How to Become A Successful Artist

December 14, 2018
   As of late, I've been noodling some mini-duotones.

Daily Whip Out: "Miss Sophisti-Kate"

  A fellow Creeker artist friend of mine, Fran Douglas, sent me a pretty cool list of things to do to become an artist. Here are some of the highlights:

   Tell your own story and be honest. What does that look like? Well, for me, like this:

My Kingman Cowboy Kin

 Let go of being "good." Look at this.

Bad BBB

   Can you do something this "good"? I certainly hope so.

   Don't be afraid to copy and steal from the first truck that comes by.

Lon Megargee and Erwin Smith poaches

   Imagination is your creed. Sentimentality and lack of feeling, your foe. All art comes from love. For example, I love this subject:

The Female Form

"Jacky Treehorn treats objects like women, man."
—The Big Lebowski

   All good artists work in their sleep. For example, I thought of this next one at about four in the morning, as I was waking up. I executed it, quickly, as I rolled out of bed.

Shoulder Glow

   Your style and your skill is going to be whatever you do differently. Like this:

Blacks Like Me

   Find your own voice, then exaggerate it.

Sixty-Six Sue

   Listen to the crazy voices in your head.

Fish Face Plastic Surgery Woman

   I was at a hipster party once and a condescending artist type told me she did art that "healed." That pissed me off but it made me think what I do like and how do I nurture it?

  Come to think of it, maybe she did heal me.

   Fail Flamboyantly and be delusional. Go ahead and beat yourself up for as long as you like, but then stop and say to yourself out loud, "Yes, it's true, but I'm also a flippin' genius."

   Sorry, I'm too Norwegian to say something as pompous as that, but I will say this:

"My mind thinks I'm 28; my humor suggests I'm 12; my body questions if I'm dead."
—Old Artist Saying