How to Appraise a Painting / Drawing

An important part of the creative process is to stop painting and appraise your artwork.

Anna uses the work 'appraise' rather than 'critique' as it feels much friendlier and more constructive - see her blog post on this here.

As a minimum, you should aim to do this at various points during the process of making a painting (or drawing / other media artwork), such as when you’re returning to it after a break, as well as when you think it’s finished.

Even better than this is to also ask other creatives to appraise your work and share feedback with you on what they see when they look at it. You can learn a great deal from other peoples’ feedback.

If you really want to accelerate your learning, it’s also very helpful to appraise the artwork of others. This practice strengthens your own creative eye whilst helping out other members who would like your input on their work.

When you're uploading your artwork to Nature Studio, you can request to receive feedback from the community by ticking the box and adding a comment when you upload it.

If you request feedback, your upload will appear with a green flag in the corner when it appears in any galleries. This will help other members to see that you're asking for help.

Below we’ll look at the process for appraising a realistic painting. (Some of these can also be applied to appraising realistic drawings and looser style paintings).

1) Things to remember before you start:

• To appraise a painting well, we need to identify what is working, as well as what needs doing differently.
• We need to provide a balance of this feedback, with the balance tipped a little in the favour of the positives. We’re all motivated by praise and encouragement.  Remember the “sh*t sandwich” analogy with the constructive feedback sandwiched between two positives.
• If it’s your own painting: get some distance, both physical distance by looking at the work from further away, and allow some time to pass if you’re still working on it or have recently finished. You need fresh eyes for this exercise.
• Avoid using generalisations and keep the appraisal really specific to the piece of work you’re appraising.

Here’s a list of what Anna considers hen appraising paintings completed in her realistic style, but the key thing is to focus only on the main things that jump out at you about a painting: as you get better at appraising, these will become more obvious.

Overall look

• Does the painting look finished?
• Is there ‘unity’ in the painting, does everything tie together well?
• Does the composition work? Does it fit well on the page?
• Does the whole painting ‘pop’ off the paper?
• Where is your eye drawn to?

Subject representation

• Is the subject easily recognisable?
• Does the subject look true to life?
• Does the subject look three-dimensional?
• Do the colours look believable?
• Are the colours vibrant?

Values

• Does the painting use a range of tonal values to create contrast?
• Do the values used provide depth?
• Are there highlights to represent the light and show form?
• Are the dark areas dark enough?
• Do the midtones unite the light and dark values well?

Brush technique

• Have realistic visual textures been achieved?
• Are the brushstrokes ‘painterly’ and identifiable as brushstrokes, or hidden to create a realistic look?
• How neat and crisp are the subject’s edges?
• Are any straight lines straight enough?
• Has a light touch been used to capture detail where it’s needed?

Always remember the ‘praise’ in appraise!

If you strike the right balance, appraising your own art and the artwork of others will lead to improvement and the satisfaction and further motivation that comes with that. 

So, why not make some time this week to appraise your own work, ask for feedback from others, and offer a few words to another member who'd appreciate some input.