‘Creativity is not a profession; it is a way of existing.’
Magdalena Abakanowicz
Why ‘Beyond Technique’, when we know that before any artist can truly find their way, they must master both their materials and their making process?
Anni Albers writes:
“We are finding our language, and as we go along, we learn to obey their [the materials'] rules and limits. We have to obey and adjust to those demands. Ideas flow from it to us, and though we feel to be the creator, we are involved in a dialogue with our medium. The more subtly we are tuned to our medium, the more inventive our actions will become. Not listening to it ends in failure."
By exploring, experimenting, listening, paying attention, reviewing, and refining our work, we discover what we respond to, what it is we want our work to express. At the same time, if we want our work to transcend its making processes, we must pay due diligence to composition. And while all of this is going on, we must learn to accept failures, learn from them, and manage self-doubt or feelings of inadequacy. We must learn to turn up even when we feel unmotivated or despondent. We must create a workspace, invest in materials, and carve out the time. We must commit to developing our practice.
Dr Martin Shaw wrote, “the denial of discipline, struggle, and sometimes flat-out boredom is why some modern art is so unconvincing; it lacks life resonance. The artist plucks the flower but has never planted the bulb, and somehow we sense that." The team at Take Two and I wanted to encourage people to plant their bulbs deep, and so the online Beyond Technique programme was born. Stage 1 ran from January to March 2025. During that time, participants undertook self-examination and self-discovery. They considered what their passage of making might contain. They engaged in rigorous study of composition and submitted ‘self-talks’ on work-in-progress and finished work. And they considered how – and whether – to release their work into the wider world.
Stage 2 offered a small group of participants the opportunity to step forward for a further period of focus and mentored guidance. We were together from March to September 2025, and as part of this period of focus, participants shared their work through a community platform and undertook small group, online sessions to provide each other with feedback and input.
Real community support and engagement took place throughout both stages of Beyond Technique, but in Stage 2, we went deeper. The decision to commit to such an undertaking is not to be taken lightly, and I applaud the participants and offer heartfelt thanks for their bravery, determination, hard work, and faith. A degree course takes three years to complete, so nine months isn’t a great deal of time to develop an art practice or achieve desired pieces of artwork. As such, what we see here from the Tier 2 participants is simply a beginning, not an end. Many, many established artists only find their true path once well-embedded in their practice, as it’s the doing and the making, the failures and the setbacks that often provide the biggest insights and learning. Rick Rubin said, “Each piece of work can never be a total reflection of you, only a reflection of who we are in this moment."
And Rubin also writes, “One of the greatest rewards of making art is the ability to share it. Even if there’s no audience to receive it, we build the muscle of making something and putting it out into the world… the more times we can bring ourselves to release our work, the less weight insecurity has." Some of those reading this will be the artists, so thank you for having the courage to stand by your work. If you’re the audience, I hope you enjoy and appreciate the reflections of who these artists are in this moment… and know that in the future, they will evolve and change.
“Success is not final, failure is not fatal; it is the courage to continue that counts.” (Attributed to Winston Churchill).
Claire Benn
