In 2018 I took painting lessons in the hopes that it would help me understand the basics of painting (light/shadow, colour, etc.).

I had previously taken a course at university called “Perceptions, Illusions and Art”, which was about how artists use painting techniques to trick the eye into perceiving properties inherent to binocular vision such as depth, shadow, transparency, etc. on what is in effect a 2d plane (i.e. a canvas).

I was hoping that this course would help me apply some of those techniques as a beginner painter. However I found the lessons to be quite loose and freeform, and not as technical as I had hoped. As a result I didn’t feel that I got too much out of it.


Painting in general is something I find frustrating; it’s not obvious to me why I can observe things in an image but am unable to replicate it on a canvas. I think it’s just practice, but practicing things I’m bad at is a frustrating process.

I will definitely do more painting in future, but right now I feel that I have to be in a particular mood to be able to make progress with it.