The Art of Not Finishing

What Unfinished Work Can Teach Us

In a recent reflection on creativity, curator Elizabeth Markevitch wrote:

“Every artist leaves a trail behind. A corner of the studio filled with half-done sketches, torn paper, dried clay a map of unfinished thoughts… Scraps are where art refuses to end.”

Markevitch’s observation captures something profound about the creative process, that what remains incomplete is not waste, but evidence of life in motion. Her words invite us to look again at the forgotten corners of the studio and, perhaps, the forgotten corners of ourselves.

From the studio to the self

In art therapy, unfinished work holds a particular kind of intelligence. These fragments of half-painted canvases, collages abandoned mid-arrangement, journals that stop halfway through a page can reveal where energy met resistance, the pause itself becomes meaningful.

Markevitch reminds us that creativity is not a straight line but a spiral; it circles back, hesitates, re-enters. The same is true of personal growth. We move forward, stall, and return to old material with new eyes. In this sense, unfinished art mirrors the psyche: an ongoing conversation rather than a completed statement.

Scraps as “proof of searching”

As Markevitch highlights art history is full of examples of artists who valued what was left unresolved. Leonardo da Vinci’s notebooks reveal that the margins, not the masterpieces, often contained his greatest insights. Agnes Martin called her uncompleted paintings “proof of searching.” Louise Nevelson built entire sculptures from leftover pieces of wood, naming them “the bones of time.”

These gestures recognise that the creative act doesn’t end when the brush is set down. The fragment itself becomes a document of inquiry a trace of thinking and feeling. In therapy, this same recognition helps clients to soften self-judgement. An artwork left mid-way isn’t a failure; it’s a record of process, of curiosity meeting uncertainty.

Therapeutic meaning of incompleteness

Perfectionism often drives both artists and clients to measure value by completion. Yet the unfinished work offers a gentler narrative. It reminds us that healing, like art-making, rarely resolves in a single session or a single image. Sometimes, progress means simply tolerating what is unresolved.

When clients revisit unfinished art or ideas in therapy, they often notice shifts in how they relate to the concept. What once felt stuck may now feel complete in its own right. Or it might invite new marks, a small continuation that symbolises re-engagement with a once-abandoned part of the self. Either outcome is meaningful; both honour the process rather than the product.

Returning as integration

Markevitch writes that “scraps are where art refuses to end.” In therapy, we could say that these scraps are where self-understanding begins. To return to them to look again at what was set aside is to integrate earlier experience with present awareness. Each act of return acknowledges that the story is still unfolding.

The unfinished self

Perhaps our unfinished artworks are reflections of an unfinished self not a deficiency, but a truth of being human. The psyche, like the studio, is filled with drafts and fragments. Wholeness comes not from erasing them, but from accepting that incompleteness is part of growth. In the language of Gestalt therapy, the “scraps” of the studio might be seen as externalised echoes of our internal “unfinished business.”

Maybe the mark of an artist and of a person isn’t how much is completed, but how openly we can stay with what is still alive in us.

Reflective prompts

If you’d like to explore this idea in your own creative or reflective practice:

• Return to a fragment. Choose an artwork or idea you left unfinished. Spend a few minutes simply observing it. What draws your attention now?

• Notice the pause. What was happening when you stopped? Emotionally, practically, or relationally what interrupted the flow?

• Respond, don’t repair. If you feel inclined to add to it, do so with curiosity rather than correction. What might your present self want to say to the person who first made those marks?