We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Renee Yohe a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Renee, thanks for joining us today. What’s been the most meaningful project you’ve worked on?

So many of my projects are meaningful. I remember when I was in college, my professor, Ryan Flathau, told me often that I carried my heart on my sleeve. For many of my classmates, they seemed to find it difficult to put themselves into their work; while I couldn’t help but to do so.
I worked through my feelings often throughout my photography class career, including a series that explored my recently being fired from my office position that I had held for over 10 years. It was very personal and I tried to include all the different aspects of how being fired affected, not only me, but my entire household.
In another project titled, “Indecisive Moment”, I photographed myself twice in each photo, and played the part of myself and also the part of my mother, with whom I no longer have a relationship. This was another therapeutic series for me, as I was able to explore my feelings of anger, sadness and abandonment in relation to my mother, and put it out there visually for others to see and take in.
I’ve continued in the years since college to delve into my art and use it for healing purposes, working through feelings of grief and loss by painting subjects that have passed away in my life. I actually feel compelled to immortalize my loved ones in this way, for example after my cousin Jasmine unexpectedly died at the young age of 32, I completed a portrait of her in only a day or two and sent the painting to her mother.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

Well, I think like most artists, I started young, doodling on the back of all my school worksheets. I had planned on traveling to New York for college after high school, but life got in the way and threw me some challenges, and so instead I ended up going back to school in my late 20’s and focused on photography. I fell in love with the dark room and the ability to tell stories through my photographs. I especially enjoyed street photography and capturing a small moment in time in a person’s life. There’s something so beautiful to me about people in general and how each person is unique.
Now, in my last semester of college I was pregnant with my daughter and after I had her I didn’t have the same time for going out and doing street photography. 20 months after I had my daughter I had a son, now with two small children at home, I pivoted away from photography and into a medium I could do in the comfort of my own home, painting.
It’s funny because I had never been into painting before; I sketched and colored and took photos, but I didn’t really know how to paint. One day while I was living in Illinois, near St. Louis, and planning to go back home to Michigan to visit family and friends, I decided on a whim to paint portraits of my four college friends and deliver them as presents during my trip.
The first ones I attempted were not good looking back, I didn’t really know any proper technique. But as it goes with any endeavor, I improved as time went on. I read books and watched YouTube videos to help with techniques, tips and tricks. Eventually I narrowed my focus and found my niche, which, as no surprise, was people.
So as of late, I continue to fine tune portraits, mostly of celebrities who I admire or loved ones; either my own or client’s loved ones that they have commissioned. A few times I have combined photos of clients’ loved ones so that family members that have passed away can be in an image together with someone they may have not met in life.
I would like to do more work along these lines, and although I have had commissions over the years, it’s hard to build a following from ground zero, especially when I am depending on word of mouth through family and friends.
Currently I mostly work in black and white acrylic paint on canvas or with watercolor on paper. They convey completely different moods and so I enjoy them both. I would love if I could get more requests from clients for black and white images as I find the striking, high-contrast images extremely fun to paint and aesthetically pleasing.

What can society do to ensure an environment that’s helpful to artists and creatives?

Buying art from local artists and vendors is the simplest way to contribute. Being open minded and not rejecting someone’s work because they do not understand it, or think it’s “too easy” or that they could have made the same thing at home themselves.
Society would do well to value the work of artists, as a lot of time, money and training have gone into honing their crafts.
Society also needs to reject the use of AI art. AI definitely concerns me in many areas, art being just one. As an artist, it is very disheartening to see so many AI images circulated on social media and take the place of art created by real artists.
Just because you can manipulate something easily and quickly on your phone doesn’t make it superior to the real thing, that took time, patience and skill to create.

What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?

My dream, and therefore my goal, is to support myself through just my art. It’s a difficult market to break into, but I have been making small strides and taking advantage of any opportunity, (such as this one), that comes my way.
Ideally I would love to combine my passions and have a second home that I would decorate and have space for guests to rent out as an Airbnb. One area would be for guests to stay, while in other spaces there would be a gallery for my art pieces as well as a photography studio and dark room. Guests could book a room, a photography session and peruse the art gallery (and perhaps book a commission) all in one space.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: @rdy.art.studios
• Youtube: Renee Yohe @reneeyohe8864

Image Credits

All images taken by me, Renee Yohe