/ic/ - Artwork/Critique

I only care about drawing from imagination. I think using references while drawing defeats the whole purpose of drawing. I don't understand why people sit around and congratulate artists on here for drawing something that looks 90% similar to another drawing.

What are you really teaching yourself? The perspective, foreshortening, pose, gesture, angles, this was all made available to you. It's like being handed an exam with 90% of the answers filled in. What kind of exam is that?

I just don't get it. I think about art in a totally perpendicular way. Again, artists that do this to make money, I understand. What I don't understand is the idea you have to do this in order to progress as an artist, do people not see this as a crutch?

Sometimes I even feel frustrated with myself when I complete a drawing and realize it's eerily similar to a photo/image I've already seen. I want to create new works of art, at least as new as I am able to generate.