Do you have to accept commissions?

One day, you’ll come across this situation! Someone asks you to paint them a commissioned picture. They want something specific because they know you’re a talented painter. Or maybe you have a website where your paintings are displayed for sale, and a customer wants to buy a painting that’s already been sold.

Should I accept to paint to order? What’s involved?

Ordering a painting: can you paint to order?

🖌️ A customer likes one of your paintings and it’s no longer available. You’ve sold it. You are asked if you can paint it again.

🖌️ In another case, a prospect has a very specific idea for a painting: he asks you to paint it to his specifications.

I almost feel like telling you that it’s up to each artist to judge. I’ll give you some food for thought if you don’t know how to position yourself when faced with a commission for a painting.

📌 The first painting was created at a particular moment in time. You were in a unique state of mind with a particular inspiration. Do you think you could recreate the same atmosphere to paint exactly the same picture again?

📌 This raises the question of inspiration. In short, you’re going to force yourself to paint a picture. To remake a painting. Is it even possible to do a painting exactly the same way?

📌 If the painting doesn’t correspond precisely to the customer’s wishes, will he buy it anyway?

📌 Will you still enjoy creating the picture if painting suddenly becomes a kind of constraint?

📌 The buyer of the first painting will no longer have an original and unique work if you create an identical one.

Breaking through as a painter is a long road. Selling a painting boosts your self-confidence, and sometimes you’re ready to accept a commission to secure an income.

Personally, I feel restricted when I have to paint a canvas to order. When I like a painting I’ve already sold, I explain why I don’t want to reproduce it. On the other hand, I advise the person to visit my site regularly: he or she will certainly fall in love with another painting!

Finding your style: becoming an artist

One of the most important things to do when you’re starting to feel more at ease is to give yourself a space dedicated to your activity as a painter. Little by little, you’ll be able to indulge yourself by acquiring equipment such as spalters, brushes and knives! You’ll be able to try your hand at a variety of painting techniques, on different supports, on stretchers of different sizes, on triptychs…

This is how you’ll gradually find your style, the style that will be your artist’s signature, the style that will enable people to recognize you as the author of the painting.

If you can, set aside a specific place to paint. Either you have a room you can invest in, or you can set up a small studio in your own home. The best thing is to have all your materials at hand and to be able to store everything nearby. That way, as inspiration strikes, all you have to do is pick and choose from the materials around you.

How do I find ideas for paintings?

Sometimes, in the course of a painter’s career and with each new painting, one loses a little of one’s imagination. You get the impression of going round in circles, painting the same thing over and over again…

This feeling of “treading water” is more prevalent in the world of abstract painting, where there are no figures, no landscapes, nothing figurative.

At the same time, having a defined style can give the impression of doing the same thing over and over again. You have to be careful not to get lost in habits, and keep the pleasure of creating by renewing your ideas.

Here are a few tips for finding new painting ideas:

🖌️ Take a walk in nature, listen to music: listen to your feelings and paint your emotions!

🖌️ Vary formats: use smaller frames, different formats, try to create a polyptych.

🖌️ Try out new textures: discover modeling paste, create relief effects with gesso, gesso mixed with sand and more. Collage unusual objects!

🖌️ Use the color wheel as inspiration to mix and match colors and come up with new painting ideas!

🖌️ Try painting with a knife, the alla primatechnique, layer by layer, glazing. Paint with a variety of objects: sponges, spalters, etc.

🖌️ Broaden your practice by discovering how to make paintings with acrylic pouring paint.

Sometimes when you’re short of inspiration, all you have to do is let your canvas dry for a while and step back. Go off and do something else, and come back to your painting later with a fresh and different look 👀! So you have many strings to your bow to create a wide variety of paintings, among which your admirers are sure to all find something to their liking!