Wanting to be an artist or creative is step one. Following through means investing in learning your craft, but we’ve heard from so many aspiring artists and creatives who feel unsure about where to start and so we’re incredibly grateful to the artists and creatives who’ve agreed to share their stories of how they learned their craft.

Jordan Fiegehen

I began my beading journey in January 2022 with zero crafting skills and a need to do something with my hands. My community is Batchewana First Nation, which is nearly six hours away from where I currently live, and with covid restrictions still in place, I wasn’t able to learn easily from any of our Elders. I really wanted to make sure the people I learned from were Indigenous, and I watched many tutorials on YouTube and TikTok. Read more>>

Brynne Filer

Learning the craft means learning how to have a healthy relationship with time. I have had so much time to develop myself as a writer, a visual artist, production artist, and most importantly, have had time to understand what the point of me pursuing music is. Yes, I taught myself how to play guitar, went to open mics, performed on local stages, but those were just me developing the tools of being a performer. The aspect of becoming an artist as an identity and an archetype, that became the craft, which I think is about having a daily practice. Read more>>

Will Heck

Growing up I was influenced by my family members and funny enough I tried to avoid pursuing any type of music related career. Eventually, I realized it’s something I’m truly passionate about and I feel I’m halfway decent at it. Growing up I was influenced by my family members and funny enough I tried to avoid pursuing any type of music related career. Eventually, I realized it’s something I’m truly passionate about and I feel I’m halfway decent at it. Read more>>

Julie Krafchick

In 2016, my co-creator Yue and I had an idea for a podcast about the struggles of modern dating, which became Dateable. Neither of us knew how to podcast then – it was an entirely new field. But we felt compelled to try out this medium, so we grabbed a mic, a couple of friends as guests, and started recording episodes. Some of those earlier episodes weren’t the most polished, but looking back on them now, diving into the deep end was the only way to start learning. Read more>>

Shih Hung CJ Hsu

My parents have a great influence on me. The school I graduated from was also my father’s dream, so in other words, I fulfilled his dream. Of course, he also supported my music career very much. Since I was a little kid, the only music on looped in the car was always 80’s rock, that surely changed my musical taste, I’ve always been different from the other kid since they started listening to C-Pop, while my play list was Bon Jovi, Gun N Roses, Scorpions… Read more>>

Kimberly Hager

I have fine art background and was one of the first graduates at my college in Nebraska to use animation in my thesis. Afterwards, I attended UCLA Design|Media Arts graduate program for interactive installation. While there, I interned at school in the Laboratory of Neuro Imaging where I got a taste of 3d modeling an animation in a professional setting. After graduation I had a decision to make, accept a full time job at the lab, or look for a job in the fine arts. I took the job, which led to learning different softwares and applications. Read more>>

Dan Brockett

I started teaching myself the craft of basketry around 2018 after stumbling on a video of someone weaving with willow, which was a something I didn’t even know was possible. At that point we had some willow already growing on our farm, but I decided to ramp up production in order to cultivate my own supply of weaving material. For several years I taught myself how to weave through books and online videos, which was challenging and only got me so far. Read more>>

Wuliang Zhang

Hello, my name is Wuliang Zhang, a recent MFA producing graduate student from the American Film Institute Conservatory. Read more>>

carl John

I started my artistic journey later in life. Determined to transition from my previous life to that of a real artist meant that each lesson needed to ingrained and quickly, From the craft of creating to performing, to all of the pieces to become the packaging, we are always learning as artists. Oddly, I set out as a performing singer songwriter but I learned a lot from being a visual artist, putting paint to canvas. Read more>>

Lauren Devora

I definitely learned by doing. I wrote and wrote and wrote until I knew the story I was trying to tell. Then I’d scrap it and start all over, rewriting it until it was the story I wanted to tell others. I started young, at fourteen, and never looked back. I was too passionate about storytelling to ever want to do anything else, so the labor of writing felt like exploring a new corner of my heart I had no idea existed and dwelling in that energy. Read more>>

Susan Woods

I have always been taught that learning the craft of an art is the best avenue to take, as one can build upon this knowledge. I am a classicist in this subject. Once a craft is mastered, one can be more independent in what one makes/creates. I started as a classical piano player until my later teens decided that I could not play another note. However, this training was the basis of my pursuit of the visual arts. Mainly, I am a sculptor. Though, I span the 3-dimensional world from Fine Art to Functional Art/Design. Read more>>

Lara Miller

I learned a majority of my jewelry making skills through books. I spent all of my free time studying pictures of jewelry and breaking them down in my head. I started off with bead working and at around age 9 I got a bag of seed beads and my first bead weaving loom. I spent hours separating out all the tiny beads by color and drawing out patterns for that loom. That escalated into freehand bead weaving, bead embroidery, and macrame. Macrame led into wire work and weaving. That is when I really developed a passion for working with silver. Read more>>

Jana Burnette

I embarked on my journey in the entertainment industry by starting with acting, the most accessible entry point. While acting seemed daunting at first, I began with school theatre, local plays, and acting classes—simple yet effective ways to step into the industry. This foundational lesson is one I emphasize to my students: begin with what’s available, taking gradual steps towards your larger goals. Read more>>

Krishann McConico

My love for poetry began at age eleven. Mathematics was my first love and passion since age four, but it all changed with a trip to the library. My middle school took us to a reading for Niki Giovanni. We were given a book with a poetry compilation with Dr. Angelou, Phyllis Wheatley, and Ms. Giovanni. When I flipped through the book, I saw and read Phenomenal Woman. Read more>>

Marshall Daniels

Tuning steel is a lesson in perseverance. I first started by finding a 55 gallon steel barrel and beating the bottom to a pulp with a sledgehammer. That was the start of a 4 year journey of learning a craft that tested my body and my mind. There were only a few makers in the world, and very few resources on how to learn a craft that wasn’t even 15 years old at the time. Read more>>

Kenny Smallhorn

An exciting thing about comedy is that there is always more to explore and to learn. I started doing open mics when I was in college. As I continued to try new opportunities, I increasingly learned about myself as a performer. Putting in several years of doing shows like this taught me a lot about comedy, but even more about a well-run show. Read more>>

Subin Kara Ahn

Embracing references was a big step for me that really helped me make the works look more like what I had in mind. Before I thought that everything had to come to me and if I were to use references, that it would not be organic. I wish I had started using references as a tool to communicate with collaborators earlier, since many times we do not quite have the language for what we are envisioning. This applies to everything I do – directing, acting, song-writing, etc… Read more>>

Crystal Eckstadr

Writing is going through the god-awful motions of writing. Most writers are gifted with incessant overthinking and relief only seems to come once the thoughts hit the page. I am no exception to this chaotic process; however, there is no way around it—you sit in a chair and do the grueling work. I’ve learned to be on-call to ideas when they come. It’s nightmarish, but I have ongoing lists of sentences and phrases that come to me at the most inconvenient times. Read more>>

Troy Prine

One of the most beautiful things to me about music is that you can approach it so many different ways and achieve so many different outcomes from your own journey. I always find it interesting how learning certain instruments lend themselves toward specific avenues of technique, theory, and composition, even among classmates or colleages who already have similar influences and musical upbringings. I liken playing an instrument to picking a class in Dungeons and Dragons – whichever path you choose will have certain areas of focus that make you very adept in certain situations, but unless you multi-class, you may end up missing out on some vital skills needed to take on the final boss. Read more>>

Kevin Aoussou

I have always desired to be an artists that is able to have a personal creative foundation strong enough to not limit my ability to collaborate with any other creative. I believe in each individual artists creative voice, and never want anyone to feel like they should minimize their ideas to feel like they have space as part of a process/project. As a high schooler, I would read An Actor Prepare by Stanislavsky, dreaming of what it means to be, and to train as an actor. Read more>>

Dorlethia Johnson & Samiyah Hall

Our journey as a mother-daughter fashion duo from Los Angeles has been an incredible exploration of style, creativity, and growth. Amidst the challenges posed by the pandemic, we discovered our passion for fashion curation and content creation. What sets us apart is our unique approach to fashion—highlighting similar styles from different generational perspectives. Read more>>

Rosa Ragoonan

Being a co-host of a podcast was something that I learned partially through research and trial and error. I don’t mean just trying to figure out what to talk about for each episode. I did have to do some research on the best microphones to use for when it’s just me and my husband to when we have guests. I also had to learn how to connect the microphones through a mixer to my laptop and figure out what gives out the best audio output. Since some guests appear virtually, I’ve had to learn some basics of Zoom to help out with troubleshooting if it occurs. Read more>>

Ms Cam

I started my musical career when I was six years old. First with the guitar. My father had his father’s guitar in the living room. Old guitar, very hard to play but he always said I was the only person who could make it sound good. So I started taking lessons at my village school. I didn’t like the classes very much. I preferred to learn on my own at home, at least I could play what I really like. With my sister, we even wrote some songs. It was very funny, I can still remember it and sing it today. Read more>>

Diamond Montgomery

I learned how to crochet in 2022 on May 7th. I was scrolling on Instagram one day and constantly kept seeing this big crochet hat to the point were I really started to want it. At the time I was unemployed and the hat was $90, so I couldn’t afford to just buy it. I immediately thought to myself “I’m sure I could easily make this hat myself”. I went to Walmart the very next day, bought me some yarn and crochet hooks for about $15, and ended making the hat that same day. Read more>>