There are times when being an artist is a struggle.

The creative process involves rigorous mental and physical effort.Besides, it’s also a very competitive career path to take.

With thousands of creative professionals trying to make it in the art world, pursuing the life of an artist can become very disheartening.

But, the trick is to keep moving forward despite all the obstacles you face. When that becomes hard, it can help to look at the masters for inspiration, artistic and otherwise.

Most great artists didn’t have it easy.

They struggled too. Yet, they managed to find ways to move forward despite them.

They managed to place their total focus on their art because they believed in themselves.

We know Pablo Picasso for revolutionizing art. He is famous for his innovative technique and profound understanding of the human form. Yet, like many great artists, his work was heavily criticized in the beginning.

Read on to learn from six of the greatest masters.

1. Pablo Picasso — Have the courage to be yourself

Tips for artists by Pablo Picasso

Success is a filthy word for many artists.

For them, it means compromising or degrading their artistic value.

But, Spanish artist Pablo Picasso ( 1881–1973) didn’t think so.

So often we hear that an artist must work for himself, for the ‘love of art,’and that he must have a dislike for success.

“That’s false!”

Picasso told his friends and fellow artists.

“An artist needs success.”

Picasso started with humble beginnings.

He worked with an unstoppable force whilst refusing to take notice of trends or criticism.

In the process, he’d achieved creative satisfaction, worldwide recognition, and great wealth.

From Picasso’s experience and beliefs, an artist’s work needs to be seen. Otherwise, an artist is limiting his creativity and financial situation.

I could not agree more!

Picasso also told his fellow artist’s friends, “One must have the courage to make a living from one’s vocation.”

Picasso believed financial gain would follow those who persevered.

Success gets awarded to those who create the work they wanted to make. Rather than creating work they should make — or work that would provide a quick income.

Picasso was often broke. Yet he always resisted the temptation to earn money any other way than through his paintings. In the beginning, he kept his price low as for him the main focus was selling his art.

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Why leave success to best-selling painters? Be part of it.

Adopt Picasso’s attitude toward success. Have the courage to follow your vision without compromising along the way. Make sure your work gets seen and make selling your art a top priority.

Aim for successes.

2. Frida Kahlo — Make Complex Content Accessible

Frida Khalo holding a sculpture

Frida Kahlo (1907–1954) is one of Mexico’s most well known and influential artists. Born shortly before the Mexican revolution she lived a turbulent life alongside painters, poets, and revolutionaries.

She lived through her art.Her artwork was layered, heavy with meaning and intention.With her self-portraits, she gave other artists the power to display their pains and frustrations.

Following many miscarriages, her paintings are an exploration into motherhood. Especially, how the absence of this impacts female identity.

Through her art, she changed the meaning of maternal subjectivity forever.

She often uses ribbons as umbilical symbolism. Demonstrating a deep connection to her surroundings and that she is a ‘mother’ without children.

Two Frida's by Frida Kahlo

The life and work of Frida Kahlo were inextricably intertwined.The way in which she was able to use her art to show her suffering is remarkable. How would you use your artwork to outwardly display complex content such as pain and frustrations or discontent?

3. Georgia O’Keeffe — Break the Rules

tips by artists by Georgia OKeefee

The first time I was standing in front of Georgia O’Keeffe’s work was in 2001 at the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum in Santa Fe. I still remember that I was very moved by her charcoal drawings.

This series of abstract charcoal drawings represented a major break with tradition. The drawings led to O’Keeffe (1887–1986) becoming one of the very first American artists to explore abstraction.

Her friend showed these drawings to the art dealer, photographer and gallerist Alfred Stieglitz. He was the first to exhibit her work in 1916 and later became her husband.

“It takes a kind of nerve… and a lot of hard, hard work,” said Georgia O’Keeffe at the age of 90 whilst explaining her success.

From an early age, O’Keeffe had decided that she wasn’t going to spend her life, as she put it, “doing what had already been done”. And it worked.She has become one of the best-loved American artists of the 20th century. She produced works for more than 70 years that oscillated between figuration and abstraction.

“The notion that you can make an artist overnight, that there is nothing but genius, and a dash of temperament in artistic success is a fallacy,” Georgia O’Keeffe declared in 1928.

“Great artists don’t just happen, any more than writers, or singers, or other creators,” she continued.

“They have to be trained, and in the hard school of experience.”

So, what can we learn from Georgia O’Keeffe?

She believed in the importance of observation, organization, perseverance, and enjoyment of the process.

“I believe in having everything and doing everything you want,” she once wrote. “If you really want to — and if you can in any possible way.”

Indeed, O’Keeffe lived her dream ecstatically and without compromising.

4. Louise Bourgeois — Maximum Meaning, Minimum Means

black and white photo of Louise Bourgeois

Louise Bourgeois died in 2010 at the age of 98 years old, leaving behind a huge body of work and writings.

Her work was deeply autobiographical.  As a result, it offers other artists great insight and inspiration.

Records of interviews, essays and diary entries show her approach to making art. Throughout her life, Bourgeois maintained that art and life were one.

“Art is not about art. Art is about life, and that sums it up,” she declared.

She revisits the same themes over and over again but also at the same time kept experiencing.

“There is a development. The repeating of one image and another image means that what you cannot say in words, you try to put in visual terms,” she once reflected. “You have to repeat and repeat; otherwise people don’t understand what you are talking about.”

Bourgeois created a pool of personal meaning through her repeated use of images, abstract forms, and colours.

Her use of repetition also reflects the rawness of her past — her desire to nurture herself by revisiting specific childhood trauma.

“My childhood has never lost its magic, it has never lost its mystery, and it has never lost its drama,” she once said. “All my work of the last fifty years, all my subjects, have found their inspiration in my childhood.”

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Louise Bourgeois believed that artists should make art about their own life.I understand that many artists are not interested in creating art about their life. Whatever rocks your creativity is fine. But, have you thought about revisiting the same themes with the aim to experiment and maximise meaning? Pushing yourself and your material a touch further, just to see what happens?

5. Egon Schiele — Embrace the minority

Egon Schiele (1890–1918) was an Austrian painter, whose creative audacity was cut short by his death at twenty-eight. He died of the Spanish flu pandemic which also claimed the life of his pregnant wife three days earlier.

Schiele had several exhibitions that scandalized Europe with their electric eroticism. This led to his arrest in April 1912 — he was twenty-one years old at the time.

While awaiting trial the judge burned one of his drawings over a candle flame.

Although the charges were dropped, the police still raided his studio. They confiscated more than a hundred drawings they considered pornographic.

That summer, Schiele, shaken by the experience, contemplated what it means to be an artist. An artist in a world so often hostile to new ways of looking at it.

Schiele was inspired by Kierkegaard‘s thoughts. He believed that:

“truth always rests with the minority… because the minority is generally formed by those who really have an opinion, while the strength of a majority is illusory, formed by the gangs who have no opinion.”

Schiele continued to consider the power of the minority:

The “many” are those who are dependent upon each other, the people.The “few” are the leaders of the world. They introduce only what is new and are, therefore considered offensive.

Follow in Schiele’s example and dare to view the world differently.

See how your work can benefit from you being a leader. Don’t follow the majority, have an option that matters.

6. Robert Rauschenberger — Change the Game, use what inspires you

This American master re-wrote the rules.

Robert Rauschenberg (1925–2008 ) created his own path and re-defined what it meant to be an artist.He re-defined how art is made and what it could be.He threw out old ideas and welcomed new ones.

From his start in New York, his focus was on exploration and trying to find new creative possibilities.

Rauschenberg studied at some of the most well-known art schools, under influential teachers. Yet he always paired this with learning from the world and people around him.

He was always eager to put together different creative areas.In the 1950’s he became well known for his“Combines” in which non-traditional materials and objects were used in new combinations.

He mixed theatre and dance. Similarly, art and painting, as well as aspects of painting and sculpture.

Rauschenberg was both a painter and a sculptor. As a result, his Combines are a combination of both. In addition, he also worked with photography, printmaking, papermaking, and performance.

Having the discipline to work on his projects every day with an attitude of never knowing what would happen set Rauschenberg apart.

He was not afraid to make mistakes — for him being correct was never the aim. He nurtured the idea that being right can stop the momentum of a very interesting idea.

Rauschenberg learnt from everything and everyone.

Where do you find creative inspiration?Do you think your artwork would flourish if you pushed your vision further?

Try to replace any restrictions of rights and wrongs with a dose of exploration and curiosity. Take inspiration from all areas of life to create your art — mix it up.

Dive into a well of knowledge

You have artistic goals, dreams for your future, and the willpower and determination to bring those dreams to life.

Am I right?

All you’re missing is the insight, and advice of someone who’s walked that path before you.

Learn from and get inspired by the great artists of the past.

Read about successful artists you admire, adopt their tips, tricks and attitude and apply it to your career.

Imagine diving into a well of knowledge and powerful insights.

What could you achieve?

The answer is anything you can imagine.

Every single artist can put an end to their struggles.

Why don’t you start now? Even a small change can have a HUGE impact.