Staying Centered
About two months ago I talked to Amir, founder of Nurture the Creative Mind, about how things were progressing in his life and with the foundation. The foundation has been growing fairly quickly and I was really impressed with some of the great opportunities that they have been able to participate in. He talked to me about opportunities that the foundation had accepted and had passed on and pointed out that it was important to constantly review the path that the foundation was headed down while frequently re-centering on the goals of the foundation. I didn’t know how this conversation would impact me until now.
After Comic Con I took a week off of freelance work to look at what I was doing with my art. I found a to-do list that stretched a mile long and seemed extremely scattered. I realized that while I was pushing hard to move forward I had lost focus on my direction. Without any direction in sight, I had lost focus on my artistic style and what I had wanted to do with my art. I sat down to refocus and try to remember what my goals were and the answer was blatantly clear.
Illustration. Its part of the title used on all of my social media sites, website, business cards, etc. For me, art has always been about illustration. I love it. Once I found this base I decided to split my focus into three sections.
These three sections represent what my main focuses have been on as of late and where they will continue to be in the future.
My top focus has always been to be a storyteller with my art. I don’t care if it is done in children’s books, YA novel illustrations, comics and graphic novels, etc. I just want to tell stories. I grew up with my great grandmother, my grandmother, and my mother all telling me stories. It got to the point that I would beg them to tell me more. Having grown up, I want to provide stories for others and to share that magic through the use of art.
My second passion and focus is to work conceptually to discuss topics with my art. I’ve done this with my BFA Thesis “Eating Disorder Studies” and am currently working on it now with my focus being on Anxiety. Working conceptually I am able to explore deeper themes and create new portfolios for each concept, spending as much time and energy as I desire on each one until I feel I have properly visually represented the topic.
The last focus is on collaborative work. I love collaborating with artists which is why I set up Menageric Expressions. This is a way to fuse my love for conceptual projects with working with other people and expanding my own artistic abilities. Working on A Study in Longing has been fantastic and has completely gotten me to think outside the box. I look forward to working on more collaborations in the future.
Now that I’m refocused I don’t think I’ll be working much outside of these three sections. I’ve learned a lot of great skills over the last two years and feel that it is now the time to focus and start making progress forward instead of sideways.
