How to become a talented artist.

Road through the clouds to infinity

Leonid Tishkov. How to become a brilliant artist without having an ounce of talent. - M.: Gayatri, 2007.

There is nothing more artistic than loving people.

Vincent van Gogh

Many - and not without reason - accuse contemporary art of being rational, cold, and lacking emotions. At the Moscow Breakthrough exhibition, held in London in the fall of 2005, two works stood out precisely for their piercing emotionality (as well as for their remarkable creative imagination and skill of execution). One was called “Private Moon”, the other was “Solveig”, and both belonged to the same artist - Leonid Tishkov (“Moon” - co-authored with photographer Boris Bendikov). I walked around the exhibition, looked at the works of other authors, and then returned again to “Private Moon” and “Solveig” - they, as they say, hooked me. Therefore, when I saw a cover in a bookstore with a familiar photograph - the artist is sitting by the bed of a cold moon, whom he carefully wrapped in a blanket and treats with apples, I immediately and without a shadow of a doubt bought it, especially since the title was tempting - “How to become a brilliant artist without having an ounce of talent.”

I have read the book twice (so far). The first time - binge-watching, like a novel with fascinating intrigue. The second time - slowly, one chapter at a time, as a collection of aphorisms and wise thoughts, as a wonderful guide to gaining faith in yourself, in your creative forces, in its uniqueness and originality.

Tishkov has a rare gift - he managed to organically fuse several genres in one book - memoirs, essays about artists, almost practical guide according to different artistic styles and techniques philosophical parables. The genres flow smoothly into one another, and the book is read with an ease that should be an example and goal for all authors writing about art.

Leonid Tishkov tells the story of how a little boy from the Ural village of Nizhnie Sergi dreamed of becoming an artist and how his dream became a reality. The story seems far-fetched, incredible - but it life story Tishkov himself. Adults did not approve of his desire to become an artist, and he studied to be a doctor. But you can’t run away from your calling, and without five minutes the doctor Tishkov begins his career as a cartoonist, then book graphics, and as a result, medicine was abandoned, and a few years later Tishkov was accepted into the Union of Artists. He recalls with a smile how in the column “Which art university You have graduated”, he wrote “1st MMS”, and when asked what kind of university this was, he mysteriously answered: “There is such a art institute, you do not know…".

“Laughter expands consciousness,” says the author. Let's believe him. Perhaps precisely because he started with the most “ridiculous” genre - caricature - his consciousness is not blinkered, it is open to any crazy idea, any artistic image.

Tishkov shares with readers how new images are born in the artist’s head, and these stories are fascinating. Consider, for example, the story about the Divers, or the Dabloids. And the story about the Snow Angel and the flight from Annapurna! And stories about books that Tishkov - no, did not illustrate - created: “The War with the Newts”, “The Twelve Chairs”, “The Hunt for the Snark”; These books have long become a bibliographic rarity and an adornment of the collections of many leading museums.

It must be said that artists are extremely rarely able to explain what they wanted to say with their work, why they work in this and not another manner, where this or that image came from. Tishkov has a unique gift of introspection; he knows how to reveal his creative secrets to the reader without boring. They are often quite practical. For example, here is a useful one creative advice: Young grass shoots should be painted with a thin brush to emphasize its freshness and fragility. And the stones should be drawn with thick ink, thick and bold, to show how heavy they are. Or here’s another thing: if you want to draw an elephant, take a small piece of paper, and the elephant will seem huge. “It’s better to draw a skier on a large sheet of paper, and then his confusion and loneliness on the white field will be visible.”

Advice about the elephant - actually cautionary tale about how a thoughtlessly purchased piece of huge paper prompted the idea for one of his most interesting series. These were not just drawings of elephants, but stories about ZHVH - living in the trunk; and since these were stories, Tishkov provided the drawings with captions, creating his own calligraphic style. Letters in this style spread at random and caused the indignation of the famous calligrapher Evgeniy Gannushkin. But he quickly calmed down after hearing the author’s explanation: “You know, this was not written by an artist, but by someone living in a trunk. He doesn’t quite succeed, his hands are in his trunk, he took a brush in his teeth and began to write.” For Gannushkin this sounded convincing; It also sounds convincing to readers, although it is unlikely that the artist was aware of this when he wrote slanting and crooked letters on a huge sheet of paper.

An important tip is to develop imagination and imagination. I can’t resist quoting the book in its entirety. “A sailor walks along the seashore. Waves, waves, waves move back and forth across the sea. We imagine that the waves are alive, but what kind of fantasy is that? The waves are truly alive. And if so? One wave jumped out of the sea and walked along the sand with its bare feet. The sailor immediately jumped up and became familiar with this wave. And they start dancing! Next to them, let’s draw a wind-up gramophone for convincing...” Note that for ordinary person the assumption that the waves are alive is already a fantasy. And for the artist - “what kind of fantasy is there? The waves are truly alive.” Maybe the secret of art is what is considered fantasy? The artist’s imagination is an order of magnitude more fantastic, probably...

No less important is the advice to develop your own, special vision of the world, because “ a real artist always multiplies the world in its splendor, but does not repeat it. Each artist has his own view of the world, and this view itself becomes part of the world, enriching it, just as Levitan’s landscapes, Dali’s super-real works, and Kabakov’s installations became part of the world. “Where does such an extraordinary look come from? It grows like a flower, in the bud of which the eye blooms, and the roots of this flower spread around the heart... This inner view, bypassing simple reading of the image on the retina. It consists of the artist’s empathy for what he sees, an intuitive feeling of an object or event. And then, when he transfers what he has seen with his inner eye onto canvas, paper, embodies it in clay or an object, we see it too.”

Along the way, Leonid Tishkov tells a lot fascinating stories about the most different artists- ancient Japanese and Chinese, European masters of the Renaissance and Enlightenment, great masters of the 19th and 20th centuries, our contemporaries - everything is entertaining, fascinating and instructive, with great respect and love for their characters.

But the most amazing and touching thing in the book is the confidential communication with the reader. The author addresses him as “you”, as if he were an old friend, and on every page he calls out: don’t ruin your talent, don’t bury it in the ground! Don't be afraid of your talent, don't give up on it! Find your style, discover your unique “I”, believe in yourself!

Leonid Tishkov defines his own style as “the search for style.” Either he builds installations from pasta, then he knits his heroes from colored rags, then he creates snow and northern lights from ordinary salt, then he invites the moon to visit, and she sits comfortably on his balcony, to the envy of his neighbors... The inventor Tishkov gives life to everything, what does it touch Magic wand his imagination. His view of the world is like that of a child - open, bright, ready to be surprised and amaze. He creates like an artist, he writes like a writer.

The book ends with “approving advice: stop taking anything for granted. Look with curiosity at yourself - at a very strange, wonderful, precious being. And look at familiar and unfamiliar passers-by with exactly the same look.”

I really want to believe that at least one of those who have read or will read Leonid Tishkov’s book will be able to follow his advice. And then another brilliant artist will appear in the world.

In this book one of the leading Russian artists Leonid Tishkov tells readers how to reveal and develop the inner genius that exists in everyone. The author is sure: the state of “pre-creativity,” when a sprout of inspiration appears in the soul, happens to everyone, and it is important not to dry it out, but to let it develop.

This book will inspire you to take the path of an artist and help you improve along the way, even if you think you have no talent for drawing.

Book chips

Illustrations by the author in different periods of life
Photos from the author's archive
Every page contains inspiring advice and stories from the lives of great artists.
Tips for when you need to write or draw, but your head is completely empty
A poetic book-conversation about drawing and creativity

Who is this book for?

For future and current artists.

For everyone who is interested in drawing.

From the author

What will this book be about? About what and about whom? It will be about art, about life and creativity, and about man at the epicenter of these three suns.

It's about becoming an artist. How to become a brilliant artist without having an ounce of talent! What a deal! How is it possible to become an artist, especially a genius? The biggest misconception is that you and I have no talent. It exists, you just need to find your unique self and immediately begin to cultivate your talent, immediately, now, step by step, without interruption, work on your talent, just as Michurin grew an apple the size of a watermelon. And raised him. Because he was confident in his apple. And, of course, the apple itself was confident in its Michurin.

How to become a creative person? If you understand that life is creativity, that every moment is illuminated by the energy of creation, then awareness of this will lead to the awakening of your talent, and then genius. Just like once in childhood, you will be able to do everything - draw, sing, dance, create your own world, everything was possible then - even fly!

Blog Articles

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Leonid Tishkov on the set of the video film “Snow Angel - 2” in Almora, Himalayas, India, 1999.

The cover design uses Red Ring and Red Square fonts from Letterhead. Text composition – Yuri Gordon

On the cover: Private moon in New Zealand. At the foot of the Rongitoto volcano. Photo by Leonid Tishkov and Marcus Williams, 2010.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without the written permission of the copyright holders.

I dedicate this book to my mother Raisa Alexandrovna, the Ural teacher who created Vyazanik, Dutch artist To Bas Jan Ader, who disappeared into the Atlantic Ocean in search of a miracle, and to all the artist-dreamers of our beautiful Earth

Poet at the seaside. Paper, ink, 1976.

What will this book be about? About what and about whom? It will be about art, about life and creativity, and about man at the epicenter of these three suns.

It's about becoming an artist. How to become a brilliant artist without having an ounce of talent! What a deal! How is it possible to become an artist, especially a genius?

The biggest misconception is that you and I have no talent. It exists, you just need to find your unique “I” and immediately begin to cultivate your talent, immediately, now, step by step, without interruption, work on your talent, just as Michurin grew an apple the size of a watermelon. And raised him. Because he was confident in his apple. And, of course, the apple itself was confident in its Michurin.

What is creativity? Creativity is the meaning of life. This is life itself. And the person who comes to creativity, namely to artistic creativity, certainly becomes an artist. I will speak as an artist who has dedicated his life to the fine arts.

The artist creates new worlds through all kinds of devices: his magic wand - brush, canvas, paper, pencil, installation, video, objects, sculpture... Everything that we can depict and, above all, see with our eyes, can be attributed to the world of art.

The being in whom the artist awakens begins to understand how this world works, how amazing and diverse it is. You read books, look at reproductions, go to a museum - and you want to create something yourself that is similar to what other artists have created. You don’t find a place for yourself, you wander back and forth, an irresistible need for creativity grows in you. The search for a stable point on the earth, one’s own axis on which the world will turn, is a search for the creative “I”, a search for the main channel along which the flow of energy that creates the artist will rush.

The state of pre-creativity is a state when you suddenly feel that a sprout is appearing in your soul. Any of us has experienced this at some point. Some allowed this sprout to develop, while others dried it.

Here is the situation: a person graduated from school, went to college, studied, for example, at the Electromechanical Institute, then began working at a factory. But all the time he was inexorably drawn somewhere in the other direction: towards fantasy, fairy tales. Something was missing for him to experience this life in its entirety. The world seemed to him not only boring, but under-fulfilled.

Sometimes in his sleep he was able to momentarily grasp fragments magical world. Or suddenly he opened a book, read it, and it seemed to him that this could be told differently. It seemed as if the book he wanted to read existed, but it was nowhere to be found. Or: he looked at the painting, and he imagined another painting that is not in this exhibition, but it could have been painted.

This is the first signal that a person has set foot on the path of an artist. You should definitely listen to him. But in order to walk this path, he must have great courage. Fearlessness. If a person decides to become an artist, then he must overcome the cowardice of not being one.

What is this courage? The fact is that the creator is a being inside the world, and not from the outside. A creative person bravely enters the center of the world, holding a lamp in his hand, raising it above his head and standing in a circle of his own light.

And he begins to talk - first of all about himself: what he would like to see in this world. And everyone surrounds him, looks and is surprised.

Why do people care about art? Because the artist reveals the invisible, makes real pictures that arise in their imagination.

This is the main reason for interest in creative person. Why do people go to exhibitions, why do they read books? There they see themselves, sometimes without even knowing it.

Diagonal movement. Oil on canvas, 1986.

First step

The desire to become an artist struck me as a child. Let’s call this desire talent for now, since I had nothing else but a thirst for creativity. I so wanted to depict the place where I was born, the Ural Mountains and the forests that surrounded it.

It was a small ancient town of Nizhnie Sergi, built together with a metallurgical plant under the miner Demidov. My wooden house stood under the low Kukan Mountain on the bank of a large artificial pond created by a wooden dam that blocked a mountain stream on Nudovskaya Street. My grandfather was a foreman at a factory, and my parents were teachers. That's why I had books at home. They all fit on a bookcase. And among them is a children's encyclopedia - ten yellow volumes, full pictures And important information about the world.

The world around surprised me with its strangeness, mystery and beauty. You sit on the very top of Mount Kukan, look at the pond, which goes around the mountains like a horseshoe, and huge clouds are reflected in it, floating right above your head. In the middle of the pond there is a boat, as if empty shell seeds, and in it - a fisherman with fishing rods. You can’t tell who, probably some relative or neighbor of mine. It was a small, cozy town, full of relatives inhabited it.

I lay detached in the bluebells and grass, looking into the sky, deep as a pond. And I no longer understood where the reflections were and where the real clouds were. I didn’t understand what I was doing here on earth. Why was I born, why?

Flower birds. Drawing from a notebook. Paper, rapidograph, 1983.

Only drawing somehow reconciled me with reality. I tried to depict everything that surrounded me and everything that seemed to me on paper. My hand was always scribbling and drawing something; all school notebooks and textbooks were covered with my scribbles.

I wanted to draw skillfully and correctly - just like in life. Being a natural, completely self-taught person, I constantly leafed through albums in the library, where I went twice a week with a string bag full of books. I carefully studied reproductions of paintings by real artists such as Repin or Shishkin, Leonardo da Vinci and Botticelli. I didn’t see any “living” paintings: there were no Tretyakov Gallery, neither the Louvre nor the Hermitage. The writer Viktor Golyavkin has a story “Harp and Boxing” - about how one guy turned into an artist: how colors suddenly shone and exploded in him, and he had a desire to paint all the walls in the house and the house itself. He bought paints, he started painting and couldn’t stop. He didn't even know himself that O he draws and what motivates him at this moment. And then I really wanted to learn how to draw. But I didn't believe that I was an artist.

Leonid Tishkov “How to become a brilliant artist without having a single drop of talent”

Tishkov will not lie to you. Motivational speakers convince that anyone can become a millionaire. Can not. Because not everyone is given this. There is talent, even just a drop, in everyone. So the title of the book is disingenuous, quite a bit, but in the spirit of cunning marketers. They, wanting to sell the book to everyone, convince them that it is possible to create without talent: everyone does it, many even succeed. Discovering talent does not necessarily equal financial well-being, but the person definitely becomes richer. Just a little different. Not like motivational speakers and consultants to top managers.

Today Leonid's works can be seen in the Tretyakov Gallery, New York and Moscow museums contemporary art, he is known all over the world. The thirst for creativity captured Tishkov in school years. He lived in the small Ural town of Nizhnie Sergi, where the city-forming enterprise was a metallurgical plant, built under the miner Demidov. A place very far from the desire to create. Leonid wanted to paint the place of his birth, the mountains and forests surrounding the town. He really wanted to learn how to draw, so he mercilessly copied all the images he liked, covering the margins and covers of school notebooks with slanting and crooked drawings. His friend Misha could draw much better: once on a piece of linoleum with an old school board he himself cut out an engraving with a knife of an Indian galloping on a horse and gave it to his friend Lena for his birthday. Tishkov is still amazed by the skill with which the image was made - by the hands of a schoolboy, whose talent no one specially developed, in art schools didn't drive.

In those days, telling your parents that you didn’t want to go to medical school after school, but to become an artist, was very, very improvident. Being an artist is not a profession. Absolutely right: this is a calling. If you want to become one just for the money, it’s better not to ruin your talent. If you are drawn to create not for the sake of profit and fame, but simply feel that you cannot do otherwise, then the attraction of art will be found everywhere. Leonid Tishkov talks about this attraction, and his book is not exactly a textbook on development artistic skills. This is not a biography of an artist who did not find any special talent in himself, but found enough courage not to give up and bring to life any creative idea that came to mind, without dividing into successful and failed. It's both. The book is about someone who was not afraid, even though he understood that he would not become a brilliant artist. School friend Misha, by the way, preferred to listen to his father: he did not want to doom his future family to suffer, so he became a military cartographer. I didn’t take the first step, but it’s very important. After that, it’s time for other questions. Why be an artist, for example, how to develop imagination, what kind of paper to choose for creative ideas, what pencils and paints, how to draw every day and try to draw more and more complex subjects, concepts and images. First, tell yourself yes. Everything else will come later.

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This article was automatically added from the community

There are no untalented people, they simply do not exist! The author of the new book is 100% sure of this “How to become a brilliant artist without having an ounce of talent.”

The artist's literary work is intended to awaken hidden talent every reader. Tishkov is convinced that in any person, regardless of his lifestyle and environment, hidden ability to create. And not just create, but create real masterpieces.

The book of the Russian artist is unique, because it is imbued with personal stories its author. Leonid conveys his thoughts quite simply, but at the same time he gets into the very depths of the reader’s soul, makes him think, and reconsider his views on life. Tishkov calls not to bury your own people alive Creative skills, because, in his opinion, many people only think that they don’t exist, but in fact, everyone’s talent is simply waiting for attention to be paid to it.

The author's communication style is not entirely standard. On the one hand, he addresses the reader quite friendly, but on the other hand, Leonid demands complete dedication from him, calls on him to act right now. The art connoisseur insists that you cannot delay for a minute; if you decide to become talented, then you need to become talented at that very second and there are no excuses. Realize your uniqueness, believe in yourself and act - this is what the author of the new publication calls for.

This book is indispensable for those who dream of becoming an artist, or are still afraid to even dream about it, but cannot imagine their life without drawing. It contains many years of experience not only of the author himself, various photographs of his life and works, but also of many of the greatest artists of all times and peoples. Plus, Tishkov’s book is a treasure trove of new ideas for beginning artists or those who have depleted their stock of imagination.

And if you look at it more broadly, “How to become a brilliant artist...” is a book not only for artists. It concerns everyone who, for some reason, has stopped believing in themselves, in their individuality, in their talent.

Tishkov's work is a real guide to life for every person, which will help him understand himself and show his unique abilities here and now, no matter what. Inspiration, motivation and friendly support from the author are three points that anyone who decides to read this book can count on.

“In this book, one of Russia’s leading artists, Leonid Tishkov, tells readers how to discover and develop the inner genius that exists in everyone.”