3 years ago, when I was 32 and taking care of my 2 year old son I decided that I am going to become an artist. Ever since then I have been wondering, why am I doing this? What is that strange urge that pushes me to want to paint and nothing else?
Clearly that is a most irrational decision, considering how slim my chances are to ever succeed (as in, ever sell a single painting) and how irresponsible it is for a grownup to do something like that.
I have been pondering with this question for the last 3 years (while also trying to improve my painting and drawing skills). What is it that makes some people choose the path of an artist, considering how unstable it is, how small the chances to succeed are and how childish that sounds?
For me, it has been complicated. I have been wanting to be an artist ever since I discovered it was something people could do. But while I was growing up, it was hard for my parents to get me art classes or send me to an art school and very early in life I developed the idea that I need a real job that would pay the real bills and help me be less of a financial burden on my parents.
So I gave up on art and studied hard at school, trying to excel at math and science (that didn’t go very well) and finally I entered a university to study psychology.
Once I got my Bachelor degree I gave up on it because I just wasn’t interested in it.
I started working in marketing and felt completely miserable. So I gave up on that too and started to self-study design. My reasoning was that since art is now off-limits (I was 21 back then and considered myself too old) I will at least do something related and more financially feasible, which, I figured, design was.
That’s how my constant career struggle started, first I studied interior design and decorating and worked as a 3D modeler for interiors, then I slowly changed from that to graphic design which felt like the sweet spot and I did that for a while. Until my son was born and everything changed.
For some reason (sleep deprived brain?) I thought now was finally the time for me to put everything aside and start painting. After all, 32 didn’t seem as old to me now as 21 one seemed to my 21 year old self, and I thought it’s now or never.
And so, my journey in the world of art has started. I again chose the self-taught route, first because it seems to work well for me and second because I just didn’t have the time and money to invest in an art school.
Luckily the internet is full of useful resources, tutorials and courses where you can learn everything there is to know, at least on the technical skill level, which I was mostly interested in. First I learned to draw realistically, then paint in oils, combining it with constant reading on art history and theory.
Here are some of my paintings from the time when I studied:
My journey so far has been anything but smooth or linear. It is a constant mental struggle, and every day I am on the verge of giving up. Here are some struggles and difficulties, objective and subjective, that I am facing daily.
- I have chosen more of an academic approach to painting. Which is fine on its own, as my goal was to be able to paint people realistically. But the caveat was that once I got on that road, my mindset changed and my goals changed. I developed the feeling that I should not share any work with anyone until it’s academically perfect and started giving a big meaning to things that to be honest nobody really cares about since the 19th century. I have discovered It is easy to get lost in your pursuit for realism and perfection and put yourself in the rigid framework of academic rules. So at some point I found myself in a state where I felt like I can’t continue painting, because I can’t hire models to paint from life and don’t have the space to stretch my own canvas and make my own rabbit skin glue (I’m also very opposed to harming rabbits). Now I am trying to remember why I actually embarked on this journey, that skill is a means to an end, not the goal. I just need enough skill to express what I want. I try to go back to creating the kind of work I want to, not what is deemed academically worthy. Studying art history and being able to put everything in context really helps to find my own place in the flow of art.
- The second big obstacle is actually just life getting in the way. Probably there are some geniuses out there who can create with all kinds of distractions, but to me, every time my son gets sick at daycare and stays home (which is sometimes every other week), or every time I need to be doing some administrative tasks around the home, painting just gets thrown out of the window, and then it is very hard to get back to it. I am still trying to figure out a way to reconcile my life and my art, which seems to be a messy and unending process, requiring lots of flexibility and willingness to change. Probably having a community of like-minded people would help, but being an extreme introvert and a parent with very little time I never got to reaching out to people or visiting physical workshops or art meetups.
- Another obstacle is that I am not immune to looking around and comparing myself to others. Seeing people around me having successful careers, even if initially that wasn’t their dream job, while I am here, pursuing my dreams, kind of makes me question if my life took a couple of wrong turns along the way. On a good day, I feel like it doesn’t matter and as long as my family and I are happy, everything is good, but on most days I wonder if I am just being extremely childish and selfish.
- More subjective obstacles are thoughts like I am a stay at home mom pursuing my creativity, I mean, can you be more cliche than that? And there are art critics out there who believe painting is dead, so why do I even bother? And of course being a female artist, and a self-taught one at that, feels like a recipe for disaster. And don’t even get me started on AI, like I’ve been struggling with following my dream for 20 years, and now that I’m actually doing it you’re telling me some machine is going to make it obsolete anyway?
As to the question why it is so important for me to make art, and why I haven’t given up on it yet, I have been wrestling with it for a long time, even trying to find scientific explanations to it (here doesn’t seem to be much research on the topic though). So here’s what I think makes me go on and not give up.
For me, art is simply about being able to express myself. I feel like my whole life it has been very difficult for me to show the real me to people. I rarely express my opinions, because I’m never 100% sure about anything, I am not particularly emotional externally and I am just very low key on the outside. Which sometimes leads me to feel like even my closest friends don’t really know who I actually am. Sometimes I even feel creepy about it, as if I’m always pretending to be someone else.
And while I am always frustrated by words and by talking, art is different. When you make a mark on a paper, there is something very direct and honest about it. When you paint in a way you believe in, you show people who you are. I believe that every artist who has ever painted has left the mark of their personality in their paintings, even if it’s in the smallest details and brush strokes. So to me, painting is that way to put myself out there, to share myself with the world.
Another, more tangible benefit of art is that it is extremely therapeutic. Seriously, I think everyone should draw, regardless of skill level or what they do for a living. The act of drawing puts my mind in a meditative state which is hard to reach by any other means. It clears my mind and lightens me up and makes it possible to face whatever life throws at me.
Also, to be honest, being able to do what you really love is not something you can easily give up on.
So I guess those are the reasons why I don’t give up, despite the many obstacles and rational reasons to actually do so. And I am very aware of how lucky and privileged I am to actually be able to pursue my dream and give a try at doing what I really want to. I realize that so many people aren’t even faced with the choice, and I feel both very lucky and very selfish to be choosing this.
I don’t know where life will take me, whether I will stick around and at least start putting my work out there before giving up, or will I just decide it’s not worth the bother and do something more “respectable” with my life. All I know is that for now I am not ready to give up just yet and at least I owe it to myself and the past 3 years of my life to try a bit harder.