We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Billy. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Billy below.
Billy, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. We’d love to hear about when you first realized that you wanted to pursue a creative path professionally.
I realized I wanted to pursue a career as an artist when I was a kid; but on a professional level, I started taking it seriously in undergrad when I really started developing my hand and my own voice. After graduating and moving to California for a bit I was learning how to balance working multiple jobs while finding time to draw and plan projects and apply to artist opportunities. Those six years in California led me to apply to graduate school, where I am currently completing my MFA at Pratt Institute. I am learning a lot about how I want the trajectory of my career to go and am currently putting in the work to meet those goals.
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.
My art practice moves through drawing, performance, and video. I use mixed media materials in my drawings that live on the wall. I start with portrait-size paper then add paper as needed to the work as my hand moves around and off the page allowing the figure to grow in sections. I like to depict my friends, community, and people I love and care about that are visually arresting. I want the people that I represent to feel what it is like to be put on a pedestal and have their personal aesthetic rendered. If they were to create their own album cover what would their most confident pose be or how would they want to be memorialized. It’s a collaboration between how I view them and how they view or want to see themselves.
What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?
There are many things that are rewarding as an artist. To be able to materialize what is in my head through many mediums be it drawing or dance movement, etc. feeds my soul like nothing else. But what is truly beautiful, is when people see your work and and they don’t just “see” me, but they feel me! They get what I’ve gone through, what it felt like to make the work and how my own experiences, values and personal interests all translate visually and somehow resonate with them. Those observations can incite many feelings and open conversations of relatability and can make not only myself but others feel represented as well. On some level I feel that is what we are all here to do, connect with each other.
Are there any books, videos, essays or other resources that have significantly impacted your management and entrepreneurial thinking and philosophy?
This is an insanely loaded question as I am an insane archivist of visual media in general. I’ll start with a book by Ian Roberts called “Creative Authenticity”. I read this book often in my studio before I start making art. Its a great book that helps ground me in a calm space and helps to wash away a lot of the anxieties that come with the creative process and it can be applied to any discipline. I also consume an insane amount of videos (music videos, dance videos, interviews, fashion films, cinema), images, and music and curate them across multiple platforms and playlists directly correlating to my changing moods and places I need to go in order to bring out the most creative parts of myself. Anything can be inspiration and I will log it into my camera roll, notes app, or wherever I need it to be so I can look back and reference my myriad of interests that can inspire the artwork. Ultimately my taste is derived from this collection and is a representation of me.
Contact Info:
- Website: billyhawkinsstudio.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/billy_onair/?hl=en
Image Credits
Koozy