Season 4 Archives | Page 4 of 12

#243 Andrea Scher: Artist, Author, and Wonder Seeker

Artist and coach Andrea Scher has a degree in business, but she instantly knew she was destined for a creative field. She started painting, and soon she was selling her artwork. Andrea now works with women to help them be more brave and feel more alive. She helps them to practice and honor their creative superpowers. This is done through e-courses, private circles where she mentors artists, and now through her new book, Wonder Seeker: 52 Ways to Wake Up Your Creativity. Andrea also has a podcast called The Creative Superheroes, where she interviews authors, artists, coaches, and teachers.

Listen here or download from Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, CastBox, Overcast, iHeartRadio, Amazon podcasts, or Stitcher.

Andrea Scher

Andrea’s website is andreasher.com

She is also on Instagram @andreascher

Her book is called Wonder Seeker: 52 Ways to Wake Up Your Creativity and Find Your

Her podcast is called The Creative Superheroes Podcast

Here are some great takeaways from our conversation:

Don’t worry if you’re into a lot of things. According to Andrea, that just means you’re alive, and vibrant, and passionate.
For years, Andrea wanted to write a book. She’d send proposals to publishers and she did receive some rejections. Instead of abandoning that book idea, she would turn it into an e-course. Realize that a lot of your ideas will be very good, even though they don’t fit in one format, they may fit in another.
Andrea had submitted many book proposals that were very business-looking. As soon as she changed her idea and made a proposal that was visually beautiful, that’s the one that was accepted by a publisher.
If you’d like to host a retreat, either in your home or in another city or country, you might want to partner with another creative to do it with you. Andrea hosts a retreat in Mexico and she partners with a woman who is a writer. That’s a great way to bring more than one medium or activity to your attendees.
Podcasts are a great way to virtually meet people from all over the world. Anyone can start a podcast, and with today’s apps and programs, it’s not that difficult. If you are curious and like to meet new people, a podcast might be the thing for you.

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#242 Courtney Cerruti: Artist, Author, and Collaborator

Courtney Cerruti is an artist, author, and collaborator working out of Oakland, California. She’s authored 5 books with Quarto Press and Abrams, including her latest book called One Color a Day. Courtney taught craft workshops when she worked at Paper Source, then moved toward display merchandising for Anthropologie. She currently teaches workshops online at Creativebug.com where she is Editor-In-Chief.

Listen here or download from Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, CastBox, Overcast, iHeartRadio, Amazon podcasts, or Stitcher.

Courtney Cerruti

Courtney’s website is courtneycerruti.com

She is also on Instagram @ccerruti

Her books can be purchased here.

Her Sleeping Animals collaboration is done with artist Michael McConnell also known as @poopingrabbit

Courtney is offering two free months at Creative Bug to my listeners. Use this link.

Here are some great takeaways from our conversation:

Any kind of public speaking will help you in all areas of speaking. For example, teaching a class gets you used to talking in front of a group. Don’t pass on other opportunities, like presenting at a gallery or art show just because you think you can’t do public speaking. You’ve probably gotten much better at speaking because you’ve been teaching.
When you purchase a subscription-based service, like Creative Bug, you have access to their whole library of classes. The library just keeps getting bigger, but as long as you are a member, you can take those classes. You’re also able to take them at your own pace. The classes are broken into smaller manageable lessons that you can repeat as many times as you’d like.
Courtney talked about the daily creative activities in her Living a More Creative Life course on Creative Bug. One thing she talks about is getting a library card and just going to your local library and exploring the books. Don’t look for a specific book, but look at categories of books and let yourself be open to finding something new.
Another way to expand your creativity is by collaborating with other artists. You don’t have to have a goal of selling the art, just making it so that you can challenge yourself to combine your art with a different style of art or different mediums.
Courtney says don’t be afraid to put your art and techniques out there through teaching and putting it on social media. There are some cases where art has been stolen by others. For the most part, though, sharing your knowledge will not take away from your capability, and you will continue to evolve and expand as an artist.

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#241 Dawn Trimble: Painting a Narrative with Spatial Harmony

Artist Dawn Trimble lives in Atlanta. Dawn is a painter with an interior design and architecture background. Just a few years ago, she started painting so she could take a break from so much time in front of the computer. Her paintings might be called minimalist, and yet she combines paint, oil crayons, scraps of paper, and words to make a beautiful composition. Each painting is a part of a named series, which she changes every few months. Her art reflects the joy that she feels, as well as the hope that she sees for the future.

Listen here or download from Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, CastBox, Overcast, iHeartRadio, Amazon podcasts, or Stitcher.

Dawn Trimble

Dawn’s website is dawnmtrimbleart.com

She can also be found on Instagram @dawnmtrimble_art

Dawn has art at the Atlanta Artist Collective.

Here is the link to the House Beautiful article about Dawn.

Here are some great takeaways from our conversation:

When you are first figuring out what kind of art you want to do, start small. It can be overwhelming to complete something large when you are still experimenting with materials and techniques.
A great way to experiment with unusual art materials is to go dumpster diving. Look in your own trash can to see what discarded things you may be able to use for your art, like cardboard, string, and metal.
Dawn likes to include white space in her art and think of that as its own medium. Think about whether you want to cover a paper or canvas completely with color, or leave some white, and how that will affect your colors.
When posting photos of your artwork, you can describe the materials, or the colors, or the composition, for example. Dawn thinks of her posts differently, and treats them like she is sharing her personal journal. She tells stories about what she is feeling and going through at the time she made her art. There’s no right or wrong way to share your art, you need to do what feels comfortable to you.
Dawn told us about a conversation she had with her son. He said that now is the time to figure out what your vision should be. Now is actually a perfect time to think about what you’d like to do in 2022. Evaluate what you did in 2020 and 2021, what worked, what didn’t, and what changes you made to your business as our economy changed. We all hope that next year will be back to normal, but you’ve probably already discovered that normal now is different than normal a few years ago. Make some end of year lists now that will help you to determine your future plans.

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#240 Cbabi Bayoc: Painting the World He Wants to See

Artist Cbabi Bayoc lives in St. Louis where he’s making a name for himself painting murals in schools and doing portraits. He started his art career doing caricatures, which he taught himself by studying other artists. His own style has evolved as he uses vibrant colors to bring movement to the piece. He often paints families and music, and he even created the cover art for an album by Prince. As Cbabi says, he is painting a world where his and your children can thrive.

Listen here or download from Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, CastBox, Overcast, iHeartRadio, Amazon podcasts, or Stitcher.

Cbabi Bayoc

Cbabi’s website is cbabibayoc.com.

He is on Instagram @cbabi and on Facebook and TikTok.

Here are some great takeaways from our conversation:

No matter what stage you are at in your art career, you should think about creating a body of work. If you want your artwork to sell, you need to make, make, make, so that you are ready for opportunities that will come your way.
When creating a body of work, also known as a collection, create so there is a common theme to your work. You can still have individual series, but overall, your artwork should look cohesive. What I mean is, people should be able to identify that you’re the artist by looking at any of your pieces. Even if some are portraits and some are abstracts, they should have something that tells the viewer they are yours, like a color scheme or a style.
I’ve said this many times before on this podcast and I’ll say it again: Diversify your art offerings in type and price range. Cbabi offers large paintings, but he also said that one of his biggest sellers is 5×7 prints. He also does murals for schools. One of the things we’ve seen from last year’s shutdown is that you can’t rely on one form of income, because you never know if or when that might be taken away from you.
The best kind of art that provides word of mouth business is murals. They act like a public business card because people will see them and tell others or contact you to do more.
When using a third-party platform to sell your art, you might want to direct sales there even if someone comes into your studio to buy. The more traffic you get on that site, the easier it will be for others to find your art there.
If you use more than one platform for sales, do different collections on each platform so there’s no overlap. Also, consider which price range would make sense for each platform.
Get creative in what you post on social media. Cbabi likes to do a little dancing in his posts, so he’s going to do some in front of his murals or in his studio so that they will be fun and also promote his business.

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#239 Kristin Dieng: Glass on Glass Mosaic Artist

Kristin Dieng is a fine mosaic artist who works with glass. Her glass on glass creations highlight light and color, illuminating different parts depending on where and what time of day they are viewed. Kristin’s creative motivation comes from her desire to respond positively to a chronic illness. For her, creating art provides an opportunity for finding purpose and enjoyment in life, and this enjoyment shines through her use of bright, colorful designs. Kristin specializes in nature-based designs, as well as complex geometric patterns that often incorporate geode slices, bike gears, healing stones and other forms of mixed media materials. She has exhibited her glass art in galleries as well as a recent solo show

Listen here or download from Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, CastBox, Overcast, iHeartRadio, Amazon podcasts, or Stitcher.

Kristin Dieng

Kristin’s website is kristindieng.com

You can purchase her glass art from her website and also from her Etsy site: Kristin Dieng Art

She is also on Instagram @kristindiengart

And on Pinterest

Here are some great takeaways from our conversation:

Kristin made a good point, about how our identity is often tied into our jobs. She lost her job due to illness, but it was important to her to have something else to do. That’s when she started making glass mosaics. Of course, she loves creating, and she’s really good at it, but it also gave her another part of her identity that her children could admire.
Another point she makes is that sometimes things are rough or complicated or you’re just too busy to make art. You need to make art anyway, because that complicated time is just a part of life and a part of your story. You don’t need to wait until the hard part is done before you start making art.
For Kristin’s glass artworks, you can move around it and see it from different angles, and it changes. It also changes depending on where you place it and how it catches the light, as well as how the light travels over it throughout the day and night. Think about this aspect of your art and how it looks from all angles at all times of day. You may think that your painting or wall hanging has just one side to it, as you will just be hanging it on a wall. Think beyond that, and consider whether your style of art can be made in a 3D shape, or can hang in the middle of a room. The environment where your art is placed can definitely change the art, so think about how and if you want it to change.
When thinking about what you want to share on social media, remember that it can take many forms. You could have taken 30 photos of one piece of art, and you can put that into quite a few social media posts. Or, you can just post a photo of yourself and tell a personal story. Whatever you do, it is your choice, and you don’t have to post anything because you think you should. There are no rules.
Kristin talked about the rules for sales when you are using Etsy. It sounds complicated to me, so my tip here is to make sure you fully understand how much money you make and how much the hosting platform makes when you sell your art. Look at all the rules and sales levels to be sure that it is worthwhile for you to use a separate platform vs. posting all your art on your own website.
When Kristin started showing her artwork in galleries, she was advised to use her name for her business name. That makes sense, because people will remember your name and can easily search online for your website that way.
You should also use your own name in your email address. That will make it easier for customers to find your email later.

Post category:Podcasts Season 4 Show Notes