Restarting My Art Career

If you have been following along, you know I've had a very limited online presence since last November. Around that time I let a comment about my art question my entire career. One comment. Questioning my lifelong dream.

Are you wondering what was so awful that made me feel like years of my life were wasted? What horrible, terrible thing could have possibly been said? One word. One small word. "Boring."

I want to be this badass, confidant, artist that cares little about the opinion of others. But this comment was not said with anger, jealousy, or envy. This was genuine. And it came from someone high up within the representational art world.

I had a decision to make. Brush off the comment and continue down the road I was on, or, think very carefully about why I was referred to as "boring." I started thinking.

I ended up having a lot of time to think.

I won't go into all the negative emotions I went through. Like I said before, I'm not looking for sympathy. I'm writing this because someone else is out there questioning their creative path. I want them to know they are not alone.

This is how I worked it out.

I put all my paintings in one room and sat in front of them. Eight years ago I didn't think I would have been able to achieve this level of realism. And there they were, still lives, portraits, all looking like photographs.

Ok, there is nothing wrong with realism, or photo-realism. But I started to ask myself if these works were reflective of who I am, what I see AND feel. And the most difficult question of all: If I were an art collector, would I buy any of these paintings?

This post is me baring my soul. This is me going against everything I have come to learn about how to present myself in public. "Fake it until you make it." "Smile through the pain." "Never let them see you sweat."

I'm doing things my way now.

Instead of giving up, or continuing to make work that feels "safe" and worrying about whether or not my work will appeal to a large number of people, I'm starting over. I'm rebuilding my art career from the ground up. And from here forward I will no longer worry about looking arrogant or self-important. From now on, I do what I want.

Art is hard. Art is lonely. Art is life. Art is my life.

If it is your life too, keep going.