For the Artists

Fail more please

Hi everyone,
Hope you’ve all had a fantastic few weeks. I was going to apologise for another two week hiatus, but at this stage, I think it’s getting a bit old. I don’t disappear for any other reason than I get busy. I used to feel guilty, but now I don’t as much, and I want to talk to you about why you shouldn’t either.

Making art in any way, shape, or form is hard in fact, it’s fucking hard! Lots of people do it with the dream that it’s what they’ll do forever, and more people give up every day than commit to doing it more. I’ve nearly given up myself on many occasions.

Where I’m at now
I want to talk to you about where I am now and why I think this might be the healthiest I’ve ever been in terms of my relationship with my art practice.

I have, by my own standards, failed to make something of my art career many times. One standout moment was spending 20k on an exhibit and making 3k back. Money isn’t everything, I get that, but when you’re starting out and invest hard, it’s a pretty big punch to take at the time. This has happened more than once, I’m five exhibitions deep and have about 35 professionally framed images sitting at my parents’ house. I’ve tried to get them on walls for years, and every time I do, I take them home once my time’s up. Some of them I’m still confused about to this day because I think the images are beautiful.

This has gone on for years, and where I am now might be as healthy as I’ve ever been, and maybe as healthy as I’ll ever be, with art.

How I see my art now

I used to view my art as something I would “do” – for work, for love, for life. I am an artist, and I make art. To be honest, I still do, it just looks very different than I thought it would.

My art is divided into all I do, not just the practice that puts pieces on walls or brings people to exhibitions.

• The commercial work: While there are bits of me in this, it’s not exactly what I do for myself, but it enables everything else. Having a job that allows flexibility and includes parts I love might actually be the most important part of my art practice. I adore people and working with clients. We get to do cool things I wouldn’t experience otherwise.

• Portraits: This came back into my life in the last year or so, and I don’t think I’ve enjoyed anything as much as story‑based imagery told through portraits, with people in their places. Turns out I adore passion! makers, artists, creatives, designers, farmers, any form of work where people are not only doing what they do but also what they love. That’s a good place for me to spend my time and create.

• The art practice: More than anything, this is about experimentation and play. Right now I’m building an interactive exhibition based on my latest series, Gaoth. I have almost no idea how, when, or where it will happen, or even exactly how it will look but right now I am still shooting for it and seeing what happens.

Because of how I’m setting up myself, my business, and my life, I’m enjoying each element of my work and art. This gives me the breathing room to figure out the exhibition space while still working on other parts of what I do.

Imbalance over balance

The key for me is all about imbalance, not balance. Things are cyclical. June was a crazy month for commercial work, and right now I’ve got a few portrait shoots coming up as well as a bit of commercial. It’s also allowed me to do a lot of coffees with people in the industry and trying to figuring out how I can do it and the best way of giving it the opportunity to be what I think it can be. This quieter time allows me to step into the interactive space and try things without needing them to succeed. In fact, I’m encouraging more failure, because it means I’m trying.

So if you’re an artist figuring out how to make art your full‑time thing, maybe it’s less about doing it full‑time and more about how you live your life around your art. That might carry more weight in the grand scheme of things.

A note to my younger self

I think if I could go back and tell my 25‑year‑old self, who only wanted to do exhibitions and make photobooks, that art wasn’t what I did but who I was, I would have dived harder into the poetry I used to love and the way I used to explore woodworking. All of these don’t have to be what I do for my art, but they’re all part of living an artistic life. Doing so means being a creator not just in what you do but in how you do it. It’s important to remember all of these are hard but they are suppose to be fun right?

Happy Tuesday,
Make some art.

Love y’all,
Adam

Here’s some things for all elements mentioned above