How do artists know…
- When a piece is finished
- When and or if their work is valid (or not)
- When the theme or series they are working on is actually working! Useful or otherwise.
- If the doubt they feel when working on a series is relevant to their level of emotional input
- The works completed would meet with peer approval and does that matter?
- Their family and non art friends points are valid or not
- If peer or critic approval is a valid and relevant guide to assessing their works
- They are not just manifesting the work of other Artists they have not yet met or found out about and does it matter
- If they are manifesting the work of another artist because of some subliminal influence, perhaps seeing that artists work years before and is that an issue
- If they should soak up the work of other artists by going to Contemporary Art Galleries, perhaps it will make them feel inadequate somehow… and what if it actually makes them feel good, do they then get despondent because they may not be represented by a gallery or perhaps because they feel in their heart their works are better somehow
- If the methods they use to create the work will hold the test of time and does it matter if they are creating art for art sake…
- When they have an exhibition if it is poorly patronized, does that mean they have failed, or is it the marketing that failed, or the gallery, or they don’t have enough art friends? oh the pain
- If the work/s is/are adding to their own or the wider communities ‘cultural depth’
These and I guess many other questions float in the heads of Artists, I know some of these do in mine. Is it good to have so many doubts floating, so many queries bubbling, so much angst, annoyance and pain. Well I guess it sorts out the ‘wheat from the chaff’ as they say and in the end if you have created works which may have significance to you then others will see the genuine you in the works. Those close to you who know the process will (hopefully) appreciate the ’struggle’ and the life journey Artists are on and be supportive. 
I have long been an advocate for Art Students (and Artists for that matter) doing lots of work and focusing more on quantity than quality (to a degree and depending on what medium they are working in etc.) so they can work fast through issues and not get bogged down in the ‘is it ok’ scenario.
Recently I have been working on a big bunch of paintings and have now accumulated over 40 works in a few months, each one put aside and not looked at as the catalyst for a new work bubbles to the surface and off I go. That one is put away and I move on again, and again.
At one point I counted them up and started to take photographs… nah too hard. Ideally they would be hung and photographed in situ to make the whole thing easier. It’s a ‘catch 22′ how do I show people without the photo’s (the old days of dragging works from gallery to gallery is surely over…)
So as you can see readers my questions posed at the start are a solid part of my reality and if I am not careful I would end up ‘looping’ (not loopy! Well not yet anyway…) this is a process where your brain ways “Yeah go for it, make art” while a short time later “I can’t do this… it’s not valid” and then “Yeah go for it!” and so the cycle continues.
Welcome to the Visual Artists lot in life, a struggle of immense proportions at times.
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