representational as example)

Self doubt (lack of confidence at times in my abilities and work) and letting this stop me from working

Limited abilities with hand tools (solvable)

Making processes more difficult than it needs to be (not realising the easiest way to do something)

Do these weaknesses and strengths balance each other out?

To a degree, for example, self doubt can affect work ethic, and problem solving

What is the best idea I've ever  had?

First year, wooden pallet work - still go back to this after a year and a half

What made it great in my mind?

A successful piece, risk taking payed off, confident in creating work, work is 'alive'

What is the dumbest idea?

Unsure, just because an idea didn't work, doesn't mean it was dumb. All ideas have some potential

Can you connect the dots to what led you to this idea? (best idea)

Howard Hodgekin painting methods, abstract

Lucio Fontana, slashing into canvases

Loose expressive painting, holes in the canvas

Found a wooden pallet outside, possibility to use it as a found frame

Seem purely as experimental

What is my creative ambition?

To continually develop my skills, grow confidence in myself and my art, create the best work I can

What are the obstacles to your ambition?

Self doubt, fear stalling and paralysing me, human nature (laziness, procrastination)

What are the vital steps to achieve this ambition?

Be confident in myself and abilities, not let my doubt stop me, force myself to work, take risks = confidence to take larger risks

Describe your first successful creative act.

As a small child, life drawing class, drawing a black Greek style statue from life with good accuracy for age

Describe your second successful creative act.

Designing a logo for a Police Bogus calling campaign during a level art at sixth form

Compare them.

Second is a more skilled and advanced progress from the first act.

Which artists do I admire most?

J. M. W. Turner, Giuseppe Penone, Andy Goldsworthy, Claude Monet,

Why are they your role models?

J. M. W. Turner - Prolific art maker, the sheer amount of work he produced, expressive, romantic, also representational but with energy
Giuseppe Penone - His relationship with nature, the connection between man and nature, particularly the tree. His work can often offer a moment of reflection between ourselves and the natural world, doesn't set out to solve the problems of the environment etc. He reveals the enormous power of the life around us, the magnificence of biology.

Andy Goldsworthy - His use of natural materials in the area he's in to create work that doesn't generally impact the landscape negatively. Failure doesn't phase his work, he continues despite multiple failures until success.

Claude Monet -  His obsession with understanding how light, colour works in nature. Understanding the blessing and curse of never being able to 'switch off' creatively.

What do you and these artists have in common?

The ideas of nature that I feel and hold are shared in one way or another with all of these artists. Learning about them has made me realise and make sense of my own connection with nature, and partly what I want to say about nature.

Who/what is your muse?

Nature

Define muse.

Something that continues to inspire me throughout the years of creating.

When faced with impending success, or the threat of failure, how do you respond?

Success - continue to work, harder on realisation of success

Failure - doubt self/worry, then consider what has gone wrong and why, go back to previous work or research to try and solve problems occurring

When confronted with superior intelligence or talent, how do you respond?

The possibility that I could reach that level, learn as much from them as I can, also have some jealousy

At what moments do you feel your reach exceeds your grasp?

A lot of the time, stems from my lack of confidence, usually continue despite this feeling

When you work, do you love the process or the result?

Both. The process of working, researching, problem solving etc is enjoyable, and it's rewarding when all of that hard work comes together into a successful piece of artwork.

What is your ideal creative activity?

When inspiration and ideas work well together, or learning a new process or method of working

What is your greatest fear?

Failing, letting myself down, not being able to solve problems myself, not achieving best I can

What is the likelihood of either of the two previous answers happening?

There is always the chance of either happening, but you continue to work in the hopes of the ideal situation happening.

What is your idea of mastery?

Being able to execute something with a lot of skill without thought/thinking about it. Subconscious.

What is your greatest dream?

To have a large studio to create the work I want, access to the materials I need, supporting myself as an artist, having a community of artists working together to create art

Which of your answers would you most like to change?

My lack of confidence - having confidence in myself and my work could make everything a lot easier, more time on art, less on worrying or doubting ideas