Learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist.

The line expresses a common artistic principle: mastery of technique and tradition is not opposed to innovation but is often its precondition. “Rules” stand for the accumulated knowledge of craft—drawing, composition, perspective, and the conventions of a medium. To “learn [them] like a pro” suggests disciplined study and competence; to “break them like an artist” suggests purposeful deviation that produces expressive or original results rather than mere error. The aphorism also implies that rule-breaking gains legitimacy and communicative power when it is informed—when the creator understands what is being violated and why.