Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Brynn Elizabeth Barrietua. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Brynn Elizabeth, appreciate you joining us today. Before we get into specifics, let’s talk about success more generally. What do you think it takes to be successful?

In my own little corner of the art world, I believe I’ve found “success,” but I don’t quite feel like I’m successful in the traditional sense. I’m not wealthy or famous, I still struggle managing all the aspects of being an artist, especially the business and marketing aspect, and feel generally overwhelmed a lot of the time. Most art galleries have no idea who I am. However, in my life as a whole, looking at my career and the place it holds in my day to day life, I do think I’ve found success. I get to create beautiful things and make an income from it. I get to illustrate my inner world and inspire people. And I’m fortunate enough that my artwork always finds its buyer. I think what it takes to be successful, is defining success for yourself and aiming for that. It isn’t one-size-fits-all.

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 consider myself a magical realism artist, which generally means I strive for realism within fantasy themes. In 2024 I have limited myself to acrylic paintings and graphite drawings, but I have a portfolio full of mixed media work including oils, gouache, watercolor, and ink. I started making fantasy art around age 12, but I have always been drawing and painting. I always knew I was going to be an artist as an adult.

I’m technically an art school dropout! I attended art school for 4 days and left. I knew very quickly that I wanted to do things on my own, in my own way. In 2013, at 19 years old, a few months after dropping out, I opened my Etsy shop and started offering prints and originals for sale. Shortly after that, I started advertising my work on Facebook. I found a little network of similar artists, joined a few collectives, and started participating in group gallery shows. From there, I continued building my customer and collector base, joined more collectives, improved my skills, and it’s all lead me to where I am now. I am constantly pushing myself artistically, which is most certainly a strength and something I admire about myself, but I am very prone to burnout. And learning how to navigate that in and of itself is a skill I’m trying to learn.

I think what connects people to my work is my authenticity, both in the emotions I try to convey, and the figures and bodies I paint as well. I’m drawn to realism in figure paintings, especially when it strays from the typical thin body type seen in much of fantasy art. That is something very important to me personally, and people connect with that. I also put my heart out on my sleeve when I paint, even if it’s not obvious. I like leaving the interpretation to the viewer, but there are some that came straight from my soul and those are always the ones that have the biggest impact.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

Without a doubt, my biggest pivot is when I had my children. I knew starting a family was going to affect my work, but I had no idea how much until I was in the thick of it. I stopped participating in gallery shows altogether for a while and focused on my own shop, because deadlines were too much to handle during that unpredictable time. However, having children forces you to multi-task, and because of that I learned better time management, and ended up producing far more work than I ever had pre-children. I had my first child nearly 5 years ago, and since then I’ve participated in shows here and there, but I’ve had so much success connecting to clients and customers directly that I’ve all but let the dream of being a gallery artist go. That may change in the future, but this is what works for me at this time.

Do you think there is something that non-creatives might struggle to understand about your journey as a creative? Maybe you can shed some light?

Absolutely. The innate, inexplainable drive that we creatives feel is something I think non-creatives will always struggle to understand. I need to create, it is essential to my being. I need to express. It is what makes life beautiful, and bearable. I can’t explain in words how it actually feels to love someone, to be in nature, to be overwhelmed with despair, or to be filled with joy or strength. But I can paint a scene with figures and symbols and colors, pick a story from mythology, or come up with my own narrative, and try to illustrate the feeling. I also can’t explain why I chose to dedicate my life to this endeavor, when I could have chosen something more stable in a way non-creatives will understand. And that can sometimes lead to feeling like I need to prove myself, which I think can honestly be useful and motivating, but it can get toxic. We creatives don’t need to prove anything, we just need to create and be authentic.

I will also say that not all of my work is that deep. Digging up emotions can be draining! Sometimes I make art to have fun, or because I simply want to make something pretty. And that is authentic in its own way. I used to feel like I was selling myself short by doing that, but I’ve left that way of thinking behind.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brynnelizabethart/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BrynnElizabethArt/
• Other: https://www.etsy.com/shop/BrynnElizabethArt