My Art Journey

My humbling, infuriating and healing journey through art.

This blog will be designed to describe and examine my efforts to become a better artist and man through the incredibly challenging pursuit of art. I will post my, (hopefully), daily efforts to draw, paint or design a variety of subjects using a variety of mediums.
For most of my life I have been most interested in the human figure and will continue to focus on this. I do, however, enjoy drawing and painting animals and various other subjects.

One thing I’ve become aware of over the years. Art is much more to me than doing a nice drawing or painting. When I first started out that was about all I thought in terms of. I had my favorite artists and simply wanted to be able to do a drawing that seemed to appear to be somewhat similar in look.

I first became interested in drawing through comic books, so I wanted to emulate my comic book heroes; Jack Kirby, Neal Adams, Frank Frazetta etc. Then I gradually became aware of other artists I wanted to imitate; Andrew Loomis, Alex Raymond, Austin Briggs, etc.
Discovering these artists led me to start taking art classes first in Junior College, then at Art Center College of Design where teachers introduced me to so many others; Sargent, Heinrich Kley, Anders Zorn, Sorolla, Lautrec, Manet, Rembrandt, Michelangelo, etc etc.

The artists that inspired and excited me helped me to take my life more seriously when nearly all my friends just wanted to party and get stoned.
These artists helped me deal with an alcoholic and dysfunctional home. They helped me try again when I failed artistically or experienced a social, physical or emotional setback.
Something I’ve found more and more remarkable is that being inspired and uplifted by my artistic efforts is NOT dependent on success. For me, it’s truly about the effort, the journey, the process.
I know, and have worked with, so many artists that paint, draw and are creative in ways that I’ve never been able to match. It used to really hurt and discourage me, but never for long. The desire to paint and draw better than I did the day before was stronger than the discouragement. It kept picking me up and filling me with excitement and drive.

I feel so blessed to have found something like this in my life.

While I hope people who happen upon my blog will enjoy it and maybe it will help them in their artistic efforts, it is primarily as a tool for me to look at my work in a different way, possibly a more objective and linear way, that has gotten me to finally go through this process.

It is this desire to continue growing that has prompted me to start this blog. I’m a very private person and the thought of putting all this online is very uncomfortable. But one thing I’ve definitely realized is that the only time I REALLY grow is when I step out of my comfort zone.

So here goes.