The number of hours you have to spend mastering any art of the hand (drawing, et

The number of hours you have to spend mastering any art of the hand (drawing, etching, painting, sculpture) is daunting. Which is why it matters so much that you start before age 10 or so. Then by the time you’re 18 or 20 you have enough manual skill to produce something that requires thoughtful design.

This is really the reason that I didn’t go into the arts. I was happy with drawing (black and white), but I couldn’t imagine a life that ‘isolated’ (what some craftsmen consider relaxing). And worse, at the time, the art world was still engaged in the last throws of pop/minimalism.

I was far more interested in the history of art, and the theory of art, than I was in the construction of it.