If I’m learning piano for the first time, how long should it take to make something that sounds like music? I could spend several months learning scales, correct posture, hand and finger independence, and music theory so I have the building blocks for making something that sounds like music, but all that won’t sound like music. Or, I can learn a chord progression and use my voice to add a melody so that, within a couple of days, I’m making music.
Even outside of art, this holds true. When we learn to drive, we don’t sit in a simulator and learn the building blocks of driving like hazard perception, gear changing, mirror/head checking etc, we just get in and start driving. Albeit, we drive slowly, and with someone in the passenger seat, but we use real roads, real traffic, and a real car; we learn fastest by trying the real thing.
Same goes for making visual art.
For years, I can sit around and read about art history, pigments and chemistry, properties of different brushes and papers, and I can watch endless video demonstrations. Or, I can pick up a brush, put some paint on it, and make some marks.
This isn’t to say that all theory and fundamental skills are useless, but that the motivation to develop those skills and delve into the theory often comes from making something that sounds like music, that looks like a drawing, as quickly as possible.