We asked some insanely talented artists, creatives and makers to tell us about when they know they were going to pursue a creative career.

Caitlin FitzGerald

Pursuing art professionally is something that I think all creatives and artists dream of as an ideal professional outcome. Though personally, growing up I only knew a handful of people I could observe who were actually pursuing their art professionally. So, for a very long time, I had no idea what this could look like for myself in the creative field. Read more>>

Roxana (RoxanaBOArts) Barahona Oliva

Since I was a child I knew that art was what I wanted to do, however the academic world took me in other directions. In high school I studied mechanical and architectural drawing to make diagrams for the construction sector and the manufacture of mechanical parts. At university I studied engineering in Topography and Geodesy, Read more>>

LAYNA

Recently, 2022 to be more specific. I moved to Nashville in 2021 to go to graduate school with hopes of someday being a publisher. In Ohio I had played some shows, performed in local competitions, but I never thought it would be my full time job. I loved songwriting and was open to mainly doing songwriting on the side, but everything changed when I got here. My whole view or artistry and performing altered and I fell in love with it. Now there is nothing else I could see myself doing for the rest of my life. Read more>>

Michel Ramirez

I’ve always known I would pursue a creative path, art has always been a part of my life. The first time I held a tattoo machine was a monumental starting point to my career. I was 16 at the time, accompanying my brother to his tattoo session to begin his sleeve. Up until that point, I had known about tattooing but never had perspective into the life of an artist. Read more>>

Taylor Dunn

I’ve always tried to be the class clown. I took a lot of inspiration from Jim Carrey, Robin Williams and Adam Sandler. Originally I wanted to be an actor, but when I was in high school I wrote a comedic monologue to perform at a theatre competition and I was hooked. My first time doing stand-up came shortly after I graduated. The feeling I got from getting that first big laugh is more addicting than any drug. Read more>>

Michael Thomas

First off let me say thank you again for giving me the opportunity to do another interview with y’all. I always wanted to be in the entertainment business ever since I was a kid. I remember watching the first Spider-Man movie, after the movie was over I told my mom that I was going to be a actor or a script writer( which I found out later it’s actually called screen writer) or be a comedian. Read more>>

Olivier Dubois-Cherrier

In 2008, after having overcome my midlife crisis I decided I wanted to spend my time painting everyday. I was living then with my wife and her son in Barcelona, we were both life-coach sharing the same offices and I was at the same time the CEO of several printing companies based in the Caribbean islands, a business organization I founded 15 years earlier. Read more>>

J. Wesley

I believe many of us are born artists, but we blossom into our artistry during different stages of our lives. The creative/artistic path wasn’t something that I consciously pursued at first – my words were a means to help men and women find a common bridge of communication in relationships by looking inwards first. The moment being an author and writing professionally clicked was when I was writing my first book. Read more>>

Kristina Gorcheva-Newberry

Twenty years ago, when I was a graduate student at Radford University, I took a class on women’s literature with Professor Moira Baker. Noticing that my essays were so creative, Dr. Baker urged me to start writing fiction. She believed that I had a story to tell and that I could tell it well. I have been writing and publishing ever since. It did take me over two decades, however, to be able to earn a living as an author. Read more>>

Tess Johnson

I started playing classical piano when I was 8 and fell in love with music pretty quickly. I also loved to write poetry and short stories, and when I was 14 I wrote my first song. I was a shy and anxious teenager, so it was much to my family’s surprise when I booked myself a gig at a local rock venue in Des Moines at 15. My older brother had been performing in bands for years, and told the family to all show up to support me because it was going to be a train wreck. On the way to the venue, Read more>>

Omavi Waite

Well, I first knew I wanted to pursue a creative / artistic path was when I knew I had to share my writing/visions with the world. I got much feedback when I started to write my poetry on Facebook and people read what I wrote. Poetry came to me in my sophomore year of high school, and once I figured that out, I knew that was the medium in which I could express myself and my abilities to the world. Read more>>

Chris Mastandrea

I think it was mostly from my dad. Seeing my dad build something or fix something with his hands and “save the day” was kind of a big deal. Learning how to not to rely on anyone else to take care of our home left a major impression on me. As a skateboarder from the time I was 10, we used to watch videos and saw some interesting ramps. Read more>>

Beatriz Reid

I have 5 beautiful children with my husband, David; they are my absolute joy, but the demands of raising them did crush my “creativity” for the past 14 years. Before 2020, I was always trying to downplay the “creativity” low hum that has always lived inside me. I really thought that being a woman, a mother, and an artist couldn’t coexist, and that one side had to be on top of the other one. While motherhood was calling on me to find ever-greater resources of patience, empathy and composure, art felt like an opposing force. Read more>>

Dongyan Xu

I grew up believing I was not going to be an artist. I believed it was not realistic, and I had no talent, and I would never be good enough to make money. I went to college for architecture because in my country being an architect is viewed as a promising goal to pursue. And I was BAD at architecture. I liked it but not enough to want to take it as a career. Read more>>

Bradley Thompson

To be honest this wasn’t my goal or never would of thought of it back in 2016! Mane my home boy had came up to me and asked me to rap this verse he had wrote and i just said u know what? Whats the worst that could happen!! Like some nwa type shit with cube and E But after i did that I didn’t want to stop so i took my life and put it in the music and here i am now i did stop for some years! But im back and goin 1000 Read more>>

Nekayla Henderson

I knew i was good with the camera since i was a kid i was always taking pictures and in the mirror, I was just too shy to start. It wasn’t until after high school graduation pictures that I finally realized the potential I had as a model, I started paying for photo shoots to build my portfolio.. shortly after photographers started contacting me to collaborate, Read more>>

Tasche Laine

I’ve known I was creative since I was five. I used to put on elaborate, dress-up comedy sketches for my parents, even ‘directing’ my friends in them. But we had little talent, so I had to dream other dreams. In fourth grade, we had to answer the prompt: what do you want to be when you grow up? I answered a Veterinarian because I loved animals. Read more>>

Dante Alba

Ever since I was a little kid wanted to be inside of the screen and I side of the music player. Nevertheless, I would say that when I was 18 years young is when I decided to go to Los Angeles, California to pursue my artistic career professionally. Read more>>

Chris Zander

Honestly, I always knew! However, my first year of college truly solidified my aspiration to pursue theater, television, and film. I began to understand the power of being open-minded and creative. Growing up, creativity was a safe space I cultivated for myself and could live freely in with no interruptions. I was so involved in art, speech rhetorics, and theater growing up because it was a way for me to live vicariously through life, experiences, and situations around me. Read more>>

Kelcie Weber

I think I always knew I wanted to be in a creative field when I grew up. As a kid, my mom put me in dance classes, and that was my first taste of performing. But even before then, my mom cultivated an environment of creativity and wonder for my sister and I while growing up. We were always doing art projects together, playing dress up and putting on skits. Read more>>

Bradford Loomis

My father was a relentless artist. He was raised by a very analytical numbers minded business man who told him that if he got a business degree than he could go to school to get his art degree after. Best laid plans being what they are, are quickly set aside. Life has a way of settling you down into the comfortable path of least resistance. He met my mother and a very damaged man settled down with a very wounded woman and a tumultuous 30 years later he got his art degree. Read more>>

Omar Seitisleam

Art has been an integral part of my life for as long as I can remember. As a child, I spent countless hours sketching and drawing, often at the expense of my studies. However, despite my passion for art, I never seriously considered pursuing it as a profession until later in life. Read more>>

Tracy Miller

I experienced intense burnout after building a multi-million dollar real estate business and investment portfolio in seven short years. I was a top producer in my real estate market for sales. I owned my own real estate brokerage where I supervised and mentored 11 agents. I bought, flipped, and rented 13 doors (12 properties). I went into real estate so I could achieve a life of freedom, which is my most precious personal value. Read more>>

Morgan Ashley

I didn’t officially think about a career as an artist until I was 17 years old! I did the FFA (Future Farmers of America) Talent Show and sang ‘Famous In A Small Town’ by Miranda Lambert. I only sang to background tracks because I did not play an instrument, but there were other people in the competition that played the guitar and I thought that was the coolest thing! Read more>>

Nikky T

Ever since I was a young girl I loved to sing. I grew up in the world of arts through dance. performing and choir. The artistic world was a huge passion of mine, and I knew I would like to continue my life in it. At the age of 17 I was brought into my first recording studio session and from then on I was addicted. I continued to work on creating my own original music, songwriting and vocal production. Read more>>

Amber Sung

I started to fall in love with art since I was a child. My mother took me to my favorite art class and invited teachers to my home to teach me. I got a good education in art. But the moment when I decided to pursue artistic path is during my high school. The AP Studio Art class in my high school only accept 9 people in a class, and I’m one of the lucky one to be selected. This give me a lot of confidence about my art works and my choice. I would like to thank my high school, Shanghai High School International Division, for giving me the opportunity to take AP Studio Art course in the eleventh grade. Read more>>

Roseanne Tiongco

I was working as a web developer and feeling burnt out. My job was more on making the back end structures of the website – the login system, data processing etc. To destress I would play this online game called Mabinogi online. It looked so cute and so pretty, I would forget my fatigue and spend all night in this tiny little world playing make believe that I was this adorable character that I was controlling. Then I had a thought – I want to work in the game industry instead! Read more>>

Catherine Moore

On some level, I guess I’ve always known I’ve wanted to be a creative. I was always interested in creating. I was always drawing or coloring or making crafts. When I was about 5 or 6, for a school project I was asked what I wanted to be when I grew up. My answer was an actress or an artist. Read more>>

Taylor Richardson

I always loved to sing. I started in my church choir as a kid so I developed an ear for music early. But I never took it “serious”. My family and friends would always put me on the spot to sing happy birthdays and random feel “good songs”. It wasn’t until I was 26 years old and in my first year of living in Dallas that I actually felt I was good enough to record. Read more>>

Spotlight Green

Since I was in elementary school, I knew I always wanted to be on TV or at least become famous. I always did the morning announcements, recited lines from movies around the house, etc. I have an extremely outgoing personality and feel like it was made for more than any old regular 9-5 job. I’ve always wanted to be in a field where I can be myself, make people laugh and show my personality. Read more>>

Smitha Magal

In so many ways, Bharatanatyam has been for me the best investment of time, patience, effort and hard work. Bharatanatyam is one of the oldest classical dance styles of India. Devotional in spirit, Bharatanatyam is highly stylized and sophisticated in its technique. It is known for its strong footwork, highly coordinated movements and facial expressions. Read more>>

Phoenix

I picked up my first camera at the age of 11, when I was just a child living in a small town in Ukraine. Back then there were only film cameras and I found them to be incredibly exciting, it felt like I was creating magic when I was shooting. As I grew older I kept refining my skills because in my head I would imagine all sorts of beautiful imagery that I wanted to capture with my camera. Read more>>

God Body Bingo

As early as 15 years old I’ve felt like I was capable of being a successful artist if that’s what I chose to do. Over the years after that I began to record and release music but it took a while to decide I wanted to pursue it as a career. After attending college in 2014-15 and realizing that no subject interested me more than my craft, I knew a career music was the life I wanted for myself. Read more>>

Alicia Tubbs

Unlike most creatives, I didn’t realize that I had a love for art until much later in life. The first part of my adult life, raising four children and serving in the church took up most of my time. Once our children were old enough to care for themselves, my husband and I found ourselves even more involved with the non-profit world. Traveling all over the world we enjoyed encouraging and serving leaders of missions in Africa, Poland, Romania, and Thailand. This was quite fulfilling in multiple ways. However, there was a longing in my heart to fill an undiscovered void. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but I knew there was more. Read more>>

Erin Munchel

Ever since I can remember, growing up I’ve always loved makeup. I remember being at a sleepover in middle school, and my mom called to pick me up early because she was mad I stole her MAC Studio Fix compact. I have always loved makeup, but I think I really started to be interested in it because of my mom. She raised me as a single mother, so I really looked up to her and admired everything she did. Read more>>

LEXI SIDERMAN

There isn’t a time I can remember when makeup wasn’t a part of my life. As a young girl struggling with insecurities and stress, makeup was a way I could escape. It helped me express my individuality and creativity and made me feel powerful. However, I did not feel I could pursue makeup and be monetarily successful. Having immigrant parents I felt the need to go into a more “practical” profession in order to make them proud, Read more>>

Marcellus Cox

Right off the back with this one haha. I knew around 10-11 years old, watching movies and really starting to understand the important magnitude of storytelling and the impact that it could have on people. It was a real eye awakening moment and feeling that I still can’t fully describe. Read more>>