‘Artist’ vs. ‘Human’ with Featured Créative Aria Bird
Before the pandemic started, I had gone two full years without creating, without drawing one single new drawing. Just re-posting old artwork, throwbacks, and maybe starting a new concept for a series and never finishing it. I had gotten more depressed than I'd ever been before. As much as I hate to say it, this past year's pandemic helped bring me out of it.
Long before the pandemic, I did numerous art markets, was ripped off by art showcase companies, and let other collectives take fifty...yes 50%...commission. One day I realized this isn't fun and doesn't feel fair. Taking on the title of ‘artist’ felt like a burden. For example, turning my art into mass produced soulless stickers for people that thought $2 was too expensive—if this was what being an ‘artist’ meant, I wanted no part of it.
A month after the pandemic hit, like many others, I was let go from my day job of three years as a graphic designer. I also had broken up with my boyfriend of what would have been six years, which meant I needed to find a new home. Through several frustrating attempts to find a new place to live, I ended up at my family's cabin in the middle of the woods. With no internet, no cell service, and no insulation. I was in a place cut off from the modern world, which gave me space to be with myself. Turns out, I hadn’t had a chance to sit and think since I was sixteen.
To say I was burnt out pre-pandemic would be an understatement. I had always been a restlessly annoying overachiever, always feeling as though everything I was doing wasn’t enough. Not taking a break between high school and college, no breaks in college, and no break between college and my first job. During that first job I ended up starting a full-fledged art business and Etsy shop on the side. Even my lunch breaks would consist of walking down to Herkimer’s coffee to work on my drawings and apply for art shows and markets. I never realized how stressed and exhausted I was until the pandemic forced me to stop. Not only stop working but stop living the lie-fstyle I had become so accustomed to.
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