I do Ask the Tough Questions
This is a question I asked myself recently as I had not really considered it until now. The answer to me was both eye-opening and honestly quite sobering.
For as long as I can remember art has been a part of my life. My dad was always drawing cartoons and painting New Zealand landscapes as he longed to return home. Both my grandmothers had the artistic flare, although more as hobbies really. Even my mother had a stint at creating nursery hangings of cartoon characters, which I remember fondly, but speaking to her now she never liked them or felt she was any good.
For me personally I never thought of my art as anything more than a hobby, as no one in my family ever made much of a living from it. I enjoyed it when I did it, but growing up in Zimbabwe, I enjoyed reading more and playing outside in the pool or on my bike. It wasn’t until I was at school that my interest in art increased and the reason for my drawing became manifest.
My dad was a pastor in Zimbabwe and our family tended to move quite a bit. Until my teens the longest I recall staying in one place was 3 years. As such I wasn’t the best at integrating. I made “friends” but none I can say I kept in touch with. Even talking about it this morning with my folks, I can’t even remember the names of some of them. As such a lot of my attention went onto my schoolwork and I tended to be a bit of a teacher’s pet. I was a doodler, and this caught the eye of the other kids and I became known as the drawer. With this attention I drew more. If that attention dropped off, then so did the drawing.
I still enjoyed drawing. My homework was always well illustrated, and I could spend hours doing it but unless I felt it had a reason, I didn’t feel it warranted my time or effort. I excelled in Art throughout school and even won a few awards on behalf of the schools I went to. However, after 5th form, Art was no longer on the syllabus and my attempts at correspondence were unsuccessful, so I threw it in as a waste of time. I was disillusioned with school after that and suffering from depression so quit school went into the work force.
THINGS BEGAN TO IMPROVE
I eventually found myself as a trainee Sign-Maker in Wellington which I did enjoy as it was both creative and physical although I was a long way from family and it took me a good few years to settle. It was there that I developed my graphic design skills and even got into painting for the first time.
Soon travel was calling again, and I decided to do my OE in London for 2 years. My folks were living there at the time so free board and home cooked meals called me. There was nothing going in the sign-making front so I ended up doing Credit Control. I know right..?! The natural progression. It was pretty low key and I had fun with the other temps there but I again used cartoons to make my mark. Things never deviated much from there. I ended up back in Credit Control on my return to New Zealand, and for a number of years after, all while doing art as a side project.
I am a creative and while I do ok in an office environment, I still have a dream of working in a creative setting. It was my second stint in the UK that I decided to take the plunge and do my art full time. I hated chasing debt and wanted my life to have meaning. My beautiful wife agreed to support my “dream” and I knuckled down to make my fortunes….
It was now that my motives became evident. I didn’t become an artist because I believed in myself. I did it to be noticed and to stand out. I was newly married in a new country, struggling to fit in. The only fallback I had was my art. You cannot run a business like this and as you can guess it was never going to work on this foundation. I still remember the dark moments when I didn’t get enough Facebook likes or my Instagram followers didn’t increase as fast as I wanted. Never mind I loved the process or that up until that point I had learnt so much in creating that particular painting and had been quite proud of the end result. It was as if I was lost without the recognition of man. It would take weeks to recover enough to pick up the brush again and start over.
THE HARD TRUTH
With the loss of our daughter and the birth of our son soon after I became “daddy daycare” which allowed limited time to be able to dabble in my art. In the process I also learnt website design which I have also found very interesting. The lack of “business success” however during this time fell under the excuse that I lacked the time and enough sleep etc. In hindsight that’s all they were, excuses. Unless I do my art for the right reasons all it will remain is a side project or a hobby.
We have since moved back to New Zealand and I find myself back in the office environment. The strange thing is, painting and creating is all I think about so it must be my passion…right?! It’s the lack of “social approval” for the work once it’s done which I feel holds me back and I need to overcome.
This realization has been an eye opener for me. Painting needs to be for my own satisfaction. I need to enjoy the learning process and grow in my craft. I do hope to be able to make a living from my art someday and if this is my God-Given calling then “I need to let go and let God.”
