How My Style Found Me
Thoughts on Style, Part Two
I never really tried to find my style. It found me.
Here’s what I mean. I never set out to answer the question:
“How will I find a unique illustration style that will be distinctive and hopefully will get me work in the children’s book market?”
It didn’t feel right to me to start down this path. I can’t even say why, honestly. I don’t fault people at all who wrestle with the question and try so hard to choose a style. It seems like a logical and smart business decision (this is probably why I didn’t trust it. Choosing the illogical path is one of my gifts).
If you’re one of these people, I come in peace and want to offer my own experience as a different path (yeah, the one marked “winding and somewhat slow, illogical and maybe dumb”… sound fun?! It is. Trust me. I’ve lived here for a long while and have a tent with drinks and good eats).
This is part 2 on a series about style. While illustration heavy, I think this applies to writing and other creative fields too. Check out part 1, where I talked about why a unique style has been important to me:
Let’s start with an alternative question that I think gets at how I allowed my style to find me, rather than trying to choose or find it:
How will I get better at being myself artistically when I make illustrations for the children’s book market?
There’s a subtle shift there that I think opened me up to some possibilities that if I’d focused on the first question, I’d have missed.
First, let’s get the obvious out of the way. “Getting better” is not a fixed end point. It’s a process that continues on forever. I like that because I’m a crazy growth mindset disciple guy.
In the comments1 from part 1,
shared a bit that I think gets at it quite nicely:I’ve been ‘finding my style’ for five years and every time I try something new hoping this will be the lightbulb moment, I make a new folder on my Mac. I have 11 folders now! This did make me depressed but recently I’ve got to thinking that they show my journey, with each folder I’m getting nearer to working out what I want to say and how I want to say it. I’m enjoying the self discovery.
I responded with an imperfect analogy (another one of my gifts)! I think that our true kind of creative selves are trapped in ice or rock and that we can work to chisel away chunks over time. We get better at doing the thing (illustration, writing, cooking, music making, film directing, etc) and we ideally get closer to our unique and distinctive style. It’s a process and like Briony, I’m here for the self-discovery, even if my hands are tired and a bit calloused. 2
Secondly, there’s a paralysis that sets in when you have a book published or work with a dream client. It says “you’ve made it” and the work towards being more yourself is over. Just do what you did last time! But I think this is a mistake. I’m not putting down my chisel because the end product that one time was cool. I want to keep cleaving and shaping so my style is more and more true.
When I was working on the final art for Little Bee’s Flower, I was feeling discouraged and overwhelmed. It occurred to me (like at 3am3) that I was super-tight and it was constraining in a way that was disabling or countering my progress. The joy was being choked out of the art. To get back on track, I introduced more randomness via collage and scribbly drawn marks and kind of let myself have fun again. The bolded words are things that I love about my own work. It’s me.
What are some words that you’d use to describe what you love about your own work?
What image have you made that you return to, because there’s just something you love about it?
Is there a medium or way of working that lights you up?
These are clues. That’s our style finding us.
I can’t wait to share part 3... See you next week! If this letter is helpful to you, consider sharing it with people you know. It’s available for 2 weeks before it gets archived and is only available only to paid subscribers.
I laughed so hard when
dropped this comment: “MAKE UGLY STUFF!!!! is my new battle cry, t-shirt, and country's flag. Gracias for it, Jacob ❤️”Alongside the feeling of needing to choose a style, is the feeling that your work doesn’t have a defined style or it’s not unique enough. I think this is a sign that you need to chisel more intentionally (ie. do the hard work of making more art intentionally, more often). I plan on heading in the direction for part 3.
Most moments of clarity arrive at 3am, in my experience. Or in the shower.
Ha! If I'm stumped about something I will jump in the shower just to think. It's magic.