Hello again you lovely people! Since there seemed to be somewhat positive reaction to my last go at this, I'll be trying to provide some (hopefully useful) insight into various things regarding art from time to time. This time around I'll be tackling critique. Since this topic tends to be a rather touchy subject for quite a few people, I'll be splitting it in two: this thread will deal with giving critique, while the next will give with taking critique. With that out of the way, here we go!

Critique--or constructive criticism--is a process by which you, as either an artist or the audience for an artwork, can provide feedback in order for the art's creator to either make changes to the work or better realize their future projects. I'm aware that there tend to be a lot of negative connotations associated with this process, and that's why it's important to mention that critique is meant to be objective feedback. Value judgments, while useful in their own way, do not count as critique. When you are critiquing an artist or their work, you should not be doing it with the intention to harm--it kinda defies the purpose of providing constructive feedback. Set a clear line between objective criticism and value-based judgments, i.e., 'The eye is tilted in the wrong direction' versus 'I think she should have longer eyelashes'. Once that line is established, make sure both you and the artists are aware of the differences, even if that means prefacing a statement with a warning about whether or not it's a value judgment.
When engaging in critique, there are a few steps you should take in order to ensure that your critique will benefit the individual(s) in question.

1: Ensure critique is desired. This is something I need to pay more attention to myself, but you should always make sure beforehand that the artist responsible for the work you will be critiquing is either open to critique or has requested critique. Don’t assume that an artist wishes to hear critique—this can lead to bad times for all parties involved. <_<

2: Establish that your critique is impersonal. While it should be tailored to be beneficial to the person in question, be sure to keep in mind that you are meant to be providing objective and valuable feedback. You are not making personal assessments of the artist or their work. While you cannot control whether or not an artist will take your critique personally, you can ensure that you use fairly neutral language to avoid your words being misconstrued.

3: Alongside the second point, avoid negative language. While it should go without saying, please don’t be an asshole when providing critique. If something in a particular work or regarding an artist’s style is in need of work, you needn’t roast the artist or their work over a fire. One rule I often see used is ‘Mention one positive thing for every negative.’ I wouldn’t call this necessary, but if you’re inexperienced with giving critique, it can be a nice rule of thumb to avoid appearing hostile. Remember, your criticism is there to build the artist up and help them improve, not tear them down. While this doesn't mean you should avoid mentioning issues in favor of preserving their ego, it is a great deal more detrimental to them if you avoid giving serious critique to avoid stepping on toes.

If there’s any additional information you figure I should add to this, feel free to let me know! I’ll hopefully be adding another thread on receiving critique at a later date.

The biggest issue I usually see with critique being given on the internet is that it is given mostly very lazily and by people who have very little idea what they are actually talking about.

The best thing to do before giving critique is to learn yourself some art terminology. And no I don't mean bullshitting and pretending like you know because believe me when I say that the people who formally understand the terms will spot the difference.

The most important terms are the technical ones that will refer to specifically to techniques or elements of a drawing. The "building blocks" as it were. While the more airy ones that define the nature of art and different art styles are optional, it can still surprisingly enhance your ability to talk about art and critique it if you understand the differences between things like "abstract" vs "conceptual" or "non-representational."

And yes, contrary to what most non-artists tend to think about these terms, they do really mean real things and have specific definitions. Some are just very often misused accidentally or intentionally by people who become very confused when they find themselves stumbling into an art museum.

Art terminology is not, nor has it been for some time, a necessary requirement for someone to provide critique. Using this as a qualifier for people to critique you has less to do with their critique not being valid and more to do with you trying to dismiss that critique due to it not meshing with how you view your own work. They can be helpful if both parties are aware of what the terms mean, but they are hardly a necessity.

Narrowing the pool of people who can critique your work based on how large or small their artistic vocabulary is an arbitrary and rather silly way of excluding your work from being critiqued by people whose opinions are no more or less valid due to that smaller artistic vocabulary. Not only that, it's fairly wrong to assume the artists themselves will be aware of the actual definitions for various forms of artistic vocabulary, so you are hedging your bets on both of these people hopefully knowing some very specific (and, again, unnecessary) terms. If you are unable to describe your thoughts or ideas without using those terms, that says more about you than it does about the artistic illiteracy of the person you're talking to.

Believe what you want I guess.

I've never found anyone who can't speak the nomenclature that can give effective critique. Basically the difference is between someone who can say what they don't like about it (which is literally anyone who can breath) versus someone who can actually explain how to fix it (formally informed people or trained artists.)

Well, This was recently posted on the kerbal space program blog,
Another good insight on how to give critique.
Credit goes to KasperVld for this great post.

Yyunko said:
Well, This was recently posted on the kerbal space program blog,
Another good insight on how to give critique.
Credit goes to KasperVld for this great post.

That was a great read, thanks for sharing it! o/