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

Alright, Alexis thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Can you open up about a risk you’ve taken – what it was like taking that risk, why you took the risk and how it turned out?

Many people think the boldest thing an artist does is make their first mark on a blank canvas. But there’s a step before that I feel is far more significant: to fully devote oneself to being an artist. After 10 years of dividing my focus with other jobs, I finally took the leap to pour all of my creative energy into my art.

A big part of preparing me for this leap was moving away from the place I had lived for three decades – from the familiar and predictable weather of Southern California to my current home of Austin, Texas, where it is breezy, sticky, hot, refreshing, lush, sometimes cold and sometimes thunderous. I packed up my studio, drove 20 hours with my husband, and the risk was greatly rewarded with a soft landing into the welcoming arms of a very special community of people and fellow artists that offered immediate support and showed up for me whenever I asked for help.

Committing fully to my art was a seismic shift mostly in the realm of expanding my own permission field and how I value myself and my time. It wasn’t that I hadn’t always been painting. I had, consistently, for over 20 years. But I stopped asking for permission and stopped measuring my own value in units of productivity. I started fully following my instincts, not just in my studio, but in all areas of my life.

One of my favorite authors and teachers, Martín Prechtel, wrote in his book The Disobedience of the Daughter of the Sun: “So often the artist is sacrificed for the art and the art is what lives […] our art must be sacrificed, turned into a magic that puts us back together in a new way and hatches the world back to life […] living the life of an artist is not as useful as living our lives as a work of art.”

This is the new terrain I am currently traversing – living my life as a work of art.

I make work now that feels like a conversation with something ancient and internal. It’s intuitive, physical, feminine, and primal. My studio is a world of its own—half chaos, half cosmos. I wouldn’t trade it for anything.

The thing with risks I’ve found is that they’re all about perception and the internal capacity and resilience to keep making another mark – whether that’s with paint, words, or simply physical presence. I used to see the cliff that we live on the edge of as artists as too daunting and treacherous, but now I see the colorful world waiting below that always catches me. And I run towards it.

Alexis, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I’m an artist based in Austin, Texas. After experiencing a personal transformation in October 2018 when my vision spontaneously restored after 25 years of wearing corrective lenses, I shifted my artistic focus from the external world of nature scenes and portraits to the inner landscape of the imagination.

Working primarily with oil paint, and secondarily with gouache and acrylic, my touch is easily identifiable through fluid, snakelike paint strokes and noticeable absence of straight, hard edges. My process follows a color logic, where I instinctively choose colors and they take shape under my brush, leading to surprising outcomes that may spark an entire series.

My paintings reflect an interest in elemental, primordial themes of creation myths across ancient cultures, and serve as both a personal evolutionary compass and a joyful meditation on the relationship between individual physiology and collective stories.

Looking back, are there any resources you wish you knew about earlier in your creative journey?

I wish I knew earlier that reaching out to fellow artists for guidance and mentorship is so incredibly important. Artists are full of wisdom, experience, and creative solutions, and as creatives we have all experienced very similar challenges that we can help each other to overcome. Seeking guidance from artists has inspired me, uplifted me, and lit my fire with more impact than anything else in my career.

Are there any books, videos or other content that you feel have meaningfully impacted your thinking?

Hearing mythteller and author Martin Shaw say the phrase “uncolonize your imagination” propelled me into a new chapter of my work and my life as I completely changed my daily habits and the subject matter of my paintings from this one call to action. I recommend any and all of his books, as well as those by Martín Prechtel, particularly Secrets of the Talking Jaguar, to start. These mystical teachers and storytellers have brought a new level of depth to my creative life, the business of being an artist, and my unique purpose in the world from a very wise and holistic perspective. I am also in Madelyn Moon’s Unhinged artist community which has blown open my creative expression in all areas.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.alexissonesart.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/alexissonesart/

Image Credits

Personal Photo by Tram-Anh Marciano