We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Annika Wahlstedt. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Annika below.

Annika, appreciate you joining us today. We’d love to hear about when you first realized that you wanted to pursue a creative path professionally.

I was just about to graduate high school, and I was trying to decide what to do with my life and my career. I didn’t know what I was good at, or what I loved doing enough to do it as a career. I thought it had to be thrilling, something new and exciting, but I searched and searched, took career tests, and nothing felt right. I couldn’t picture myself doing any of these things for years on end. I had been drawing and painting my whole life, and it was something I loved, but it felt so natural to me I almost didn’t even consider it as a career. It was just something I did, all the time, almost without thinking about it. Then I realized one day that when I asked myself “what’s the one thing I can picture myself doing every day without getting burned out,” it was art, and that was that.

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 am an artist and muralist, my company, Into Focus Art, does murals primarily.

My designs are inspired by the beauty I find in different places. Colors, light, faces, animals, plants, etc. I see beauty in so many things in the world around me, and I want to bring it into focus for other people to notice and enjoy too. I find if you are looking for it, you can find beauty nearly anywhere. That’s where my company name comes from.

I am also passionate about helping small businesses. I grew up with a small family business, and now running a small business myself, it’s very close to my heart. If I can help someone bring in more customers or get more attention for their efforts, it really makes me happy. Murals are a great way to do that, so it’s one of my favorite things about the job.

In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?

Hire real artists and designers instead of using AI. I totally understand the need to get the job done at the cheapest price, but I believe that if an artist is doing their job right, they will be worth exponentially more to a client than AI.

AI can only give you what you ask of it. An artist will work with you, consult with you, and design with you, using their personal knowledge, vision, and a human understanding of your needs to craft something unique and purposeful.

Hiring artists keeps the creative well filled by supporting the creation of new ideas and encouraging people to embark on creative careers. AI depletes it by sampling from artists work across the internet and cheapening it.

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

I would say there are two things that are the most rewarding for me.

The first is helping businesses. Knowing that my skill set can actually help other people with their challenges with their business is immensely gratifying. It’s the best feeling when a client tells me they’ve actually gotten more customers coming in because of my work. I know how hard it is to get your hard work noticed, and I love that I can do that for people.

The second is seeing something I spent hours and hours designing on a small scale come to life on a wall. A plain wall or dark window becomes alive with color, and my little design becomes something so much bigger, literally and figuratively.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://intofocusart.com
• Instagram: @intofocusart
• Facebook: Into Focus Art
• Other: You can find me pretty much anywhere at Into Focus Art or intofocusart. I’d love to connect!