This chapter was very informative about how the fear of others’ opinions can affect the art making process. Many great ideas are lost and abandoned because of small comments here and there made by others which I find really stupid because one person’s opinion doesn’t define an artist’s worth. It is as important for an artist to learn how to deal with other people’s comments as learning how to do their artwork. The author touched upon this a bit but I believe different people should have different strategies of coping and preparing for the criticism they will inevitably face that work best for them. I think that giving yourself the time to mentally prepare and fully finish your piece like Andrew Wyeth’s example is a good way to learn how to accept your work and be confident about it so that your artwork is not affected by it. I personally find that this is a good method to overcome criticism and be less self conscious about your work.
It’s scary how much control the audience has on someone’s self worth and art making process. The examples given in the chapter show how cruel people can be sometimes and I’m not going to lie if I were performing a piano piece and got a zero on a scale of 0-100 because the person thought I could not play, I would give up playing the piano in a heartbeat. When it comes to art, criticism can either make you or break you, so it is important to learn how to embrace it and deal with it without having it affect your work because we live in a cruel world and apart from your close family and friends no one is going to go out of their way to be nice to you or sugarcoat their comments.
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