A Post About A Few Of My Favorite Things.
For about a solid year and a half now I've been digging deeper and deeper to really get to core of who I am as an artist. It's been an exciting ride but there's still so much to learn and accomplish.
A few questions always come up during my search for artistic freedom:
How can I remove all the fear, ignore all the doubt and insecurities and just create?
How can I eliminate the idea of perfection to the point where it doesn't even phase me?
What are things that I can do to trust the timing of my path as an artist?
What can I do to push more boundaries and become more disruptive?
What can I do right now with what I have to create instead of saying I need more money, supplies, etc?
How can I get rid of the concept of comparison?
With access to the entire world at the touch of our finger tips it's easy to log on, look around, and compare. It's easy to try to create what's trending, and what will get the most hits, clicks and likes. It's easy to mimic the styles of artist that are "successful." It's easy to create for a system.
That's not what any of this is about.
Art is the act of presenting your flaws and courage with honesty.
Art, creativity, and sharing your perspectives is about giving it unapologetically to the world. It's about saying "this is the way I see things."
The quote above from one of my favorite artist Oliver Jeffers. It's beyond prolific! It's the proper equation to artistic freedom! It can be applied to life as well! I heard it on Design Matters (one of my favorite podcast) with Debbie Millman (another favorite artist of mine) during an interview. He originally shared this quote on The Great Discontent (one of my favorite magazines). I've been replaying the interview since I discovered back in June 2015, so I decided to dance with it during a recent hand lettering session. You can listen to the entire interview here.
The only obligation we have as artists is to trust the way we see things and share it with the world. Become the best you can at those things.