Love letter to the suffering artist

We all come to the point of being at a crossroad of choosing a life or career path. It’s really one decision for both of these things. You’re not just deciding on a career, you will be devoting most of your life to this. You want it to be something of your own creating. You want it to be your love child, your homegrown flower.

There is a great devotion, a full commitment when entering life as an artist or creator, or whatever you want to call it.

We enter a time in which we get to redefine many things, one of those things being what it means to be an artist and creator. You don't have to be painting or crafting something every day to be a creative. You don’t have to be a designer who keeps releasing collection after collection to be ‘allowed’ to call yourself a designer. Who decides that anyway? A few elites? Where? Who are they? It's about time we stop believing that somewhere, some posh senior artist is looking at us young, flourishing artists and deciding whether we are worthy of that title. There isn’t such a person or group, it’s just you and your tribe. You, together, against the current of the old rules, the old ways of being, the judgmental ways that people in art and life put value on one another. Against the way snobbism has taken over most of the ‘social’ part in this world, and the way we’ve made it the ultimate goal to be able to brag about yourself and talk down on other artists. Or at least to be in a space where you feel defined enough by others appreciation, so that you get to judge others and even influence the careers of younger artists by simply your liking or disliking of their work.

What does it mean to be an artist these days? Does it mean that you suffer every day, drink gallons of coffee and that you haven’t washed your bed in months simply because you haven’t really been using it for more than two hours a night?

I have entered the world of aspiring artists in the 21st century -also known as art university- and I have to say, I’ve had fun. But I want to break the mould that I was trying to fit myself into. I hope you are willing to hear me out on this one, and maybe, just maybe, even step onto this yellow brick road with me. It’s gonna be a crazy ride, but oh heavens are we gonna have some fun.

So yes, there is a huge commitment, a dedication of one's time and life when entering the path to follow their dreams. You’re about 16 years old and standing on a crossroad. You can go with the current, which is whatever people around you decide on doing most, like I did. I entered an economics and business university, because you could ‘make some money’ and I could tell myself as it was an art-focused university, that I was being creative. I despised going there, as I wasn't doing anything I really loved, making calculations, writing out business plans and pitching. To be completely honest, I did love the pitching. Such excitement. Who knew a year later I’d be pitching my own creations on an almost daily basis at an art university.

I loved some aspects of the business uni course, but didn’t feel like I was putting my talents to good use. They told us we were doing creative work and I didn’t really feel it. I later discovered that I felt a need to create things with my own hands, which explains why I mustn’t have felt the creativity as much during my time of business university.

Fast forward to now, I am seeing so much value in that year of business school. I even asked my sister to send those books to my home in London, because I remembered some awesome passages in them and I am now actually making business plans and pitches. Who’d have thought. In art university, where I studied fashion design, I was the business girl who would love doing pitches, make call sheets for shows and take care of schedules. I always loved doing this almost as much as standing in front of my mannequin and draping a corset on it, or doing embroidery with beads and crystals.

So I guess what I’m trying to say here is, we should soften up in how we label a ‘right or wrong’ course or major. We all feel like we’ve failed massively when we switch majors or drop out of college, but we don’t realise that the creation of our life and career in the 2020’s is something we make up totally on our own. Going to college and working the exact job you’ve studied to do is almost impossible for many creatives these days. It’s because 1, we all want something totally different, and there simply aren't enough resources to prepare anyone individually for exactly what they end up doing and 2, systems have been outdated and are focusing on either making yourself a celebrated artist or getting you ready to work for others and be as good of service as possible. To me, there is a whole area in between and around it, that merges everything we know about art, history, media and business. I think it’s about time we start taking these seriously as the ingredients for one big mixture that makes up the career and life path of one single person. Creatives aren’t linear. We’re not one thing. We can be all. We can be designers and salesmen, healers and writers, we can be serious and outgoing, wild and wise.

So when you’re choosing your career path, which also your life path, don’t take it lightly. Do it with full devotion, but know that it is up to you to educate yourself for the life that you desire. Take that extra course, take a break in between years to develop your other skills, take care of your soul and health, make sure you feel strong and mentally healthy before anything else, and then go to the auditions. Take on the admissions. Get yourself in those scary rooms that seem snobbish and niche now, if only to someday leave them behind as more welcoming and open places than you once found them. Make the connections, let love be your motivator, let passion be your drive and never turn your back on your dreams. What’s yours will always be yours, waiting for you somewhere sacred, with your name written on it in pure gold.

This path can be a rough one, but it is up to you how rough of a path it is and how much you are willing to suffer. If it gets too much, take a left. You will still end up where you belong. Don’t let anyone tell you that if you don’t do things the regular way you will not amount to much. Show them how wrong they are. Not out of revenge but out of pure love for your inner self, who you owe it to, to live out your dreams. Who you owe it to, to stand on both your feet somewhere along your journey and say ‘Look, we did it. I did this for me, for us.’

Don’t let any people, institutions or fears put you into a picture that has already been taken hundreds of times. Create your own. And please, call yourself an artist, a creator, an entrepreneur if that is what YOU feel you are.