Lemme Tell You About This Painting That Made Me Cry

In today’s Artist Talk, it’s time for a throwback. I did some weird-ass youtube videos on this a long while back but we gone talk about it again here.

I woke up one morning and in my pool of random first thoughts, this one painting came up. It was a piece that I did several years ago at a figure painting workshop hosted by the prestigious Studio Incamminati in Philadelphia. Back when I was a young pup (my early-20s) beginning to define my artistic direction, my goal was to excel in contemporary realist figure painting. If you can believe it. Looking back on it now, this might have been the piece that made me reconsider that path, because that was probably the most difficult experience I’ve ever had in a classroom environment. I don’t find myself getting frustrated too easily, but this shit made me cry after class for 2 nights in a row.

There were a few things that came together about this piece that broke me down. First, the Anders Zorn palette. It’s a very limited color palette using only yellow ochre, ivory black, cadmium red and titanium white…Yeahhh just go ‘head and remove both my arms and my eyeballs.

Though on the one hand, I appreciated the challenge that it presented to me at the time, I cringe every time I think about it. It felt like very little room for expression at all. Second, because this style of painting requires exceptional observational skills and execution, a lot is expected from the students. The instructors are highly accomplished professionals and I could tell that they were trying to push me to the next level. BUT, that nudging, through no fault of their own, is also what made me feel like shit because I just could not get it “right” despite how much they were trying to help me. No matter what I thought I was doing the painting was still…off. It bothered me to no end! My hands were just not painting what I was seeing and I became so, so defeated. And I cried. Pitifully. Right into my Tommy DiNic’s roast pork sandwich, for 2 nights in a row.

“Face: terrible
Proportions: weird
Shadows: harsh
Color: blah”

— My Personal Report Card

In hindsight, I’m more okay with how it turned out than I used to be. I understand that it was only for practice. There are some successful areas, and there are some some parts I wish I could’ve done better. Ultimately, I chose to view it as a tough lesson in going easier on myself when it comes to participating in these workshops. It was also a pivotal moment in my development because this was the last project before becoming inspired to move into the style in which I paint to this day. So at least SOMEthing really good came out of this particular struggle. Allegedly.

It Feels Like I'm Still Taking L's with My Art

Making and sharing art has been going so much slower than I expected.

Thankfully I can share that I finished the painting shown above for my Fine Art Memes series, but getting to that point took several weeks. I’m challenged with facing the fact that this is how I work now. And it suuuuucks. When my life had more freedom it was no problem. I could easily make at least 5-10 decent pieces in a year, even if I didn’t love them or sell them. These days I’m lucky if I can get 3 pieces completed, regardless of the quality. Creating the “Crying Jordan” painting was a little bit of a roller coaster. I went into it with so much confidence and excitement, but that shit was way harder than I thought it would be! By the time I finished, I found myself connecting with the image, crying on the inside. I thought: “It took me so long to get this done, how can I sustain any sort of art career? If I start posting work again out of nowhere, will it even matter? Maybe I should get a bunch of work done before I start sharing so I won’t have such a big gap next time. But will that matter if I take months in-between completing a piece every time?”

So many questions leading me to gray areas, which then lead me to feeling like I’m stuck all over again even though I’m taking steps forward. Taking L’s left and right. The way that I progressed through this piece mirrored how I’ve been progressing through this year in general. Wide eyed optimism at the beginning of the year, devolving into a Kanye shrug. I would like to revel in the act of finishing something, AND liking the results, but it’s hard to get away from feeling bad about the drastic change of pacing in how I work. Another act of letting go perhaps? I mean, at one point I wasn’t making anything and wasn’t sure if I ever would again. Many people would say that something is still better than nothing in this case. I don’t know.

At any rate, not sure how this turned so emo, I only wanted to share that I made some progress and painted something. At the same time I’m kind of annoyed with myself because I went from being stuck to being SLOW and that wasn’t in the plans at all. On top of all the other adjustments I’ve had to make in my life, all of this is yet another change that I have to deal with and I’m blown. I’ve been going through this in my creative life for the last 4 years now. I’m tired of this shit.

What's New: 2021

Things in my world have been on a wheel of constant change and adaptation, more than I’ve had to handle in years. To be thrown off-track since last year is one of the most common feelings that we are all sharing right now, so I know that my situation isn’t special at all but: what the hell? There’s been so much to navigate, and unfortunately my motivation to create got lost in the shuffle. When I finally did make some new work towards the last part of 2020 and gained momentum with it, another change in my life caused me to lose my workspace. Thankfully it’s only temporary because in the next week or two I will have an art studio again, but the change set me back for months, unable to make any creative work at all. The good thing is that it has allowed me some time to figure out what’s still important to me and what I want to change or improve upon moving forward. A…REBRAND perhaps??

I think that the ideas and the plans that I thought that I was going to execute last year ended up being deferred to this year. Again, nothing unusual for most people out here. Do we dare to have any enthusiasm this year? Sheeit, at this point, why not? A lot of us are already used to making the best of crappy situations by now so, might as well try to push it further and have some fun. Safely, of course. For me, that looks like all new everything. New workspace, new artwork, new videos, new skills, and best of all: a new attitude.

As I mentioned earlier, being unable to do work for a while and going silent online allowed me time to sort some stuff out about what I want to do once I’m able to get back to creative work. This year I want to be able to have fun with making art and sharing art. “Fun” is a component that was lost to me a few years ago, and I’ve realized how important it is for me to have in order for me to be creative and feel positive about what I’m doing. That being said, I’ve decided to do a better job of focusing on myself rather than comparing my work and my numbers to other artists out there. I also want to try to do things that invite more interaction with my audience. Engaging with the people was something that I realized is a big part of what makes creativity fun for me. So I plan to make some content that will hopefully bring more people to participate in what I’m doing. I have to say that it feels good to start getting reorganized, teaching myself some new things, and having a refreshed mindset toward my art life. Looking forward to posting more frequently here as well!

How have you been dealing with the start of a new year? Are you optimistic or scared?