I make art because I like to. Because it provides me with the outlet needed to convey my thoughts, ideas, emotions, opinions, views, suggestions, and feelings into a visual medium. You, as a reader, don’t know this, but I literally just sat here for 5 minutes between the start of this sentence and the end of the last before I even typed a letter. It could be as simple as, “…because I like to,” but often enough it is more than that, deeper than that. Unfortunately, because I’m not wealthy, I’d be making a Hell of a lot more art if I were (and had more time… and a few assistants).
I am an only child. I never had any brothers or sisters to occupy my time like my friends did. So, I would have to amuse myself. My dad used to draw; portraits and Disney characters mostly. I would look through his sketch books constantly (even coloring in one of his dragons). He was my idol. I wanted to draw like the great master he was in my mind. I started out by drawing flies and bunny rabbits in Sunday school, but my aspirations were larger than that; I wanted to draw He-Man and G.I. Joe! My dad worked 2nd shift at the mill and I would set out these action figures every night for him to draw. In the morning when I’d wake up, it was like Christmas. There would be the figure and on a sheet of paper would be the best rendering of it in the world! I’d take that drawing to school with me and try and copy it all day long. Eventually I got better… and better. My friends saw this too and were always praising my drawing ability. It just reinforced everything. From then on, I always wanted to do something that involved art (mostly a comic book artist).
Years went by and I went to college. Without any (or enough) knowledge of Art History, I saw my first Picasso’s and first Van Gogh’s. Believe me, I wasn’t impressed at the time. I wanted that raw and shocking art. As a Freshman in college I was more interested and familiar with Damien Hirst than I was with the old masters. This is important to my development. I quickly discarded the idea of being a comic book artist and now wanted to take the New York art scene by storm with my conceptual paintings and (at the time) heavy ideas. But as we artists know, you’re never done growing as an artist and the new work is always your best.
I eventually went to grad school. I was lost. A big fish from a small pond, now a big fish in a large ocean. My work changed again. My viewpoint changed again. My thinking changed again. You cannot stop these changes. You may try and may resist, but they will eat you alive eventually. My mind was open to more possibilities than I could fathom. It’s one of the most scariest, but awesome times when this happens.
Here I am now, holding about 4 part-time jobs down, being a husband, now a new father to a beautiful 5 month old daughter, and somehow still finding those small windows of time to make art (that doesn’t include all the work to promote and show it).
I make art because I like to. Because I don’t give myself the choice not to. Because by now, it’s impulsory (if that’s even a word). This is why I make art. And this doesn’t even touch on the question, “Why do you make the type of art you make?” Now, that’s something to be continued in the next blog.
