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honestly this is such a stupid thing to be bothered by but we were on the phone last night, she's asking how the work is going, and then she goes "so what do you actually do all day though? like hour by hour" and I just. sat there. because the answer is I spent four hours on monday watching a single wash dry and re-doing it three times because the first two went chalky on me, and then I ate lunch standing up, and then I stared at the same window (the one from my apartment, the one I keep painting) and decided the light was wrong and did nothing for the rest of the afternoon. that IS the job. and I couldn't say that to her because it sounds like nothing!! it sounds like I'm lying to her!! so I said "a lot of prep and color mixing" which is technically true and also a total dodge. the thing is she's not even being mean, she genuinely wants to understand, she's just got a whole lifetime of "work = you go somewhere and someone tells you what to do" and I quit the café eight months ago and I think she's still quietly worried, and every time I fumble the answer I'm basically confirming the worry. anyway. called her back and explained the wash thing properly and she said "oh, like waiting for paint to dry, that's actually kind of nice" and I almost cried. she gets it more than I gave her credit for.

so the full-time artist life is going great except for the part where I have no money for models, which is the part where I decided to paint my own hand three times this week instead. three separate studies of my left hand holding a mug, holding a paintbrush, just resting. hands are SO hard. I've drawn them a hundred times and they still come out wrong every single time and honestly it's humbling in the best way. but here's the thing. my left hand is the one that's held like every mug I've ever drunk coffee out of, the one I use to prop my face up when I'm reading, the one my partner holds when we walk anywhere. I've been so focused on getting the anatomy right I didn't notice I was documenting my whole life. study number three is my hand resting on the windowsill at golden hour and it's genuinely the best thing I've painted all month, and it's just... my hand. my boring left hand that does nothing special. anyway I'm framing it. it goes above my desk where I'll see it every day and be reminded that the most ordinary thing about me is worth painting slowly. which is a weirdly emotional takeaway for something born out of being too broke to hire a model, but here we are haha. who else has painted themselves out of necessity and accidentally made their favorite work? I can't be the only one

Okay so I've been doing the full-time artist thing for 8 months now and today I shipped my first actual commission. Not a print, not a little piece at a market, an actual person who messaged me asking me to paint their grandmother's garden. Their GRANDMOTHER'S garden. There were reference photos of this old rose bush and a rusty bench and I spent three weeks obsessing over getting the green right because greens are the devil honestly. Anyway I sent it off this morning and then I just sat in my car outside the post office and cried a little. Not sad crying. Just like. Oh, this is real now. Someone trusted me with their memory and I didn't mess it up. My dad died when I was 19 and I painted my way through that whole year, and I kept thinking today about how painting someone's garden feels like the exact opposite of that. Like here's a thing that's still alive and growing and someone wanted me to hold onto it for them. And the grandma apparently cried when she saw the photos I sent before shipping, which made me cry again. My partner just handed me a towel and said "this is your whole personality now huh" and he's not wrong. Not really asking anything, just wanted to tell people who'd get it. What's the last thing that made you cry in a good way?

Okay so I've been painting the same window in my apartment since like January. Same light, same time of day, same corner, probably 20 or 25 times now. There's one from March that I was SO attached to, and I never liked it, I just couldn't get myself to touch it. Kept it taped to the wall above my desk this whole time like a threat. Today I took it down and washed a wet cool grey straight across the whole top third. Just demolished the thing. The light coming through was too soft in it, I made the whole window look like a rental ad. It's better now, the afternoon hits it harder. And I'm sitting here weirdly emotional about it?? Which is insane because it's a piece of paper I own. But that's eight months of full-time work talking I guess. I keep waiting to feel like a Real Artist and instead I just feel like someone who finally stopped protecting a bad wash. Anyway, if you have a piece you keep "not finishing" because you know what it actually needs is a big scary irreversible move, this is your sign. Or don't, I'm not your mom.

ok so I still don't totally know how this works and I've been full-time for like eight months so maybe I'm the last person who should be asking, but I'm curious how people actually got their FIRST sit-down with a gallery, like the real one, not a group show where nobody buys anything (been there lol). mine was kind of dumb luck. there's this little frame shop near me and the owner kept seeing my stuff on instagram and one day she was like "you should talk to so-and-so, she runs the space two doors down" and I did and it went ok and we're figuring something out for spring. so basically a stranger did my networking for me haha. but I know that's not how it works for most people and I kind of hate that I don't have a system yet. did you cold email? walk in with a portfolio? get introduced by another artist? apply to something and get lucky? I want the actual story, including the awkward parts. tell me yours and I'll feel less like I'm faking it over here 🙂

Okay so I'm eight months into full-time art and I finally have enough data to be genuinely confused. My original watercolors sell consistently, like every time I post a finished piece it's gone within a day or two. But I got a professional scan done of one of my favorites, ordered a small run of prints to test the waters, and they've just been sitting there. Like barely any movement in three weeks. And I don't get it because everyone always asks "do you have prints?" when they see the originals. I made them available. Crickets. My partner says it's because people who buy watercolors want THE thing, the actual one with the paper texture and the wonky edge where my tape was, not a reproduction. And maybe that's true and I should just lean into originals only. But also maybe I priced them wrong or my thumbnails are bad or I'm just not promoting them right. Mostly I'm annoyed I spent real money on the scan and the test run haha. But it's also kind of nice to know the originals aren't a fluke. Any other artists out there where prints flop but originals move?? Or am I the weird one who should've known better.