We recently connected with Harlyn Steele and have shared our conversation below.
Alright, Harlyn thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. The first dollar you earn is always exciting – it’s like the start of a new chapter and so we’d love to hear about the first time you sold or generated revenue from your creative work?
The first dollar I ever made as a creative was my first international juried competition. I entered an oil pastel negative space painting entitled Bloom. I did not think in a million years that I,an artist beginning a new career late in the age game, would ever even place. But, I ended up winning the best in show and won five hundred dollars. It was one of the most proud moments of my life. Additionally, it has given me the motivation and confidence to go out every day in the studio to paint and to continue to move my career ahead.
Harlyn, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
After graduating from the University Of Texas Arlington, I continued my art education with many artists over several years. I currently spend all my time in my North Texas studio honing skills and creating art -experimenting with mediums, and techniques as well as creating art for sale. With a primary concentration in acrylic and oil pastel, my art focuses mostly with Taoism as it relates to light, water, portrait work and music emphasizing the concepts of this philosophy within each subject. I prefer oil pastel for painting portraits because it gives me a more intimate and personal approach to the subject. The colors I choose correspond to the mood or the aura of the individual. For me, portrait work is about emotion, mood, light and color. My acrylic paintings are primarily wet in wet or impasto. Creating texture in these works is as important to me as the subjects themselves. I want the viewer to have a tactile as well as a visual experience with the subject. This is especially true when it comes to the paintings concerning light and water. When I occasionally dabble in watercolor, I do so because iit best communicates the idea of flow. It allows me to show more gesture and movement and it has a rhythm to each piece whether i am painting a human form, a flower or animal and even when I am painting light. I want the eye to move with the subject. With each piece regardless of medium, I integrate my Taoist life philosophy. Typically, there is a common thread of yin yang throughout every piece. I like to create the natural tension of this push pull throughout every work I create. I feel it adds the interest that pulls the viewer into a more complete experience of the subject. Equally important, my neurodivergent brain experiences all auditory sensations as vivid full color moving images and visual input becomes a tactile sensation. I paint these subjects as I experience them. Art and craft has defined me from an early age. When I’m not creating and sharing my art, I spend my time with my Partner, my two daughters, and a very special Yorkshire Terrier, as well as knitting as much as humanly possible.
What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?
I love challenging myself and once I have mastered a skill, I’m not big on repeating the same thing over and over. I like to conquer the next mountain, so to speak. So, I push myself hard to learn a new skill. I allow myself to fail many times over learning from every mistake or failure. I continue to push until I have, in my estimation, mastered the skill I set out to learn. This for me is a huge motivation. I love learning, growing and flowing with art. It is unpredictable and endlessly challenging. One day you can’t seem to draw a straight line but then a day goes by and you step back and realize you have just done something awesome and you don’t know where it came from or how it happened. You lose all sense of self, time and you get into a zone where it seems anything is possible. The flow state is the daily challenge I live for.
Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?
There is no such thing as perfect. I used to be a huge perfectionist. I would freak out a little if things didn’t turn out the way I planned. As I have gotten older and let go of my ego, I have learned that the real art is the part that happens when you aren’t expecting it or haven’t even thought about it. It flows out of you and those “mistakes” often create the most interesting and valued parts of your work. As someone who also knits, I heard somewhere that knitting a mistake in every piece is good luck. Mistakes for me have become a very positive thing and help me pivot my focus into producing something that I might have never considered otherwise.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.harlynsteeleart.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/harlynsteeleart/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100090126229564