Studio-Day 1

Mokey, our house cat, sleeping in ink.

I don’t know how to write a blog.

However, today is the first studio day of my official endeavor to become a working artist. I have had some moderate, intermittent success in selling work in regional art galleries and markets. So, now the operating thesis is that with dedicated time to work (rather than stolen bits of time here and there), I can develop sketches, drawings, illustrations, paintings, and other creative objects with greater scale, volume, and craftsmanship. While the measure of success is “better, bigger, more” work, I have to own that the only way I can continue to do that is by generating income from said work. I had a quasi-typical 40 hr/week 9-5 job, and now I’m down to 16 hours. Leaving me three days a week when the kid is in school, husband at his work office, and I am in a room of my own.

Starting out, I have a (very) little bit of savings dedicated to this project, which gives me about 6 months of runway to get money coming in from art work. When I gave notice at Day Job in mid-August, I basically exchanged sleeping for endless searching of my mind (and the internet) for paid freelance art opportunities. In three months, I found exactly two potential local public art projects to apply to. I am happy to say I’ve been accepted into the first round of one of them, to develop an original rendering that will be fabricated onto the surface of a bus stop windscreen. I had no idea this was a thing, but I found it, and so I will be trying to work out a (native flora and fauna themed) composition that successfully spans 9’ x 61’. This should be an interesting challenge. I’ve never personally made anything larger than 16” x 10”. The other is an interior mural at a hospital. I have the good fortune of having a friend who is a muralist, and I just had to work up the gall to suggest we split a job (that he could do alone in his sleep). That application is freshly submitted, and with that, the waiting commences.

My original vision was a few months to research, play, and ultimately develop a portfolio of work for editorial illustration. While I still want to do that, I understand that success in that kind of career is a long process that only begins (if it begins) months after you start sending out your polished work samples. I guess my real wish is to find enough arts-related jobs to keep working in the studio (or on site!) at least 3 days a week until I can be in the studio all the time.

So, my first paid job is developing and submitting the windscreen proposal (deadline 12/31, payment $500.) Other things already underway in the studio (return uncertain) include (1) packaging and shipping a framed ink drawing of a sleeping cat to a cat-themed show in Brooklyn and (2) developing some teddy bear drawings for a toy-themed show in a local gallery.

I hope writing will force me to organize my ideas. I hope it will be a record of a worthwhile challenge. I hope it might be of interest to others.