Weekly Challenge

I really miss the weekly challenge. It was a great source of inspiration and test of my abilities. A week was a perfect amount of time to work on the challenge without becoming frustrated or bored. If I was successful I could post a painting and if I failed I could quickly move on to the next challenge, knowing a similar challenge would come up again sometime in the future. It also provided an extended platform to interact with more artists and perspective buyers. As a student of art I miss the dynamic aspect of the weekly challenge, and wondered if it was just me or does anyone else miss it as well.

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I too miss the weekly challenges. I teach and paint in my studio daily. These weekly challenges got me to think and approach different subject matters which I might not otherwise do. One of the things I loved about DPW. is the encouragement to paint daily (thus the name), and I know that not all artists can paint daily, but the weekly challenges were something I looked forward to it helped to keep me motivated as I didn’t want to miss out on the challenge. I know that time is precious. But coming up with an idea for each week seems doable to me as I do it every week for my students. Wish they would re-think and put it back. Just my humble opinion

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I still see a challenge called the Dog Days of Summer. Is this to be the last one?

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No, they are now monthly instead of weekly.

I imagine they might consider making them weekly again if someone offered to come up with the weekly idea and image.

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I had fun coming up with challenge ideas.
Compromise… How about bi-weekly?

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I too am disappointed and want to see it as a weekly challenge again.

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Advantages for the Challenges being monthly are:
It may (probably does) lead to more people viewing the Challenges and seeing new artists.
It has to be easier for Carol,
It’s much easier to find 12 people who would like to offer an idea for a challenge than 52.
It has to save David some time too!

Would going back and doing a Challenge from the past fill the need? Or doing 2 entries each month?
How about doing Leslie Saeta’s ‘30 Paintings in 30 Days’? I think that’s offered twice yearly.

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Twice a month for the challenges would be better than once a month. I think there is a saturation of images of one type for a challenge and people might skip over good art simply because they have seen enough dog or mountains photos on the daily views over a period of time. Also, people might upload their images towards the end of a challenge to get their image near the top of the list. That happens with the monthly art contest.

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I also love weekly challenges, and I don’t think it’s a problem to come up with an idea for a challenge. Let’s look around the kitchen and paint a piece that has a fork (a spoon, a knife, a kettle, a ribbon, a can opener, scissors etc) included. Look in the fridge: why it should always be pears or apples? Let’s paint a cabbage (any kind!), eggplants (aren’t they beautiful?), radishes, zucchini, onions, garlic! Also, think about a portrait of an old chair (or not so old), a door, a window, a staircase, a bookshelf! Think animals: we already painted dogs, cats, rabbits, even bears and elephants, but there are many more: frogs, beetles, giraffes, parrots, crows - well, go to the nearest zoo for more ideas. Flowers: except for roses and sunflowers there are lilies, daisies, and even thistle! Let’s peek into our purses and paint keys, a wallet, make-up, a hairbrush, a comb, lip balm, sunglasses etc. More complicated challenges: lets’ paint wind, rain, heat, or try to express worry, joy, sadness, excitement through our paintings. About a year ago I tried to come up with a challenge and realized that the most difficult part for me is to find a nice photo reference. I usually paint from life or use my own photos, but I’m a hopeless photographer, and my pictures won’t work for anyone but me: I can use them because apart from a mediocre photo in front of me I remember the light, the sounds, the smell of the place, and that helps a lot, but I doubt my photo can inspire anyone else. I tried searching Pixabay, but as I said - it’s really hard to find a photo one would want to use as a reference. On the other hand, do we really need a photo for every challenge? I just checked out the last few challenges and realized that usually no more than 2-3 pieces are done using the picture attached to the challenge (and sometimes this number is zero). So, could a challenge without a reference be an option? If so, we could start a special thread on this forum, where ideas for the challenges could be posted (and we could even play democracy and vote for the challenge ideas using likes). Then the only thing Carol would need to do is to pick one of the ideas and post it as a next challenge. So, what do you think?

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Agreed too… the wait for the monthly challenge is so Long. Weekly will be good…

Here’s an idea…it’s just a suggestion.

It would be nice to have the ability to do any of the challenges throughout the years, and have it displayed at the top as the current challenge so it can be seen by all - it could even be tagged with the name of the challenge it came from. Of course this would need a bit of back-end programming, but it would free up Carol and others from having to come up with new ideas every month (or weekly, if that was desired). And of course new challenges could be added from time to time as well.

This idea could encourage artists to be more prolific, as they get to choose what they paint. I know that the challenges are meant to be a challenge, but to be honest some challenges just don’t inspire you as much as you would like. Being able to pick your challenge is especially good if you have little time to paint and want to build up your ‘good painting’ count.

Me too. I re-joined just be because of the weekly challenge. Maybe a monthly challenge could take its. place.