Wins·Ananya Iyer·4d

So I finally worked up the nerve to paint my grandmother's childhood home, the one she grew up in, in a little town near Mangalore. She's told me about it so many times. The jackfruit tree in the back, the veranda where her mother used to grind spices, the red oxide floors. I've never seen it myself, it got sold decades ago, but I pieced it together from her stories and old photos my aunt had. Finished it last week and showed her yesterday. And she just looked at it for a long time and said "which house is this?" I explained, and she went quiet. Then she said "no, that's not how it was at all" and started describing it again, the windows were different, the roof was lower, the jackfruit tree was on the other side actually. I sat there with my painting that was completely wrong and felt like such an idiot. But then later she called me and said to come over this weekend, she wants to sit with me and draw it properly together. She said "I'll tell you where every brick goes, you put it down." I don't know if the painting will be better the second time, but I think this is actually a win. Just not the kind you frame right away.

Wins·Camille Laurent·2w

My sixteen-year-old came into the studio yesterday without knocking, which she never does, and stood behind me for maybe a full minute while I was working. Then she said, "Maman, your paintings look less sad now." I wanted to be defensive at first. But she's right. I didn't even see it until she said it. For years my palette was all terre verte and raw umber and bone black, everything in that low grey northern light. I think I was painting the inside of my own head without realising it. The fallow years I had, the disappointment, it was all there in the colour, every time. Now there's more warmth. Not bright, not cheerful, just... alive. A little Naples yellow in the shadows. A red glaze where I would have left it dead. Kids see things. She doesn't know about the decade I lost, she only knows what she sees on the easel. And she saw it.

Wins·Dimitra Vasilakis·3w

I took on a commission last year that I was genuinely unsure about. A woman brought me a box of broken tile from her old family bathroom, the renovation had just torn it out, and asked if I could make something from it. Not a mosaic of something, she said. Just... the tile itself, made into something that feels like it means something. I said yes because I liked her face and I needed the work. Then I sat with five kilos of beige ceramic for three months not knowing what to do. Tried arranging it as patterns, tried mixing it with other material, nothing worked. It just looked like broken bathroom tile. In the end I cut every single piece smaller, reduced it all to tiny irregular shards, almost like coarse sand, and set it into a very simple circle, graded from pale to dark, like a kind of eclipse or a coin. No image. Just the material, transformed by being reduced and rebuilt. Took weeks of just cutting and placing, cutting and placing. She picked it up yesterday and cried. Said it looked like her grandmother's bathroom floor, which wasn't even something I knew about. I don't know if I'll ever do that again, but I'm glad I did it once. Something about letting the material lead instead of imposing a design. Hard to describe. But it worked.

Wins·Dani Okafor·6d

I had my first open studio thing this weekend, just me, my little apartment studio, some snacks I burned slightly, and like 30 people who actually showed up which still feels insane. And this woman came in, didn't say much, walked around for a while looking at everything. She kept coming back to this one painting I almost didn't hang because I thought it was too quiet, just a corner of my kitchen window with the light hitting the sill at that golden hour angle. I'd painted it like six times trying to catch it right. She came up to me at the end and said it reminded her of her grandmother's kitchen in Poland and she couldn't stop staring at it. And then she bought it. And then she cried a little when she was writing the check, said she hadn't seen her grandmother in eight years. I didn't know what to do with that honestly. I just stood there holding the cash like a complete idiot. My partner had to nudge me to say thank you properly haha. I think I forget sometimes that the paintings leave me and go live in other people's lives and mean things I'll never fully know. That's kind of terrifying and lovely at the same time. Anyway the burned snacks were a hit somehow so I guess I'll keep burning them on purpose.

Wins·Niall Doherty·1w

Ach, I'm still buzzing off this. A small gallery up in Sligo got in touch out of nowhere back in February, found me through Instagram, if you can believe it, said they'd been following the work for a while. I thought sure it was one of those scams at first, the ones where they want you to pay to be "featured," but no, genuine people running a proper little space. Sent them a dozen prints this morning, all matted and packed proper. The big heron I've been messing with for months made the cut, and a new hare that finally came together after I ruined about four blocks getting there. Felt strange sealing the box, like sending a bit of yourself off in the post. But good strange. Never had a gallery come to me before. Always been me knocking on doors, standing at markets, sending emails into the void. Nice to be on the other end of it for once. Now I just have to hope they sell and I don't have to pay return postage on twelve unsold prints 😅

Wins·Ananya Iyer·1w

There's this old bungalow on Nandi Durga Road, one of those Art Deco ones with the curved verandah and the beautiful terrible paint job, salmon pink over original white, peeling everywhere. I've sketched it maybe five times, painted it twice before, and both times it came out technically fine but completely dead. No life in it. Like a photograph but worse. Today I went back with just my travel kit, small palette, one brush, no pencil underdrawing. Sat on the compound wall for about 45 minutes in that late-morning heat that makes you regret every life choice. And something just… unlocked. I let the watercolour bleed into the sketchy ink lines. Didn't try to fix the wonky bits. Left the verandah half-raw. It's not my most accurate piece by a long shot but it's the first one that feels like the house, not like my anxiety about drawing the house properly. Anyway I'm still riding that high. Chai and Marie biscuits kind of celebration tonight. 🙏

Wins·Niall Doherty·2w

Three weeks without the press. Sent the bearings off to a fella in Clare who said he'd have them done in a week, took three, sure what's the rush in Clare. I was half-convinced I'd get it back and something else would be wrong with it, or I'd forgotten how to print altogether. Stripped it down, cleaned everything I could reach while I was waiting, found a biscuit wrapper the youngest had posted through the roller gap back in February. Reassembled it this afternoon with a spanner I'd left out in the rain and had to dry off on the Aga. Pulled the first proof an hour ago. An old block, a hare I've carved so many times I could do it in my sleep. And it just... worked. Clean. Even pressure. The ink laid down like it was glad to be there. I stood there staring at it for longer than I'd admit. The missus came in and said "is that it" and I said yeah that's it and she said "grand" and went back to putting the kids to bed. Which is exactly the right amount of fuss. If you've got a tool or a machine or a process that's been sitting broken and you're dreading getting back to it, just get the first one done. The second one's easy after that.

Wins·Gloria Mae Jackson·4w

Y'all, I don't even know how to sit still right now. Back in 1963 my grandmother made a crazy quilt, all those scraps, every shape you can think of, hand-stitched with that tiny perfect stitch she had. She used pieces from my mama's old school dresses, my uncle's Sunday shirt, a flour sack from a brand that don't even exist anymore. I grew up under that quilt. Slept under it when I was sick. Knew every patch like I knew every face at the dinner table. She passed in '89 and I kept it in a cedar chest for years 'cause I couldn't bear to have it wear out. Well, my granddaughter talked me into entering it in a show up in Atlanta. I sent it off with a prayer and tried not to think about it. Called me yesterday. It won. First place in the heritage category. I sat on the floor in the kitchen and cried. That's not like me. But I tell you what, my grandmother never got to see anybody call her work art. She just made beauty from what she had because that's what women did. And here's a room full of people sixty years later saying "yes ma'am, this matters." I know it's just a show. But it ain't just a show to me. Somebody finally saw her. That's all I wanted.

Wins·Gloria Mae Jackson·4d

I got a call last week from a woman I didn't know. Said she found my name on a label sewed into an old quilt she bought at a church flea market over in Tuscaloosa. Asked if I wanted it back. I knew exactly which one before she even described it. That blue and yellow improv log cabin I made in '93, right after my youngest left for school. I was so lonesome that year I just sewed and sewed. Sold it for $40 at a craft fair at the county annex, first quilt I ever sold to a stranger. I remember watching the woman walk off with it folded over her arm and thinking I might've made a mistake letting it go. Anyway she mailed it to me and I opened the box and there it was. Still sturdy. Still a little crooked in places. I sat and held it in my lap a good long while before I could do anything else. I don't know what I'm gonna do with it now. Might keep it. Might hang it where I can see it. That quilt been out in the world longer than my own children lived in this house. Lord.

Wins·Mira Vey·1w

neighbor lady down the street asked if i'd do a small piece for her kitchen, something with her late dog in it. i said yes before we even talked price because i've seen her walk that dog's ghost every morning for two years. she showed up today with a canvas bag full of eggs from her chickens and three jars of strawberry jam. said money's tight but she wanted to pay me something real. i hung the little painting on her wall and she cried. not the loud kind. just stood there with her hand over her mouth. i've been paid in worse ways for better work. this one's gonna sit with me for a while.

Wins·Mira Vey·1w

hung that thing on the wall of the booth three years ago and pretty much gave up on it. it's this beat-up brown leather jacket with a torn lining and a cigarette burn on the sleeve. i stitched some of his handwriting into the inside collar, just the word "fine" because that's what he always said when i asked how he was. someone bought it today. a guy maybe late 50s who didn't say much. just pointed at it and said "that one." didn't haggle. didn't ask about it. i don't know why that hit me harder than selling a painting. maybe because it's not even really mine to sell. or maybe because i'd forgotten something could just leave.

Wins·Ananya Iyer·3w

I went back to a street in Malleswaram today. There was this old house with a blue veranda I'd sketched in 2022, beautiful chettiar-style columns, the whole thing sagging just a little in that way old houses do. I wanted to paint it properly this time, in watercolour, give it the treatment. Pulled up to the spot and it's a construction site. Apartment going up, probably 14 floors from the look of the pit. I sat on the compound wall of the thing next door and painted it anyway from memory. Came out alright actually, maybe better than if I'd had the real thing in front of me, because I had to really remember what I loved about it. Weird feeling, documenting things as they disappear. But I'm glad I have that old sketchbook at home. At least someone drew it.

Wins·Roman Petrak·4w

Got the last of the granite for the memorial piece I'm working on. It was a beast to find the right color and veining. Took a few trips to the quarry, but this slab feels right. Now to get it back to the shop without breaking it.

Wins·Ananya Iyer·1h

There's this tiny chai shop near Shanti Nagar double road, been there for maybe forty years, tucked between a jewellery showroom and a building that's already been sold for redevelopment. I've been meaning to paint it for months but kept putting it off, too many people, too much traffic, too self-conscious to sit there with my sketchbook. Finally went this morning at 6am. Sat on a plastic stool, ordered chai I didn't even finish, and painted for two hours while the guy who runs the shop kept peering over my shoulder and saying "akka, colour kammi" meaning I wasn't using enough colour. He wasn't wrong. Came home and finished it on the table. And I don't know, I just sat there looking at it and felt something I don't feel often, like it actually came out the way I wanted. The light, the shadows from the awning, the old board with the faded name. Took a photo, sent it to my husband, and he said "that's the one" without me even asking. I never know how to take compliments on my work. But I think I'll frame this one. For myself.

Wins·Karen Wessel·17h

my sister-in-law's friend asked me months ago if I could paint her parents' lake cabin for their anniversary. I kept putting it off because the pressure of doing something for someone else, someone paying me, felt so much heavier than painting for myself. finally got it done this week and mailed it out this morning. I'm not sure how it landed honestly. I kept second guessing the colors, the angle I chose, whether it even looked like the place. but it's gone now so it's out of my hands. she paid me $200 which felt like both a lot and not nearly enough at the same time. told myself I'd use it to buy better brushes but I'll probably just spend it on the kids 😅 anyone else get weirdly nervous about commissions or is it just me

Wins·Mira Vey·2d

two years it's been leaning against the wall in my studio, face turned away like I couldn't stand to look at it. this landscape I started right after my brother died, trying to paint the place we scattered his ashes, and it was just... bad. muddy. overworked. I couldn't touch it. today I finally pulled the staples out. ripped the canvas off the frame. just let it crumple on the floor. and then I cut out the only part of it that worked, maybe six square inches of sky, and glued it into my sketchbook. like a little window. the rest went in the trash. felt like I could breathe again.

Wins·Sol Reyes·3d

I was working on this piece for like 14 hours straight yesterday, just totally gone in it. Charcoal, big sheet, just a face emerging from black. And I finished it and stood back and just started crying like an absolute fool. Not even sad crying. Just, it came out right. For once it actually said what I meant it to say. My roommate came down and saw me standing there crying in the dark studio and was like "...should I be worried." 😭 Anyway the drawing is good. Like really good. I think this is the first time in months I've made something that doesn't feel like I'm just practicing. It feels like I actually arrived somewhere with it. Gonna try to hold onto this feeling instead of waking up tomorrow and hating it. Wish me luck.

Wins·Mateo Serrano·1w

She came to the studio today. I've been sending her photos for like two years but she's never actually touched any of it until now. She picked up this lopsided little vessel with a face pressed into the side, one I almost scrapped because the glaze crawled weird, and she just held it for a minute. Then she said the glaze looked like the old robes on the figures from her village in Extremadura, the ones they'd bring out for Christmas, all blotchy and wrong but full of something. I don't think she knows how much that meant. She's the one person who never made me feel stupid for doing this, even when I was living off tortilla de patatas and rage. I made her take a piece home, the one she liked. She tried to say no. I won.

Wins·Teddy Lin·2w

pulled an old canvas out of the closet today that i started in like... 2021. deep in the bad year. it was just blocked in with this muddy grey-green i was mixing over and over back then like it meant something. couldn't finish it. couldn't throw it out either. finally figured out what it wanted today. scraped half of it off, repainted the whole bottom third, kept maybe two square inches of the original. it's done now. feels weirdly like i got to go back and tell that version of myself "hey it's fine, you're not stuck forever, you just need to wait three years and paint over most of it lol" anyway. it's leaning against the wall drying and i keep walking past it and going "huh. okay. it's good." feels like i earned that one.

Wins·Mira Vey·2w

I've been going through the last few boxes I still had in storage. Found a stack of his mix tapes from high school, hand-labeled, terrible handwriting, bands I haven't thought about in twenty years. I took one apart carefully and mounted the tape reel inside a shadow box with the tracklist card. Just the thing itself, no embellishment. It came out better than I expected. It's not for sale, I think. Maybe I'll keep it for myself. Felt good to work on something that wasn't trying to be anything. Just a record of someone existing.