Books > Baloney Express > The Year Of An Artist > My Top Ten Accidents > Blood Sport of Art > Children > Art Books
CURRENT BOOK IN PROGRESS RELEASE PENDING
INTRODUCTION
As the publication of my first book Baloney Express neared and I was rounding third on the way to my first book’s release, I wanted to keep writing but I didn’t have the energy to work on my other book projects. Journal writing is near to me but usually it is a free flow between personal and business observations. I wondered what it would be like to pick up a book about a year in the life of a professional artist. All I had to do was write a one page entry a day about the goings on of my studio, which are often sufficient to entertain people outside of my field... approximately 99.99% of humanity.
Artists lead weird lives. By weird I don’t mean bad weird, I mean unusual. I mean this week I’m doing a gravestone etching, I’m selling books out of my studio, I’m prepping for an art show tomorrow and my frames haven’t come in yet, I’m pitching a mural concept on a wall that is 5 stories tall and 150 feet wide, I am sending out my first book 'Baloney Express' to reviewers in hopes that they do not all burn them in the fireplace, I am finishing a new song I wrote called Emma Gem-a for my four-month-old niece. I was just asked to paint on the side of a stage while two bands play on a cruiser around Manhattan, I am painting a sign for a hunting cabin, and I may have sold a landscape this morning to an old friend in Houston, Texas. And if I’m not busy as hell I’m curled up on the floor of my studio like a hungry wolf, just trying to fend off the fear that can eat away at you in this game, just trying to live in the light and hang in there until the next thing comes in to subsidize the studio. Artists live feast or famine lives, even the most successful ones, so I thought the day to day routine might be a window into an artist’s studio that people might want to read about. It could be niche reading, sure, or perhaps there are armchair artists, enthusiasts, collectors, art professionals who might pick up a book and check this out. At least the exercise is a pattern, something to build on, a way for me to get the words on the page while I’m finishing edits on my first book, which is finnicky business.
I have built my studio outside the glass walls of the contemporary art market, so my story is different than that of let’s say a tenure track art professor, or that of the art school student going on to get his masters at a prestigious art school and then chasing after the commercial gallery dream. Although I miss the concept of community most artists who have masters degrees from these institutions do not make art for a living. More than a few have told me that my solo journey was just fine and perhaps preferable. The grass is always greener I suppose. I went to St. Lawrence University in Canton, New York, where I made hundreds of lifetime friends. It is 20 below 90% of the year so you better learn to have a jovial attitude and get along with people at the place or you are not going to have any fun. My parents would not send me to art school, in retrospect perhaps for good reason. Regardless, I managed to have too much fun my freshman year and that’s where 'Baloney Express' picks up. My coming of age story captures the time that I decided to make art for a living.
Sometimes I think I have rocks in my head, as being an artist is one of the hardest jobs I can imagine, and I’m not afraid of hard work. I make stuff and hopefully people will like the stuff I make enough to buy it. My stuff does not do anything, otherwise it does not qualify as art. I turn my sculptures at a wood club and I am the only guy in there making things whose sole purpose is to sit there and be art. Wood jockeys go nuts with this concept. “Here you are, back again for more abuse. Now what does THIS thing do, what function does it perform?” I respond, “The thing is, this thing I’m making... it does absolutely nothing.” I mean it does everything if art is good... art’s purpose is to elevate the spirits of those who are touched by an art object. Over the years you string all these things together and you’ve got a pretty layered world to play in. Making the mustard to keep doing it is the trick.
I have another book coming that will detail how I have survived as an artist since college. That book is called The Blood Sport of Art and I that will be my fourth book. This book you are reading about here will be more of a day to day inside scoop on what makes an art survivalist tick day by day throughout the calendar year.
Thank you for reading about my current project. I appreciate the people who keep me at the easel in life. They don't realize how important they are to my career and spirit.
Respectful Regards,
Sandy Garnett