Last week-ish, I tried something I’ve been wanting to do for awhile (but have mostly been too nervous to actually do)… I worked on a painting outside, in public, in full view of a whole bunch of strangers.
If you follow me on Instagram, you may have seen that one of my favorite local bars allowed Oscar and I to set up our booth on their sidewalk for the weekend. This meant that we had a lot more space than our usual 200cm market booths, so we decided to get creative.
One of the ways we did that? I brought my easel, my paints and brushes, and one of the paintings I’m working on, and put a mini studio setup right there on the street.
I painted for a couple of hours each day, and here are some thoughts that went through my head as I was doing so:
This is weird.
This is really really weird. People are watching me.
People are STOPPING IN THEIR TRACKS TO WATCH ME PAINT.
I don’t know how to paint. What was I thinking? Everyone is going to know I’m a fraud.
Aww, that little kid just said that it was beautiful. Now I have to think about something else so I don’t cry in front of all these people.
The sun is too bright. I wish I could turn down the sun.
Lol, those people don’t know that I can understand the unflattering things they’re saying about me.
Another little kid fan! These are my people.
I hope that sound behind me was not all the stickers falling off of the table, because it sure sounded like all the stickers falling off the table.
Oh, it was the poster display. I wonder if I should go and help. Nah, Oscar’s got it.
Seriously, if kids had their own money to spend on artwork, I would be SO rich.
I have no idea how to paint these scooters. I’ll just keep painting this same building over and over again to look busy.
I want to look at my reference photo, but I’m afraid people will think that’s cheating, even though I KNOW that’s not cheating.
Hmm. Where am I gonna wash my brushes? I didn’t think that one through.
You know, this isn’t so bad. It’s like being in my studio but with a light breeze.
HOLY SHIT HOLY SHIT SOMEONE BOUGHT A PAINTING FROM ME! AN ADULT HUMAN LIKES MY ART ENOUGH TO BUY IT AND TAKE IT HOME! MAYBE I AM NOT A FRAUD AFTER ALL!
Okay, play it cool, back to the painting. All in a day’s work. No big deal.
I wonder if this would feel different in a country where I could understand 99% of what people are saying about me, instead of 30-40%.
I wonder if being a foreigner makes people more or less likely to stop and check out my artwork. And does that even matter if there’s nothing I can do about it?
The sun isn’t bright enough anymore. I wish I could turn up the sun.
I wonder when I should stop painting.
I wonder if anyone is still standing behind me.
I wonder what Oscar wants to buy me for dinner.
…. And that’s pretty much it. Overall, I kind of hated the first day of painting in public. But by the end of the second day, though, I didn’t mind it so much.
For one thing, it led to the sale of a previously completed original painting (something that very rarely happens with random passersby at markets) and lots of people finding interest in my work who’d never heard of me before.
And while I still wasn’t 100% comfortable with people stopping to stare (hello stage fright), it did get less weird as more hours went by. If I didn’t pay attention to anything that was going on in my peripheral vision, I could almost pretend that I was just in my studio as usual.
So, yeah. I think I’ll do it again. I’m not ready to start a painting from scratch in front of random strangers—I don’t like the idea of everyone seeing the ugliest of ugly stages, especially since I’m still fairly slow—but I’ll try to bring a work-in-progress to most of our events from now on.
So if you happen to see a nervous, pink-haired, white girl painting something on the streets of Tainan, feel free to stop and say hello. :)
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