DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Everything Else... Making a run at my dream.

As many of you may know I’m a nurse, but I’m also an artist. I’ve been a nurse for 27 years, an artist my entire 51 year life. Over the past handful of years my art has started being financially lucrative. Last year was crazy from that standpoint. I never could have imagined my creativity being so profitable. I’m blessed.

Well, two weeks ago I was laid off from my job as a nurse. Due to INCREDIBLY poor management I was let go related to ‘lack of census’… aka not enough clients under our care. I’ve been watching that slow train rolling down the tracks towards me for some time. I just bided my time and socked away money… the train hit. Honestly, it was the proverbial bandaide being ripped off for me. The push off the cliff I’ve been standing on the precipice of for a year or so.
So… I’m taking my severance pay and opening a new door. I’m making a run at my art career full time. It’s scary as hell but I believe the cosmos/God has plans for me. Ones I may have been too scared to attempt without that bandaide being ripped off for me.

My buddy I create with and I regularly get chosen as a top 3 or 4 artist chosen to make a presentation to get a gig that we, and hundreds of other artists, have applied for. We’re in the running for a gig in Orange County, top three. So a 33.4% chance of landing that gig. We were recently top 4 for a gig in Colorado… we did our presentation on Friday… we were unanimously chosen. Getting that gig. A gig that will pay me my entire year’s nursing salary with just a couple months of hard work. I’m blessed. I’m eternally humbled that my lifetime of sharing my creativity has culminated in the place I find myself today.
Life in the arts is no guarantee but I wholeheartedly believe that I wasn’t put on this earth to not be an artist. So I’m taking the leap of faith.

I wish I could share with you all what I do, but sadly in today’s day and age of doxing, and general online stalking and assholery I don’t feel safe sharing.
That said there’s a few here that have seen my work… Pit, FATE as example.

Lastly I want to thank Clem.
Dude, you’ve followed my art career here for years. You’ve seen me go from paper mache and chicken wire to large scale steel creations. You’ve been not only a big cheerleader for me, but also an inspiration. You chased your dream in the arts. A path with no real guideposts, no rails, and no guarantees… I have longed to be brave like you.

I’ve said my entire life, “when I grow up I want to be an artist”. Here I am, 51 years old, dreams can still come true. Wish me luck.

I've seen some of your latest art and let me say it's quite impressive. I have no doubt you will do very well moving forward. It's not often people have a legitimate shot at success when following their dream. However you have a solid foundation of success with which to build on and many of your artistic relationships have been formed. I know you will do well and wish you all the best moving forward in your future endeavours.

It’s been a tremendous amount of hard work to get here. I’ve essentially worked 6 days a week since 2008. Working as a nurse Monday through Friday. Then Saturdays and or Sundays at my shop. Along with many weekday evenings too. In that time I’ve taught myself to weld. This opened doors to creating BIG art. Which we now do for city parks and such.
In that same time I’ve pretty much given my paid time from work to support my art. Traveling to music festivals as an installation artist. Traveling to take interviews to get jobs. Traveling to install completed art. In just the past couple of years I’ve been to Nevada, Colorado, Oklahoma, Florida, and Riyadh Saudi Arabia(!)… crazy. It limited my time to go home to Ohio to see family. Or to go fishing. Or camping. Or many of the other things I love. The sacrifice has been hard, and real but I always believed it’d pay off. If by nothing else except being able to share my creativity with a larger and larger audience. It’s now become so much more than I ever could have dreamed.

I hope to never be owned by another company in exchange for pay. I hope to never have to ask for time off again. Or ration my time off in such ways that limit my life to fit in with the corporate world.

I hope I’ve broken those shackles for good.

Go make it big!

Awesome. Knowing firsthand many of the sacrifices and hardships you faced as a nurse for 3 decades.....I wish you the very best. It's well deserved.

What kind of artist are you? What is your medium?

Congrats, BTW!

Congrats! Living your dream and being self employed is the most rewarding path in life for many. I quit my job when I was 39 to live my dream and I'm 52 now. Good luck on your path.

I went to the Columbus College of Art annd Design and BGSU focusing on illustration and graphic design. I have continued to be an illustrator all these years, but around 2011 I picked up a welder. Now I create large scale steel/aluminum art. My creative partner and I have been honorarium grant artists for Burning Man seven times. If you’ve ever looked up images of Burning Man art you’ve likely seen our work. Now I use my illustration skills to design stickers, logos, and such for our pieces of art and our other artistic endeavors.

YOU have nothing to be afraid of. YOU have already paid your dues. You're not 'taking a stab' at something. You've already made so many sacrifices, this is the only logical choice.

I bet you don't even calculate the sacrifices. They were a means to an end in living your true passion. And I'll tell from experience -- as long as you have passion -- the ghosts of fear are already defeated.

Here's to you living your dreams. I'm excited for your future and can't even draw a stick figure. Very proud of you, bro.

He does big, bold, audacious, sometimes damn near the size of a football field. Sooner of later (probably sooner), people will start saying "sold" and jusk ask how many zeros.

What exciting news!! I’m so happy for you. Nothing more exhilarating than embarking on a dream!

I hope you keep us posted along the way.

Cool man, I am happy for you and admire the drive. I might take issue you have been an artist your entire life, but then again, maybe your Mama plopped out a artist, who knows?



Follow the dream my man. We only have time, and time is our life.

They say you can't stop Mother Nature, and you can't, but Father Time has a much more impact on our life. That clock doesn't stop.


Go for it.

From what I’ve heard, nursing and teaching are the two most stressful jobs in the country. You’ve earned that severance. You’ve helped and healed people for years. I support you. My uncle recently opened an art studio in Houston and is doing great. He creates his own pottery and sells it. He also sells other art on consignment. Pm me and I’d be glad to give you his info.

As to my lifetime of being an artist.
My talent was first recognized in the first grade. I was pulled aside and put in classes for gifted kids. Kids that already played instruments or showed other talents beyond their age. I never drew stick figures. I started dating and saving my drawings in 1978. I was 6. My mom would take my siblings and I to the library when we were young. I checked out books on drawing. Books on how to draw animals, jets, cars, etc. I grew up in the sticks of NW Ohio, and to be honest I didn’t have a ton of friends… being the runty art nerd in a football crazy highschool. So I drew. And drew.
Maybe we aren’t born artists, musicians, or whatever… but I’ve had this creative thing inside me ever since I can remember. I think God gives us all gifts. Not everyone finds theirs. Not everyone can make a living from theirs. I honestly believe God gave me this spark. It’s why I also feel like it’s my job to put the work in to make me, my path, worthy of that gift.
Maybe I wasn’t born an artist… but it’s all I’ve ever wanted to do.

Well a football field is maybe overstating it a bit. LOL
I think the largest footprint of any of our creations is maybe 40’x40’. Maybe slightly larger. That said some of the performances we’ve put on with large puppets and props have covered larger areas. Those were separate pieces of a larger thing. Not a single piece of art.
We have a pitch for another Burning Man piece. It’ll have a fairly large footprint too… if they fund it.
The Burn came to us this year to submit a design for the ‘Man plaza’. Basically the base the Man stands on and the surrounding structures that tie into the base and festival theme. Every year they tap a select small handful of artists to submit designs. This is our first go at it. If they choose our design it’ll be the largest thing we’ve ever had a hand in creating. The Burn and their team of engineers and builders actually do the building out of the chosen design. Not the artist. Still a cool thing to have a hand in.

Yeah, well, we'll just say it's larger than 'life'.

Seriously though, from concept to finished product, not many artists flex so many 'muscles' to journey from point A to point B of a project. And now, finally, the journey becomes the road less traveled. So [censored] awesome.

PD...follow your dreams and don't look back..good luck..!

Good Luck

Good Luck Port! I hope it takes off like gangbusters for you.

On a side note, my mom left nursing at her retirement but wasn’t quite sure she was truly done. She just kept her license and edu requirements up to date for 5 years. And she also found that home care nurses make incredible money in this area, and she could pick up as many or as few shifts as she needed/wanted. She never actually needed the work or wanted it, but she got all set up for it just in case she did. I thought I’d share that for a solid plan B or transitional assist if you need it. I think it’s great you’re are going for your dream career.

I renew my license this year. I’ve worked enough hours over the past two years to keep my license valid for another cycle. After that I may have to work the minimum hours a month, about 17, to keep my license up to date. I’ll likely end up doing through an agency as I could pick and choose my schedule. Losing my license would be a bit of a gamble at my age. The art I create is big. It requires both me and my buddy to make. Often we bring in friends to help too. If something were to happen to my buddy I honestly don’t think I could carry on without him at the scale we build. None of our friends have the same passion we have to go at it full time. I could scale back and still produce art but likely not the scale that we do now. Therefore the money would be different. I figure as long as we keep getting big gigs, I have about 5 or 6 years to ride out before I’d feel comfortable walking away from my license all together. Unless of course we start adding another zero to the end of our sale prices. That’d change everything.

Become a travel nurse to be updated. The pay is more than good and it might help inspire your art.

Be both.

Two words advice...."Call people"......Get / Make a list call anyone you think can use your services. Put their names and company in outlook. Make brief notes of what you talked about and dates. Call anyone and everyone. Send out emails create a website. That should help I have been doing this for years. Good luck and congrats. FYI I graduated from a prestigious art school. CIA

Travel nursing is gig work. It’s usually a 2-4 month long gig in another city. Often times you’re filling in for nurses on maternity leave or other such long, but temporary, shortages in staff. I can’t travel like that and still be a domestic partner, dog dad, and artist locally.
An agency is similar but it’s more like scab work. The local hospital gets slammed with a bunch of nurses with the flu… they call for a shift work agency nurse to fill in. A nursing home has a nurse quit before they can replace them… they call in an agency nurse to fill in shifts until they can hire. Etc. It’s day to day. Shift to shift. The pay is great. I did it for about four years prior to moving to Oregon. I did it when I first landed out here too. Instant work the day you arrive no matter what city you’re in. As long as you have a license to practice in the state.
Working agency for your only source of pay can be a bit challenging though. Getting enough hours to pay the bills might mean having to take shifts you don’t want, like third shift, or working in settings you don’t really want… like ICU. I did one shift in ICU… that was the last time I’d ever do it. Agency nurses often get cancelled on. More than once I’d schedule a shift, only to get a call cancelling the shift a couple hours before my shift was to start. Often times it’s because another nurse employed by the nursing home or hospital was convinced at the last minute to cover the open shift. Often times employee nurses are given a shift bonus to cover as it’s still cheaper than bringing in an agency nurse. The one nice thing is most agencies still pay their nurse for four hours if their shift gets cancelled at the last minute. Those were the best days! Lol
As a supplement to income, or as a means to maintain your license, agency is kind of ideal.

Good luck, Portland! Live that dream!!!

There’s a website called CaFE that is a go to for artists. It’s a place for businesses and municipalities to put their calls for art. As an artist you can search for the types of jobs you might be qualified for. We fill out tons of them. Every year we get far more rejection letters or no response than we do positive responses. That said about 3 or 4 times a year we find ourselves being selected to give a proposal to actually land the gig. Basically the people that called for art look at your resume and portfolio and decide if they want to see what you might offer them. Usually they only choose 3 or 4 artists to get to that stage. Of those opportunities we get maybe 40-50% of those gigs. Our Colorado gig is our biggest get, budget wise. $160,000. That has to cover materials, travel, shipping of the art, engineering, ancillaries, shop rent, labor (us), and artist fee (also us). We’ll do well on the backend of this project.

Do you work as an artist? If not, do you still create? What medium?

I applied to CIA and CCAD. Got into both but got a bigger scholarship to CCAD, so chose it.

https://artist.callforentry.org/fes...m0wDmDEj_nOeKi6kQWJgIHvTSpRoC6KAQAvD_BwE

I help sculpt the NYC skyline. Mostly an architect / computer nerd at this point. I do production work and and training for architectural firms. They build from my drawings, created from a full scale 3D computer model. There is design and graphic design involved. I love it. The biggest projects I worked on were $700, $500 and $350 million. I got my crumbs from those budgets. They were not my projects. They are projects I assisted with as a consultant to the architects..

Good luck Portland !!

You have shared some stories of where your art has taken you and the doors of opportunity that have opened up for you.

Your journey started a ways back, you are riding on exciting times and experiences that make incredible memories.

New chapter in your life, write it in the way you want it to be !

You will succeed and enjoy what's ahead for you.

I love hearing this kind of story. I’ve been a life long musician, played in bands and toured extensively and was signed for a hot minute in the 90’s but family and financial realities had me shoveling dirt on it about 10yrs ago. Then in 2022 it hit me like a fright train. It just started pouring out of me again. Now I have a full length coming out on March 1, first in 12yrs. Doing a little radio promotion, internet push, see what happens. I have no illusions about my own ability to live off my art any time soon but I’ve come to fully embrace that this is a life long thing. I can’t just put it down and walk away. It won’t let me. I know so many artists that walk away for good at a certain age. They either just run out gas or the lack of support or care in the world wears them out. So it’s wonderful to hear when an artist is taking off at 50+. Would love to see your work but I also am protective of my identity on the interwebs.

That’s great that you’ve reignited that flickering spark. The arts are weird. Being creative comes easy for me. Being original is the challenge. It’s not hard when you’re being original to have lapses in your volume of production. It’s often times why bands have one great album in them. Or a novelist, one novel. They had their entire life to create those stories. It’s the next novel… the next album… that’s where the challenge lays. Having enough of a creative voice to push beyond that first round.
I’d imagine as a musician you hope to surround yourself with equal or greater talent to draw the best out of you. Helping to share some of the original creative force that can be brought to the masses. Sounds like maybe you’re doing it solo? If so it’s certainly more of a challenge to carry that flame.
A lot of artists work solo. I did for years. Still do for pleasure. I’m also in a great creative partnership. My buddy is prolifically creative and original, but when it comes right down to it I’m the better artist. He’s a great builder, his background. I have a trained artistic background. He comes up with crazy (censored). I art up his scribbles. That’s not to say he’s not artistic. Or that I’m not a builder. But what we bring to the table is two unique backgrounds. It’s made both of us better. We are where we are because it’s the two of us. Thankfully what we have very much in common is an esthetic. We both grew up watching The Muppets, and Star Wars, and such. We both are, by normal society standards, weird. We both like to try to outdo each other in that department when it comes to pushing our creative ideas further and further to the strange. Especially when we were designing and building performances for music festivals. Our goal was to send all the audience members back into the default world left trying to describe to their coworkers what they saw… and then get dragged into HR and drug tested. Lol Think LSD fueled fever dream.

Anyway, good luck man. I hope your album is a success by any metric. Even if it’s just that it’s something you’re incredibly proud of. Ultimately I hope you made it for you. That’s the truest you can be. If others dig it, bonus.

Thanks man. I honestly wish I had a partnership in some way. I’ve had a number of them over the years, most recently with an guy that’s toured the world with a number of very high profile acts and who now owns a big beautiful vintage gear studio in Brooklyn. He’s doing very well with that annd he has young kids and so he’s made it clear his original music making days are behind him.

I play most of the important instruments moderately well and I was a session singer back in the day, as well as commercial music producer, also for just a hot minute, in the late 90’s/ early 00’s so I can pretty much do all the playing and recording on my own. Except drums, I’m a marginal drummer. Luckily my old drummer from 20 years ago, who is himself a very successful session and touring guy with some big acts, has a permanent drum recording setup in LA where he does remote session work and he knocks that out for me. In a way it’s a blessing, all these tools that make being self-sufficient a true reality. For the first time I’m just doing my thing without bouncing off anyone else and most of the feedback I’m getting is that it’s the best stuff I’ve ever done. But it’s kind of a curse. I do miss that electrical charge, that tiny bit of competition and showing off and good natured one-up-manship of working with someone you know is very good at what they do. Plus the whole division of labor thing. It’s a crap load of work to properly promote in this weird social media world we live in. I hate it. That part of being solo sucks. Anyway, I’m a young 52 now and I never say never but I doubt I’m ever going to put a full, democratic sort of band together ever again. But I’ll be putting music out for the foreseeable future. Seems like I always have more pots simmering than I have time to devote to them lately. That’s not going away.

Good luck my man, love to hear the passion and that you’re truly becoming what you are.

One of my oldest buddies is a one man band. His parents were amateur musicians, playing in local bands. He’s played music since he was a teen, learning from them drums, guitar, and bass. He went on to teach his friends to play drums, and bass so he could have a (punk) band. (The drummer has gone on to be a session and touring drummer for a number of known acts.)
When he was a teen he inherited his parents older mixing board when they upgraded. So he’s been playing around with recording and mixing since he was like 15. Now he’s got a studio set up in his basement and on top of that he’s a computer whiz, IT, guy. So it’s pretty cool what he can pull off. Intermittently he plays in an actual band or sits in with other bands locally. Mostly now he just records his own stuff, using a drum machine as it’s easier for him than recording a kit.
Nothing wrong with owning the entire process. If Paul MCartney can do it, so can you. Lol

What kind of music do you play?

My buddy is kinda Ween-esque.

I was a late ween convert. I didn’t take them seriously back in the day (because they didn’t take anything seriously and I really wasn’t into joke acts) but then years later someone clued me in that they were actually super on it musically sorta on the sly. I went down a rabbit hole with those records. Good stuff. I grew up in Cleveland so I was fed a steady diet of corn fed classic rock and metal from older sibs when I was young but then teen years took a hard turn, first into hardcore, thrash & punk and then into more garage, underground and indie rock stuff as I got into college and beyond. I’m a wide pallet guy but skew pretty heavily to the left end of fm dial. I’ve been told a few times recently my stuff has a distinct 90’s and 00’s indie rock radio vibe which makes sense of course. But I think I’m just a singer songwriter who just tries to lean into song craft but likes to flesh it all out with all the bells and whistles and call myself a band. It keeps me off the streets.

j/c

This is one of the most uplifting personal stories we've had in quite some time, and it couldn't have happened to a more deserving person... and I use the word 'deserving' intentionally.

Over some years, I've been lucky enough to watch Our Dawg Portland through pretty much every step in his journey. It's been an education for me, because I'm not professionally attached to his vein of the Arts scene. Nonetheless, each branch of the Arts requires certain attributes from its (successful) practitioners:

1. Passion. The motivation/inspiration must come from an absolute fascination and affinity for the art form. And it must come from within. It must be the North Star that drags you through the truly tough times, when the work is hard and the rewards are few. Tons of talented people leave the calling when they hit this wall... and The Wall is in the path of every single person who has ever wanted to do Art.

2. Discipline. To have the fortitude and wherewithal to do the boring, daily stuff that builds the foundation- but feels like meaningless grunt work. Discipline is that trait which compels the person to do the ugly, daily work even on days when the calling feels like a thankless chore. I still work to refine my bow strokes, after 48 years of following this calling, and I know that Portland still works to make the most seamless, natural-looking, invisible welds on his large-scale steel projects. Did he tell me this himself? No. He didn't have to. I've seen his work, and I've heard him wax eloquent about the process when he's in the shop. It's a common trait in this community. The passion, discipline and dedication shows up in attention to the details, while everyone else is gobsmacked at the big-scale final result.

3. Stubbornness. When "the entire world" is telling the person that "This is stupid- noone wants to see/hear/experience something this weird..." "What makes you think you can do this, when so many others couldn't?" "This isn't a real job. How are you gonna feed yourself offa something like this?" Many times, those 'bad birds' chirping in the person's ear are the voices (s)he has heard the most: family, neighbors, 'friends'... folks who perhaps mean well, but simply do not understand the drive, passion and dedication that compels a person to reach inside himself to find that thing he NEEDS to share with others.

I was lucky. I found My Voice when I was 9 years old. I was raised by two parents who not only told me, but actually believed that "You can become anything you want to be, with hard work, a plan, and the spine to make it happen." They found a support system (through the public/state school system and local Arts community) that nurtured me through the exacting process required to make a living in an incredibly competitive field. My passion was allowed to be realized by a farm system that had been set up for me, and other kids who grabbed a musical instrument in elementary school.

Portland had no such organized support system. He had to:
Find his voice
Find his purpose
Find his people
Find his path...

...all on his own.

Although I deeply appreciate his kind words in his OP, I see it as my responsibility to The Arts World to send Portland his well-earned flowers... and to project to us all what we can aspire to.
He's Dawgtalker's current reigning OG of YOLO.

He is deserving of our deepest level of respect.
I look up to him as an inspiration- and the role model for my next chapter, after I retire from this institutionalized professional thing I've been doing for almost 40 years.

(my side hustle has been funk/jazz-inspired improvisatory/experimental jam music)

________________


And hats off to any and all of our other Dawgs who pursue/share their artistic passion. Those who choose studio music, painting, nature photography, [insert your passion here]. When you find the courage to share what moves you the most, you bring our community closer together. Our passions are what make us known to each other. We've all been brought together by our shared love for a professional football team... but we are all so much more than that. I love that we have this place-this space where we can be more than just anonymous fans who high-five each other at the stadium when the Browns score in a game.

We each contain multitudes (see Walt Whitman for reference).
The exploration of those multitudes is what bonds us as friends... and breaks the bonds which limit our understanding of each other.

Do your passion.
Live your passion.
Share your passion.

It's the only way I can conceive of how a person could lie upon his deathbed with zero regrets.



.02,
clem.

Just a quick note on your post. When someone succeeds by being stubborn people no longer call it being stubborn. At that point it's considered "strong willed".

Sort of like only poor people are called crazy. When you're rich is becomes being eccentric.

Thanks for the kind words Clem. While we don’t work in the same medium our craft is filled with hours of repetitive, not overly creative or enjoyable tasks to get to where we are.
The discipline part… man, you hit the nail on the head. Creating with steel is brutal. We spend hours welding external seems. Hours of small motor skill, exacting, hot, burn causing work. We then spend hours grinding those welds back smooth. If you’ve never run a grinder for 8 hours you can’t fully appreciate just how hard it is. I lay in bed at night some nights and can still feel my hands vibrating. There's nothing enjoyable about it. It’s not creative or artistic. It’s grunt work, but it’s part of the process. The thankless and at times dangerous part. My only trip to the emergency room as an artist was grinder related. The doc had to cauterize the wound twice to get it to stop bleeding. Grinders don’t cut… they just remove material… be it steel or flesh.

Finished pieces are filled with hours of such brutal, unfun, non artistic steps. Thankless, but necessary. My guess is your work has many similar hours of ‘work’ to get to the place where it’s presentable. The audience only sees/hears the end results. They likely at times think you make it look ‘effortless’… if they really knew… or likely in their heart they do know, and it’s why they can’t play. They didn’t have the discipline.