Artwork
Becoming an Artist — Part 1
I’m still very much an amateur, but here’s a gallery of my journey so far
“All children are born artists, the problem is to remain an artist as we grow up.” — Pablo Picasso.
One of my earliest memories is of being in my cousin Andrew’s room while he was playing computer games on a Commodore 64. He had posters of comic book heroes on his walls and a model of the Predator which is 7 feet tall in my childhood memory but was maybe only an action figure in reality. Who knows.
Either way, it was cool. Andrew showed me the basics of how he sketched. I started making my own comic books when I was very young, using a hot glue gun and crayons.
By high school, I was actually pretty good, and I even won an award for one of my pieces, though it was revoked because the size of the paper was wrong. Whatever. Here are the works that my 16–18-year-old self had produced in the late '90s.
Somewhere along the line, my enthusiasm for producing art waned when I realized there are people infinitely more talented than I am. I had absolutely no hope of ever catching up to professional artists; there’s no way someone like me could make a living at this. For the better part of 20 years, I tutored math, played video games, and didn’t produce much of anything creative.
I fell prey to the perfectionist trap.
But 2 years ago, my wife got an iPad and I quit playing computer games.
Since then I’ve had a bit of a renaissance, picking up where I left off. In the next installment, I’ll show you the results of my recent flurry of artwork, of which the cover photo of this story is one piece.
As I often like to repeat…
The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now. — Chinese Proverb
But before I get to work on the gallery of my latest work, there is one last item I want to talk about.
I drew this sometime around 1998. About 8 years later I met the woman who I would go on to marry. She raises chickens as a hobby, and so this was her favorite — because how did I know to draw it for her?
“We were meant,” she said when she first saw it, giving me a long hug. This is one of only two pieces that we kept the physical original of.
Now it’s possible it could have had something to do with one of my favorite songs. But who knows. Also, that explanation only pushes the mystery back one layer. Why was that my favorite song?
Anyway, while you wait for me to post my more recent paintings, here’s my bio and a few of my stories you might also like.
