Seeking my Future through Art

With 0 Comments

Story and artwork from Mike SanDiego

Greetings to Everyone!

I have been seeking my future in art for many years, and after almost two decades of hard work I have found myself in a challenging situation, as many others have, and faced with choices to either sink or swim. I chose to swim, and do the utmost I can to stay afloat. Art may seem like a difficult choice to make a career from, but for me this is a passion that I must turn from dream into reality. Even in the midst of the pandemic, with all the challenges it brings, I refuse to give up.

For me, art has been a part of my life and an interest among many other things, all of which I remember my parents did what they could to support me in growing up. I got a bit of a later start than most, not really making the decision that this would be my life until senior year of high school and taking a drawing class with my first real teacher, Mr, Dan Keller, who showed me that yes, you can in fact learn to draw and was quite encouraging. From that point on my course was set.

I entered my local community college the following Fall, and instead of going into medicine like I had thought I would for many years, and surprising everyone, I chose art. Who knew? Well I did, not many others around me, but I knew. Why? Because even though it was touch and go as a young boy, the truth is that I’ve always wanted to be able to draw, and to do it well, but was easily discouraged when I looked around, saw the students who were actually really good at it, and felt I never could do that because my attempts always failed.

Long story short, I got my degree, worked for a time in the Library, and then landed a job as a graphic designer where I learned many valuable lessons and worked under my manager Ann Bentson for 15 years, until the pandemic hit, and I was laid off. I had the opportunity to return for a time and work from home, so I took it, and when I was called back long before I expected, I decided it was time to make that hard choice, and knew that if I didn’t try to make my dream a reality, to become an illustrator, not just a graphic designer, that I had to take the chance.

I enrolled in an online program called Evolve Artist which focuses on traditional oil painting, with a modern approach applied. It has taught me much, but previous experience allowed me to see what was missing from the teachings and prompted me to find the solution. So I sought out an answer, and I found the Drawing Academy. Low and behold, here was something I thought lost, Classical Russian Figure Drawing! A complete and solid comprehensive system that teaches the classic tradition of drawing from life and imagination, emphasizing the constructive approach that I have always felt was so critical to drawing.

If you work from photos too much, or even exclusively, and merely copy you are doing yourself a huge dis-service. Why? Because you will never understand what you are really looking at! It’s one thing to train and reproduce a photo or even a still life with great accuracy, but quite another to actually understand what you are doing and looking at with a secure knowledge of anatomy and proportion and construction in your mind to draw upon!

Truly creative and free expression of artistic ideas and concepts is founded in this very thing. You use your mind and your eye to draw, knowledge and observation from life together! This is how a truly skilled artist works.

When I found Drawing Academy it opened my eyes to the fact that what I thought I understood, and perhaps do to some degree, could actually go much farther and felt like it was the perfect find and the perfect time. It seems like the old saying the teacher appears when the student is ready. There it is…just waiting.

Unfortunately, right now, I am unemployed, but even so have chosen to use this time as an opportunity to do my best to make my dreams a reality. For me, simply returning to a day job so I can pay the bills and create art is not the answer…I did that for 15 years and would have continued doing so until retirement. That aside, I have chosen a challenging and difficult path, but with the support of my friends, and my family I am doing what I can to make this dream real.

If I can enter the Drawing Academy course, I will gain access to some of the top artists in the field today, helping me on my drawings, for life. This is a rare opportunity, and so I am entering this competition in the hopes that I can have one more resource to speed me along on this journey!