How to Organize Your Art Space
Having a designated place to create is necessary, but it also might be impractical. If you’re living in an apartment, if you’re sharing your home with kids and pets, if it’s just too small or you don’t have the money, I get it. Up until exactly two weeks ago, I can say that I’ve spent 59 years on the planet without a designated place to create art. So I’ve broken this down into three sets of tips: 1. Just a little room 2. Mobile, art on the run 3. Dreams come true – you have an art studio!
Just a Little Room Tips:
Organization
It’s not just buying colorful containers at Hobby Lobby. Figure out what you use often, label that container (colorful pens), then put only colorful pens in there. Your black ones are going in a different container. If you’re doing mixed media, you’ve probably got thousands of scrip scraps of paper. Label a container and then maybe put that one in a closet. You might not be able to fit all of your supplies in your “art corner” area. Have a secondary area, under the bed, in the laundry room, etc. for the items you don’t use as often.
Lighting
Get a drafting lamp, they’re small but put off good light so you can work anytime of the night.
Clear space
Whatever surface you have for your art, keep that clear. Don’t let that become a catch all for putting a stack of books, or the mail. Keep your area ready to go for when time and inspiration hits you.
Inspo
Even if it’s a small frame or a corkboard you can hang by your art corner, place inspirational art work up or some of your own. The more I see my own art work when I’m creating the more ideas I get and the less I think I’m a hack. You need to get comfortable seeing your work on the walls or on display.
Visual barrier
If you need a baby/dog gate to block off your area, do it! Or create that retreat with a low bookcase, just make some kind of barrier between you and the “rest of your life” so the art corner and the artist are important!
Value your work
One of the best things that came out of the pandemic was all the art Zoom classes I took. It also gave me a chance to spy on where the students did their artwork. One woman had her desk in front of her living room window. Another woman had a little corner in her apartment with all kinds of eclectic decorations hung on the wall. Another woman was at her dining room table, but surrounded by her work. It was very inspiring to see how working women, retirees, students, parents all treated their areas with reverence. Yes, maybe messy, maybe not esthetically pleasing for the neighbor who drops by, but nonetheless it said “I create and I value that.”
Mobile – Art on the Run Tips:
I feel like this was my entire childhood. Drawing on my bed, using a picture book as a desk. Doodling on the margins of college ruled paper. Using a marker on the inside of my locker. The message I want to send you is that “art” doesn’t know it’s on the run. Art just is waiting for dip in ink, paint, water.
Journals and sketchbooks. I’ve got stacks of them. Some of my best art work is stuck between pages of crushes and annoying bosses – but it’s there. These are effective ways to keep your creative juices flowing, but I would suggest FINISH a sketchbook before you buy a new one. I have so many half-filled sketchbooks. Discipline yourself to finish on from cover to cover. You are, again, “creating and valuing” that, even if it’s on the couch with a pillow in your lap as desk.
Bring a sketchbook to work and even if you sit in your car on a lunch break – draw something.
My biggest tip is don’t give up because you don’t have the space or time. I knew some day I write a novel. I had place to do it and no time (work, raising a family) but I kept jotting down notes that I would someday use in that novel. I shoved them into binders, drawers, notebooks, and when I finally had the time to write, it was waiting for me. Same thing applies to art. It will be there waiting for you to create and value it in a larger way, do what you can with what you’ve got now!
Art Studio! Art Studio! Art Studio! Tips!
Okay, a child moves out and you have a spare bedroom. Or the den becomes all yours. Or, if you’re like me, you have a “shed” that becomes your oasis. It can be very overwhelming when you finally get this opportunity after doing art on the run or in the corner of your kitchen table.
Just do it. Worrying over the exact right furniture or storage will only result in a detail. Trust me, whatever you buy, you are likely to want to change after you’ve been working in your studio.
Put a list together of what you absolutely need. Music? Lighting? Large work areas? Storage?
Think about how you like to work, personally I like to have things where I can see them, so a lot of work area space was important because I like my coffee cups filled with brushes, pencils, and pens where I can see them.
Look into mobile carts like a hairdresser uses. Then you can roll things out of the way.
Let the studio decide what it wants to be. My original idea was vintage bird wallpaper (I know), kind of a hippy vibe, an ode to my grandma, and maybe an Asian art feel for good measure. It ended up with no wallpaper and is far more Zen then I intended. It sort of became what it wanted to be. Now it still looks a bit like a teenager girl was behind the decorating, I’ve got a fairy lights I clip mini-art to and a PotteryBarn Teen bulletin board, but mainly looks like an artist hangs out there.
Are pets hanging out with you? I bought a chair that unfolds into a cot to accommodate my large standard poodle and my cat. Whether it’s a dog bed or a comfy chair, be ready to share you studio with a pet.
I will probably spring for large cabinets with doors in the future, I think that would be better than drawers. So recycle furniture you already have until you’ve been in your studio for awhile.
Any place in your house can be your art studio when you think about it. Turn a dining room into a creative space. If that means you use a folding table in the living room for Thanksgiving, so be it! Send your guests home with your artwork.
I don’t have a clock in the art studio. Not saying that’s a good idea, but it just so happens I haven’t put one in there.
Traveling to your designated studio is neat thing. I enjoy my little walk out the back door to my art studio. I’m traveling somewhere. Think of that if your studio is somewhere in your house, treat it like a destination.