We recently connected with Michelle Doll and have shared our conversation below.
Michelle, appreciate you joining us today. Are you able to earn a full-time living from your creative work? If so, can you walk us through your journey and how you made it happen?
I moved to NYC area as a single Mother to attend grad school at the New York Academy of Art in 2004. After grad school I needed to support myself and my son with a steady stream of income, so I found full time work as an artists assistant. This work helped me in understanding the business of art, to learn how to properly network and what it takes to run a professional studio practice while making a living. Following that I started teaching and making and exhibiting my own work. Through gallery representation and various gallery and art fair exhibitions I was able to begin to build my creative vision and professional practice. Over time well spent I was eventually able to sustain my self through various creative sources. I found it was liberating to have the opportunity to sell my art while making a living through a variety of other artistic outlets. This freedom of thinking of myself as a creative entrepreneur allowed me to be purely creative and uninhibited in the the studio and business savvy in the market.
These days I earn a full-time living by selling my artwork through galleries, private commissioned portrait paintings and prints of my artwork. I also teach private art lessons, workshops and University classes as steady streams of income. I’ve found that teaching breaks up the monotony of my full-time painting practice, gets me out of my head while feeling connected and inspired by other artists.
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.
I’ve been making art for as long as I can remember so, it felt like a natural progression in my life to pursue painting as a career. Everything I do is centered on the foundation of my intimate connections with others. Whether it’s through my artwork, teaching or mentorships, I strive for developing real connections with others. A deeper understanding of our human desire for love and connection really drives me. I paint intimate portraits of couples, families, and people in their everyday lives. I begin by first spending time with people and photographing them in their homes or familiar spaces. I like to think I become a fly on the wall- observing and capturing private moments. I use the photos as references for my paintings, often collaging, cropping and shifting color and values to arrange a compositional starting point in order to begin the painting process. Each piece has a unique feeling depending on my memory of that documentation and situation. The success of every painting is informed by those feelings. I’m not interested in copying a photo but rather capturing the elements of emotional, mental, physical and ineffable state. The physicality of flesh and the invisible or abstract emotional dialogue are what I’m most attempting to express in paint. What is the energy of love? How does vulnerability feel? Is the physical flesh hot, heavy or fleeting? Is this feeling bittersweet? These are some of the many questions I ask myself when I mix these ingredients into the painting pot.
What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?
There’s so many rewarding aspects to being an artist. I suppose the most fulfilling aspect of my career has been the relationships I’ve built over time with fellow artists, collectors and gallerists. It’s been a fun life surrounded by so many creative people. I’ve also had some incredible opportunities to travel, not only throughout the United States but globally. Through both friendships and travel I’ve been able to work with many people and spend time both influencing and learning from my involvement in their intimate lives. It’s a quite unique point of view for which I am forever grateful. I’ve been privy to so many private, vulnerable and beautifully sincere moments of my subjects lives and it’s given me such a deep feeling of love and reverence for life. It is where I search for hope and am able to focus on the most positive aspects of life.
Those special moments really inform my spiritual center and push me to think and work outside my comfort zone every day.
We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.
In so many ways painting has both enriched and saved my life. It’s helped me to shift my perspective from loneliness, and loss to feelings of connection and reciprocity. Though my work I’ve learned to love myself and others. I used to create art about loss and pain. My studio walls were filled with these paintings and the more I painted them, the more those painful feelings were amplified. I got to the point of wanting to give up painting. I was working with a therapist who asked me “Could you make a painting about what you wanted in life”? It was like a giant lightbulb went off in my head and I could immediately visualize this desire of love, connection and safety. I set out to work with a couple who were close friends of mine. That relationship was loving and connective and the work I made about them created an excitement within me that changed the course of my life both personally and creatively.
Contact Info:
- Website: [email protected]
- Instagram: @michellelynndoll
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/michellelynndoll
Image Credits
Stephen Churchill Downes Sophia Conger