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I work part-time at a paper conservation studio, and last week one of the conservators asked if she could keep one of my collages on the reference shelf. Not to display. To study how the layers sit together, how the adhesives hold up over time. It's the kindest thing anyone's said about my work in a while, because she meant it as a materials question, not a compliment. It was a small piece, mostly a torn map fragment and a bit of old ledger paper. The sort of thing that takes me three weeks and looks almost accidental. She's seen a hundred years of paper fail, so her keeping it around says something about how it's made that I actually trust more than a gallery wall. I walked home in the drizzle feeling steadier than I have in months. Small win, but it's mine.

Small win but it's been sitting with me. A friend of a friend who saw my sketches at a coffee shop asked me to paint her grandmother's house before it gets demolished. She's from the same area I grew up in, so I knew exactly what those houses look like from inside even with the paint peeling and wires everywhere. I quoted her a price, I always underquote, working on that, and she transferred the full amount the same evening without me even asking for an advance. Half the time I chase people for months after they say they'll buy. This lady just paid and said take your time, no rush. I delivered it yesterday and she cried. Like actually held the painting and cried because I'd gotten the jasmine creeper on the compound wall right, and the little verandah step where she used to sit with her grandmother. She said I should charge more. I'm not going to, but I'm framing that in my head for the next time I'm scared to name a price. Painting houses that are about to fall down, and people still want them kept alive somewhere. That's the whole thing na. Made my week.

I keep almost not posting this because it feels small, but my mom pointed out it's the whole point so here I am. Someone found my work on instagram (which still feels fake to say, like who is out there FINDING my work) and commissioned a little painting of their dog. Not a friend, not a friend of a friend, a total stranger. And the money from it covered my groceries this week, which I know sounds like nothing but it's the first time I've paid for food with art money and I cried in the checkout line at Aldi. Like actually cried. Over frozen vegetables. The dog was a corgi named Mabel and she had this ridiculous grumpy face that I fell in love with. I spent three days on a 8x10 and I keep thinking about how her person is going to hang it in their house somewhere and think of her. Meanwhile my landlord just emailed about rent. Life is so funny like that. One door opening while another one is standing there with its hand out. Eight months into this full-time thing and I'm still mostly terrified but days like today I think it might actually work? Anyway if you've ever wondered whether the small wins count, they do, they're the only ones that have kept me going some weeks.

omg you guys i actually did it i sent the invoice for that big commission i finished last week. i was so nervous about it honestly, like what if they think it's too much or they ghost me or something?? but my partner was like 'just send it Dani you did the work!' and they were so right haha. it feels SO good to have it out of my hands and just like, trust that it'll get paid. fingers crossed it all goes smoothly! this is such a huge step for me going full-time, it feels so real and terrifying and amazing all at once. anyway, just wanted to share a small win!! 🙏

Okay so I've painted the same window in my apartment, I don't know, forty-something times now? People keep asking why and honestly I don't have a good answer except that the light is never the same twice and I keep chasing it. But here's the thing. I framed one today. Actually framed it, matted it, hung it on the wall above my desk where I can see it while I paint the next one. I've never done that before. Forty-something windows and I just let them pile up in a portfolio folder. This one had this weird grey-yellow morning light through the glass that made the whole room feel like a memory, and I almost scraped the wash and started over, and then I didn't, and now it's on my wall. It's not a sale. It's not a commission. Nobody's going to buy it. But I walked past my desk like six times today just to look at it and feel like, yeah, I made that, and that's allowed to be enough for once. I spend so much time trying to make work other people want that I forget I'm allowed to just keep one for me. Anyway that's my win today. Small and dumb and mine 🙂 Did anyone else keep something for themselves recently? Because I think we should all be doing that more.

lets do a thread. drop one win from this week, doesnt matter how small, there is no win too tiny for this. ill go first and set the bar nice and low: i cleaned my brushes the SAME DAY i used them instead of leaving them to fossilise in a jar for a fortnight. revolutionary stuff. your turn ShareProject contentpersonasCreated by youAdd PDFs, documents, or other text to reference in this project.Content

I been putting off a repair on a quilt for a lady from over in Tuscaloosa for a good three weeks, just dreading it. The cloth was her mama's apron from the seventies, thin as onion skin in places, and I was scared I'd cut wrong and ruin what she trusted me with. Well. I pulled out my grandmother's old Singer this morning, the treadle one she learned on, and it hummed for me like it was alive. That machine has outlived three houses and more grief than I care to name, and it still sews a straighter seam than I can manage by hand on my best day. The apron's whole and the lady's gonna cry when she sees it, and I sat back and told the Lord thank you for giving me hands that still know what to do. Mighty small thing, but it felt big today. That's the win. That's always been the win.

I did that last year. Small room in a collective space downtown, knew the people running it had zero budget and the foot traffic was basically the other artists. The work didn't sell. I don't regret it though, the hang was respectful and they treated the work properly. I keep going back and forth on whether that was naive or just... fine. Part of me thinks a quiet room with the right person handling the work is worth more than a bad gallery that moves pieces. Anyone else take shows knowing they'll be a financial wash? Do you ever consider that a win?

There was a long stretch where every blank canvas felt like an exam. The pressure to make it the best thing I'd ever done, maybe the best thing anyone had ever done, ridiculous when I say it out loud, but that's what was there. And of course nothing survives that kind of weight. You kill it before you start. Today I blocked in a small interior, just our kitchen at a certain hour, the light falling across the table, a bowl of plums I didn't even arrange nicely, and I didn't once ask myself if it was going to be important. I just painted it. It's not going to change anything. It's a kitchen with plums. And it's the most alive I've felt in front of an easel in months. I don't know if this is age or exhaustion or something else, but I wish someone had told me twenty years ago that you don't have to win every time. You just have to show up and mean it.

Had someone message me about a commission back in February. Wanted a small piece, maybe 40x40cm, in mostly smalti. We went back and forth for two weeks, she wanted a discount, wanted free shipping, wanted me to throw in a smaller piece "as a gesture." I held my ground, said the price is the price, and eventually she went quiet. I figured she'd moved on. Three weeks later the full amount shows up in my bank account with a one-line email: "Same dimensions as discussed, please proceed." No apology, no explanation. Just the money. I made the piece, shipped it, never heard from her again. Not even a photo of it on a wall. I still don't know what to make of that interaction. Part of me thinks she tested me and I passed. Part of me thinks she just got tired of negotiating and decided to pay. Either way, the lesson I keep landing on is: if you're confident the work is worth what you're asking, the haggling either resolves itself or it doesn't, and either outcome is fine. You don't have to win every conversation. Just don't be the one who folds first.

i've been on this orange and blue thing for a week now, like a full painting where those two are basically the whole conversation. and every single time i mix them they turn to straight mud before i even get the brush down. i know it's literally just color theory, they're opposites, obviously they gray out. but i keep doing it anyway like i think this time physics will let it slide. the annoying part is the reference photo is right there and the sky has that orange-pink going and the water is this electric blue and they somehow exist next to each other without turning into a brown puddle. so it's not the combo, it's me. i'm not layering it right or i'm over-mixing on the palette or i just don't trust the paint enough to let it sit. spent the whole afternoon on one small study and threw the cloth over it out of spite. i'll pick it back up tomorrow probably and hate it again. twenty dollars in paint to learn i should've just scumbled. anyway. anyone else ever win this fight or do i just paint brown forever

okay so when I was fresh out of art school I walked into this small gallery downtown with a whole portfolio folder, no appointment, no email, just vibes and hope, and the owner literally didn't look at a single piece. Just told me to "send something through the website" while staring at her laptop. I was so crushed I almost cried in the parking lot haha. it took me two more years and honestly the break I finally caught was so random, a friend of a friend's cousin was having a show and told the curator about me. no big pitch, no cold email genius moment, just someone saying my name in a room. SO what actually worked for you?? did you email and get lucky, walk in somewhere, get referred by someone, or did you have to do something totally embarrassing first? I need to hear the wins and the wreckage honestly, because I'm convinced everyone got in through some weird back door and nobody talks about it 😭