realism first, stylization later? question.

[dirtydiesel]

as a relative newbie to ca, i have a question here.

while perusing various threads, i've noticed people posting something that said how an artist needs to master human anatomy and then start stylizing, and i'm not quite sure how to interpret this idea.

does this mean that you need to be a realism master before you experiment with stylizations, otherwise your abstractions have no merit?

please do not take offense to this; i'm just a little confused!

thanks, guys! :)

[Elwell]

I don't think "mastery" (whatever that is) is necessary, but knowledge and understanding are always a good thing.

[steve kim]

your own style, whatever it is, is something that you can't get rid of even if you tried.

so don't worry about it and work on the things that are sucking most. if your basic drawing is sucking then work on that first. problems of 'style' (what a turd of a word) will come at their own time.

[Brendan N]

What Elwell said. Having a solid grounding on the knowledge side of things will allow you to make good, intelligent stylization decisions.

[Seedling]

does this mean that you need to be a realism master before you experiment with stylizations, otherwise your abstractions have no merit?

Close, but not quite right. :)

First, for clarity, replace every instance of the word “stylization” in what you said with “abstraction”. :)

The thing is, if you spend your time as a student always making heavily abstracted work, such as Picasso-esque paintings or manga, then when you decide one day to switch to drawing realistically, you’ll be unprepared and basically you may have to start again from scratch to get there. But if you spend your time as a student learning how to draw realistically, then you won’t have much of a problem transitioning to manga, paint-splatters, etc, because realism requires a rigorous understanding of the compositional elements that are needed to make those more abstract forms of illustration successful.

However, some experimentation with abstraction while you are a student is a very good thing! It will help you to understand the non-representational compositional elements that are a part of every representational image that you make. If you would like to join in an exercise in abstraction this week, follow this link: http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=111113

[Chris Bennett]

Great replies, the only thing I can add is this:
One never, ever really does 'realism'. It is all a 'stylisation'. I don't mean in the sense of elongating people's faces or putting big boots with big buckles onto people holding unlikely looking guns. What I mean is that even painting that seems the most 'literal' uses all sorts of 'equivalents' to fool us into believing the 2D surface is 3D. You invent a sort of 2D abstraction to deliver a 3D experience. The 'art' or 'kick' or 'satisfaction' or 'pleasure' you get out of this is when it is done with intensity. The crazy, crazy, crazy thing is that the more commited the abstraction in 2D; the more powerful is the 3D effect. This is precisely why I good painting has more 'presence' than a photograph and a weak painting has less.

[Grief]

let's think of it as a silly analogy:

pretend 'realism' and 'stylization' are two ladders. each step of the ladder is a higher level of 'mastery'

if you start climbing the 'style' ladder you can make it pretty far, sometimes certain steps will be far apart and a large gap challenges the artist to reach the next level, making climbing harder at times. but nonetheless you can make it to the top.

the 'realism' ladder has easier steps, but it has a lot more. it may not be as quick as the 'style' ladder, but its a time-tested secure route to the top.

the 'realism' ladder will make steady progress passed a lot of people stuck on some of the trickier gaps on the 'style' ladder (say anatomy, perspective, etc.)

the benefit of taking the slower 'realism' ladder is that it has a nifty function where you can jump off and land on the 'style' ladder in a cool horizontal action leap, already passed several initial 'style' steps.

the 'style' ladder doesn't always work this way. you may be pretty high up on the 'style' ladder, but if you try to jump over to the 'realism' ladder you may fall down several steps and be near the bottom, having to climb back up.

this isn't always the case, and there's exceptions to every rule, but it should give you a general idea of how technical understanding of the medium can vary.

[edit] this is basically what seedling said. maybe i should read all the comments first...

[dirtydiesel]

thanks, guys! you've been so helpful! :)