ART SCHOOL | INTERVIEW WITH BRIAN SMITHFilled up sketchbooks of distorted portraits of passer-bys, m

ART SCHOOL | INTERVIEW WITH BRIAN SMITHFilled up sketchbooks of distorted portraits of passer-bys, mundane objects, personal notes, weird thoughts and meanderings are just a couple things in artist Brian Smith’s sketchbook and works. Textured with black and gray tones, Brian’s drawings are often personal, humorous, and observational. We’re excited to chat with Brian to find out more about his background, drawings, and what he has coming up for the rest of the year. Take the Leap!  Photographs courtesy of the artist. Introduce yourself?My name is Brian Smith, I’m from a town called Hicksville, New York. Now, recently living in Los Angeles, California. I’m currently the sole employee of a warehouse and I like to draw.What was your introduction to drawing and/or art in general? What were your early influences? I’d had a babysitter who showed me how to draw actual hands and not just the turkey ones you make when you’re little. That was pretty big for me. It got me interested in figuring out how to draw other things just by looking at them for a bit.  I always had sketchbooks as a kid, and in turn would forget them somewhere. My Nana who was kind of a closet artist would find them and leave little watercolor drawings of shore birds, ladybugs on tall grass, pond habitats etc. That seeded some notion I wouldn’t come to until much later about the intimacy of sketchbooks and how good it feels to give and receive drawings. Early influences would definitely be those two women. There was also a lot of adolescent suburban troublemaking, the inevitable introduction to skateboarding and cartoons like Rocko’s Modern Life and Ren and Stimpy.How would you describe your work now to someone who is just coming across it? I generally stumble through an explanation if I’m ever asked.  I recently looked back at like two years of drawings for a show. Seeing a good chunk of what you’ve drawn over a period of time all at once is wild. I still don’t think I’ve got my answer. It’s all kind of vague, sad, funny and personal. I like it to be just so, where people can attach their own meaning to it or ask questions about it.  How did you find yourself going from maybe keeping a journal to actually getting work creating art or selling artwork? I’m still getting there.  I think so far those things for me have a mutually beneficial relationship. Drawing in sketchbooks is where I’m most productive.  Everything after that is selected and isolated into its own drawing. That isolated sketchbook drawing might become a print or an image someone wants to buy or use for something which is always great.How do your ideas take shape? How do you get from start to finish? What’s your process?It’s a total crap shoot haha. Sometimes I’ll blast through something in a night and others, a half inked drawing will sit in a drawer for months before I’m ready to get back into it. I get my ideas from a lot of things and in a lot of different ways though. I have a very distracting internal dialogue from time to time, I don’t know what it is. Sometimes I’ll just hang on a phrase, words that sound funny strung together in a sentence and put it down on paper and save it, maybe draw what it makes me think of later on. This croucher character I started drawing came from a thought I had of how dumb I must’ve looked a few days earlier, scrunched down taking a photo in the city while a wall of people moved around me. When are you most inspired? And what is your favorite subjects or things to draw and why?Inspiration strikes at random. I mostly like to draw at night or very early in the morning. I like drawing dogs and people, they’re emotional critters.What artists inspire you these days? The artists in my immediate circle at Bill’s Bar (@billsbarla). Those people are constantly creating and progressing. It’s insane.You moved to LA not too long ago, how has living here influenced your artwork if at all? What do you think about the art community in LA? I got out here in November. Lots of sketching and a few finished drawings in the bag since then. I’ve got a few ideas that’ll have to cook a bit longer before I figure out what to do with them. It’s definitely been a receptive town for me, showed a bunch of drawings I’d been sitting on and got a nice response. I’ve been to a few art shows and they got me pretty excited on what’s going on and what can be achieved with some elbow grease. Tell us about a favorite project or collaboration you’ve done. What kind of challenges do collaborations pose and what do you love about them? My favorite collaboration has been with Austin England (@mochelife). We started sharing drawings through the mail over a decade ago. We did that for years before we actually met in person 6 or 7 years ago. Now we share a studio space with some other great artists and I’m currently babysitting his dog Lola. Collaborations for me can tend to lead to overthinking. Not always, but sometimes.. and when it gets to that point it’s tricky to dig yourself out and just relax and work with what the other person is doing. I love the whole process of it though, it’s fun and you never know where it’s going to go. You usually learn something new and wind up with something cool. That’s the best.What was your last adventure that showed up in one of your illustrations, thematically or just visually? Driving through the midwest. Indescribable. I drew a bunch of roadkill from memory that was pretty fun and weird.Every artist has a different way of making his or her artist career work. How do you make it work for you? Do you spend time maintaining an online store or just draw when you want when you have free time? I pretty much draw when I can. Sometimes I just don’t feel like it, which is always tough. I just draw in my sketchbooks, turn those pages into zines or actual finished pieces and let people know they’re for sale on instagram. I haven’t quite dialed in the online store thing just yet, but I’ll get there. Every now and again a drawing job or commission will pop up. What advice would you give someone who wants to follow in your footsteps and pursue art?Don’t follow in my footsteps. Go to lots of museums and art shows. Keep a pen in your pocket. Take the extra time to get an image to look the way you want it to. What’s your best Art School tip that you want to share with folks? Don’t write your artist statement in the 3rd person. When you aren’t drawing or hustling, what do you do to relax or just stay fresh in life? Beers, talks, books and walks to relax. Going to a museum, taking a trip and or getting out of the old comfort zone to stay fresh.What are your favorite style of VANS?I like the white Vans Authentic, especially all worn in and pretty raggedy looking.Anything you can share that is coming up?I don’t have anything coming up which is nice. Everything’s pretty wide open creatively, so I’m just gonna keep my antennas tuned and try and get productive.FOLLOW BRIAN | WEBSITE | INSTAGRAM -- source link

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