” Just for the artFUN of it “
As an artist/sculptor/set designer/book illustrator/prop and miniature builder, I have been very blessed to make a good living at what I love to do. Some people might look at professional artists and think, “Man I wish I could do my art for a living.” The key words in that statement are “my art,” and the thing that you soon find out as a commercial artist is that it isn’t your art, it is your talent, your God-given gifts, creating art for someone else.
Soon after we purchased our first little starter home, my wife and I did the whole fixer-upper thing and managed to get in over our heads in debt. “Mall art shows” were in vogue back then, and in an effort to earn money above my blue collar job at Ford Motor Co., I entered my first art show.
I came up with a very contemporary “razor cut, peeled and paint” technique on colored plexiglass. It perfectly fit the style way back when, and my shows were a huge success. I received dozens of commissions and straightaway closed down my exhibitions and started painting.
Sunsets, sailboats, animals, kids, silhouettes, motorcycles, cars, cars, and more cars. The money was great and the commissions were an ego builder for sure. But, somewhere around the tenth or eleventh order, I was reading the instructions on the deposit check that read, in part … “Please show our sailboat crashing through a wave and make sure the name is clear and make sure the larger sail has a … blah … blah … blah”, and suddenly I thought to myself “This is hard work!” And it was, and it still is.
Artists everywhere are pulling all-nighters trying to get their art done for their clients or customers. To balance out your artWORK and keep it from becoming a daunting job, I recommend doing something that is artFUN … you know, something that you do for yourself… no pay, and you answer to no one (except maybe your spouse).
One of the things that fills that bill for me is the making of mobiles. After I have sculpted the main components of a mobile, my absolute favorite part of the process is assembling and balancing everything. I smile (out loud) as I manipulate gravity by adding tiny lead weights here and there until the mess of wires and weights all of a sudden balance perfectly and come alive as they move freely with the slightest wisp of air.
This giant feather mobile is about 7′ wide and weighs 15 -20 lbs. It is made of 1/2″ Gator board. Gator board is a foam core laminated between two layers of smooth hardboard. I like using gator board for mobiles as it is so easy to push the lead balancing weights into the foam center. I painted this piece with bronze impregnated paint and glazed it with blue, orange and purple interference colors.
My second passion and artistic retreat from art is cartooning. Now a big part of my career has been, in fact, drawing cartoons, but I also draw cartoons for my own enjoyment. Moving through my daily routine, I often see or experience something that just seems like it could or should be a cartoon. And just for the fun of it, I draw it, change it, draw a little more, erase part of it, and then, finally, I realize it is exactly what I wanted, and it makes ME laugh. Only when it makes me laugh do I feel I have succeeded, and have created my own artFUN.
The other day my wife and I were seated in a booth at our favorite hamburger joint when a rather heavy-set fellow entered. After a great deal of effort and frustration, he discovered he couldn’t fit into a booth and had to move to a table. I whispered to my wife, “Shouldn’t that be a huge red flag … you know, the first time you cannot fit into a booth?” At that moment, the “ding-dong” went off … the bell in my head that told me what a funny cartoon that would be. That led me to thinking that there are literally hundreds of times in our lives where “red flags” should pop up. As soon as I got back home, I made a quick list of some of the funny times in our lives when, whether we regarded them as such or not, there were indeed red flags, waving all over the place.
Any time I share this idea with friends, they have their own idea of a “red flag ” moment. If you have one that you would like to share and possibly see illustrated, please email me at dmessing@twmi.rr.com
So here is the “just for the ARTfun of it” launch of my very first “Red Flag” cartoon.
I can’t believe the above. My friend, Bev and I have almost seen this very thing happen in a restaurant. This is hillarious. In fact, we always seem to find the seats that eat at a table that means we eat our food – “chin level.”