Storytelling in art is important and it is very impactful. Why? How can storytelling improve art? In this post, I share with you 12 hands-on tips how you can incorporate stories in your art. The tips are simple and easy to follow for everyone – so even if you are a beginning artist, you can start off telling a visual story right away!
Not only writers can tell stories, visual artists may do so, too. While writers use words to convey their story, artists can tell stories through their visual artwork.
The difference is not even that big. When looking at a visual piece of art, you can find many elements of a written story, such as characters, setting, plot, and dialog.
However, a visual work has the potential to grasp the viewer’s interest in a single glance. A book is hardly able to captivate the reader in a single line.
This is how storytelling can improve art.
I love telling stories through my art ever since I started out to be an artist. In this post, I am sharing my approach to storytelling in art. If you have never tried to tell a story with your art, you can follow these steps and also become a visual storyteller if you enjoy the process.
If you already have experience with storytelling through visual artwork, you may catch up new inspiration and share your techniques and thoughts with me in the comments!
Let’s dive in!
Why is storytelling in art important?
First of all, why is storytelling in art important? Well, there are two main reasons:
Reason #1 is that storytelling allows you to forge connections with your audience. People love to hear – and see – stories. We are being told stories ever since we were children, and as kids we all loved to look at stories in picture books!
Storytelling is an innate part of humanity. People cannot live without art, and they cannot live without stories. That’s why people are more inclined to like your work if you tell a story through your art they can relate to.
Reason #2 is that storytelling is the best way of organic marketing you can do to showcase and sell your art.
A lot of times, people don’t develop interest in an artwork because of the reputation of the artist or because of what critics say about it. No. They become attracted to an artwork because it appeals to their emotions and because they can connect with the message the artist wants to convey.
Therefore, if you take the time to speak about the meaning behind your pieces, offer glimpses into your creative process and let people know what inspired you to create a specific artwork, you are much more likely to win an interested audience that supports your work.
If you want to get an idea of how you can speak about your art, you can have a look at ‘The Making Of’ section on my website where I show timelapse videos and WiPs of my surreal artwork and explain the symbolism I use to put across a certain message.
What is the impact of storytelling?
Storytelling is so powerful because it enables us humans to bond with each other. It’s a great way to express our emotions. We can share our experiences – whether good or bad – and build deeper relationships.
Listening to each other’s stories helps us develop compassion, trust, and mental and emotional confidence. Plus, stories are way easier to remember than simple facts!
As an artist, you can use the impact of storytelling to raise awareness of what’s going on in your personal life, in your community, or in society in general. You can depict the lives of people around you in your artwork, level criticism against unfavorable conditions or the establishment – like the early lowbrow artists used to do.
On that note, storytelling can improve your art in a way that it inspires people to see the world with different eyes and bring about change.
How can storytelling improve art?
Being an artist was never a childhood dream of mine. However, when I happened to start out creating digital art, I was never just about ‘making pictures’. I’ve always wanted to make art that has a meaning.
Making art just for the sake of having an ‘image’ at the end always bored me. My desire has always been to put a part of myself into my art (which I literally do!) and to express myself through my art.
There is no single one-size-fits-all method to how storytelling can improve art. After all, many roads lead to Rome and every artist might have their own way of telling a story through their art!
However, if you are new to storytelling through artwork, there is a certain basic structure you can follow to incorporate stories into your work as well.
In the following, I am happy to share my approach to tell stories with my art. With the following 12 tips, I walk you through my process and hope to inspire you to create exciting pieces that tell a story, too.
Let’s go!
12 Hands-on tips on how storytelling can improve art
1. Think of a story to tell.
First off, you need to decide on a story to tell. This can be an experience you had, an emotion you felt, some difficulty you went through, or anything that is going on in your life or community.
Think of the setting your story will have, what the overall mood will be like, and how you want to convey it in your artwork. How do you want to visually express the feeling, event, or experience you are planning to depict in your work?
You can already gather some reference photos at this point in time, make some sketches, or take some photos of yourself for to help you figure out what pose might be best to get your message across.
With my surreal artwork ‘oblivion.’, my wish was to express my experiences with people being oblivious of what’s going on around them. To learn more about my thought process and see how I created this piece step-by-step, check out The Making of ‘oblivion.’ here.
2. Decide on your main character.
Obviously, your main character (or characters) is the essential part of your story. What do you want your main character to be like? Paint a vivid picture of your main character in your mind and try to think of as many details as possible.
What is the age of your character? What gender? What do they look like? What about their personality? Where do they live? What do they do in their life? What do they like and what not? What are their strengths and weaknesses?
The clearer a picture of your character you have in your mind, the easier it will be to realize your idea on the digital or traditional canvas!
3. Rough out the character’s pose and features.
Your character’s pose and features are key to convey the story you want to tell through your art. Especially the facial expression and body posture of your character are essential to let the viewer know how they are feeling. Are they happy, joyful, satisfied, …? Or are they going through pain, hardship, and struggles? Their face will show it!
If you find it hard to imagine what their face will look like, you can try and step into their shoes. Adopt the feeling you want your main character to convey in your artwork and look in the mirror. What would your face look like when you are feeling that way? How would you hold your arms? Would your body be upright or bent?
Other things to consider are the clothing of your character and other equipment. For example, is your character holding something in their hand that helps tell the story? Or is your character maybe looking at something?
Even if only half of the face is showing – like here in ‘Naufragée‘ (French for castaway) – the facial features and the position of the arms are essential to tell the story you want to tell through a visual artwork. Find out more about the meaning of this piece in The Making of ‘Naufragée’ here.
4. Work out the setting.
You don’t need to plan out the entire surroundings of your character at the very beginning, but it’s important to at least have an idea of what kind of setting you want to use.
What kind of environment do you want to have? Is it inside of a house or out there in nature? If indoors, then more specifically, what room is it? A bedroom, a living room, a balcony? If it’s outdoors, then what kind of landscape is it? A forest, a lake, or a fantasy scape?
Keep in mind that the setting will help you tell the story. Therefore, it can be a good idea to roughly place all the elements you want to use on separate layers in Photoshop or other digital art software you are using, and then move them around to see where they look best.
5. Elaborate the clothing.
The clothes a character wears are very important because they help the viewer understand the story.
The garments tell a lot about the character and the setting. For example, they let the viewer know – along with the background – what time period your story plays in. Is it a modern story or from an earlier period of time?
Even if you create fantasy art, the costume you choose needs to match the overall theme and helps you get your story across!
The background with the two pillars, the chandelier, the marble floor as well as the long, floating clothes, corset, hat, and hairstyle of the character in ‘Teatime‘ inform the viewer that the story takes place in the late baroque 18th century. Learn more about The Making of ‘Teatime’ here.
6. Consider movement of the character.
Having a sense of movement can make your artwork more interesting and incite the viewer to start thinking about what’s going to happen next.
Where is your character going to go next? What is the character going to do next? Are they going to raise their hand? Are they going to move forward? Did they come running into the scene?
Even though you cannot create moving artwork (well, actually nowadays you can), there are ways to imply movement. Negative space is one way to do so.
7. Consider movement in the setting.
Apart from your character moving, there can also be movement in the environment. Wind, for example, will move your character’s clothes and hair.
If you create a fantasy artwork, there might not even be gravity and your character might be floating through the air! All these factors affect the drape of their clothing and hair.
One more thing to note: a character with billowing clothes has more potential to add drama than a character with saggy clothes.
The flowing robes of the lady in ‘Desert Rose‘ imply that there is wind coming from the right-hand side.
8. Refine the character’s expression.
As I already mentioned above, your character’s facial features are arguably the most important element to convey their feelings.
Many art styles tend to exaggerate the features. For example, in the lowbrow style that I like to work with, the faces are doll-like with slightly enlarged eyes. Puckered eyebrows can express worry or fear, while wide eyes and raised brows may express shock or surprise.
Be careful to not pull the features too far into one direction because it will make your character look cartoonish.
But, apart from the face, expression can also be found in other features, such as gestures. A hand lifted up to the chin, for instance, can convey arrogance or thoughtfulness.
9. Learn about the cultural meaning of color.
Colors are culturally associated with different meanings and emotions. To tell a story through your art, you can use those color meanings to emphasize the theme of your story.
That’s why understanding the fundamentals of color theory can help improve storytelling in art.
Rich and vibrant colors like red and purple can convey strong feelings like passion, power, or superiority. Green stands for hope, luck, and confidence, while yellow may imply hazard and even envy in some countries. White is usually linked to peace and purity, while most cultures ascribe black to death and mourning.
10. Use a color key to emphasize emotion.
You can convey feelings with the character’s facial expression, body pose, and gestures, but you can also use color.
Generally speaking, there are three color keys: high-key, low-key, and mid-key. High-key describes a set of colors that range from pure white to mid-tone hues. High-key value art evokes a bright, airy, and happy atmosphere.
Low-key colors, on the other hand, are on the darker end of the scale. Using mainly low-key colors in your artwork creates a more dramatic and moody effect.
11. Add the details.
Details are as important as your main character and the setting. Before you finish your artwork, select the elements that you want to add as details.
You can choose objects, animals, insects, natural elements, and anything you feel that fits your composition. Even if those elements are not human or living beings, they can help create a dialog in your story.
In an artwork everything is possible. That means your character may even communicate with an animal or a lifeless object. All these imaginative interactions can help the viewer understand what’s happening in your story!
12. Create balance in the composition.
Last but not least, you want to make sure that your composition is balanced. A balanced composition puts the main subject into focus and helps the viewer’s eyes move around the creation with ease.
There are different techniques you can use to achieve aesthetically appealing compositions. There are certain principles and elements of design that already the old masters used to create unforgettable artworks. Using these principles, you can also create the illusion of space.
I’ve prepared a little eGuide for you that teaches you all the secrets to achieve outstanding artistic compositions. Simply head over to the Freebie Library and download the ‘Secrets of Good Composition in Art‘ for free!
By the way, if you are just starting out and find all of this stuff too overwhelming, don’t worry. Artists tend to put way too much pressure on themselves trying to make their art perfect. But your art doesn’t have to be perfect; rather you should embrace your mistakes!
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These were my best 12 tips for you how you can improve your art through storytelling! I hope you found my tips useful and are excited about telling your story in a visual piece. I am definitely excited to see your creations. Feel free to tag me on Instagram or reach out to me directly – I’d love to hear from you!
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