My Artistic Journey.
Art : Till Death…
By Sakuan.
Where am I in my artistic journey and what am I looking forward to, what do I expect, and what am I supposed to expect? Well, for beginners I know creativity is more of a high-risk high reward type of thing. I understand what I’m doing has a high chance of failing, I’d like to imagine I’m prepared for that but of course I hope to succeed financially with my creativity. Who am I to deserve success from what I do, how am I different from other creators, why do I deserve it more than them? So, if I feel this way then why do I keep doing it, at first I did it for both personal and financial gain and I liked it but after researching and learning more about life in general, things changed, I still create but for different reasons, in short, my priorities as to why I make art shifted. If I don’t do this I have nothing to show for my existence and that doesn’t sit well with me, it gives me purpose, I don’t feel like I’m useless, I don’t feel like I’m just a waste of space, I don’t feel like I’m worthless and that feeling of knowing why you breathe beats any feeling I’ve ever felt before, that feeling of knowing exactly what you’re going to do when you wake up every morning is undefeated. So even if my art doesn’t succeed financially at least my mental health is intact and I’d rather that than having nothing, and if I were to start all over again, I would do the same thing maybe even better because now I know so much more than I did when I started. I’ll always keep creating.
Thinking about all this makes me wonder, would I ever sell out if I’m approached with the opportunity? What is selling out exactly and is it a bad thing? why do we feel like selling out is a bad thing? First, what is a sellout? A sellout is a person who betrays something to which he/she is said to owe allegiance, according to google. Is that such a bad thing? And if so why? For the most part, a sellout is mostly associated with money in today’s understanding. I feel like it depends on the thing you’re doing as an artist, sometimes for you not to keep on starving as an artist the opportunity to sell out might be the best thing that can happen to you. I feel like in certain career paths having the opportunity to sell out is a blessing. I see it all the time, celebrities being called out for being sellouts by the public, and it gets me thinking, 99% of the people who are calling them out for being sellouts would sell out for way less. Technically if you hate your job but you keep going, to some extent you’re a sellout, let me extend an olive branch, and I know this is bold of me to say but, if you don’t do what you love then you’re a sellout, you’re betraying something to which you owe allegiance to, you are partaking in something you don’t agree with something that doesn’t align with the core of your being. We are so quick to point fingers at those celebrities because “why would they want more?” right? We are human we always want more, and unless you know when to stop it all becomes a vicious circle, it never ends for most of us, we are always trying to get more and more.
What now? I guess I keep creating and see where it goes or see if it goes somewhere. If it does, good, that means I lucked out, and if it doesn’t, well, life doesn’t always go your way. What would I tell a creative person what to do if their thing doesn’t work out for them? I don’t know how to say it in a way that’ll speak to the majority because putting words together and make them make sense in a helpful way to the majority is near impossible, people react to things differently and rightly so because we are all from different backgrounds and beliefs. If I start doing that then I’ll be considered an influencer and I don’t know how to feel about that word, influencer, influencing people, like who am I to influence someone, what right do I have to influence someone, I just do what I do and live my life in a way that I see fit, and if people decide to tag along on my journey they shouldn’t feel like I’m their influencer because I shape my life according to the things I’ve gone through, the background I’m from, the things I’ve done and the things I haven’t. So how can I influence you with my life when I’m the only person who knows what I’ve done and not done in my life, my life is unique to me so how can somebody else be influenced by it? These are questions that puzzle my brain. Of course, I know my life can influence other people but I’m yet to understand it fully and I’m still learning about it, I’m yet to understand why someone would blindly do what an influencer tells them to do without giving that much thought into it, it could be the simplest things. A good example, when you watch a YouTube video of a popular YouTuber, and they tell you at the end of their video, please like the video and subscribe, and you do it, why do people do it? Do they do it because the “influencer” said so? I’m trying to study and understand why someone would just do it because someone asked them to, it puzzles me because I don’t do that because it doesn’t make any sense as little of a deal as it might seem. Times like this is where I wish I took Psychology back in college, ha.
