We recently connected with James Overstreet and have shared our conversation below.

James, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Learning the craft is often a unique journey from every creative – we’d love to hear about your journey and if knowing what you know now, you would have done anything differently to speed up the learning process.

I learned to be an artist by hard work, dedication, following passions and lots and lots of practice. Being an artist takes countless hours of work, it is a never ending learning process. Although it takes years of dedication, there are a few things I know now that could have sped up the learning process. Learning from others as much as you can , whether that’s fellow students, the community and professionals in your field. You have to experiment on your own but it also helps learning techniques and other ways of doing things by working with others as much as possible. That could be painting with peers or taking a workshop from artists. Skills that I think are most essential are learning the basics. Learning the basics to any craft will build a strong foundation for you and your work. They help give you better understanding of what you are doing which in turn helps build stronger work in your practice. Obstacles that stand in the way of learning more is time and life. How wonderful it would be if we all had infinite time to delve into our goals, we would all be masters at what we do! That being said our life often gets in our way of learning more, maybe someone starts a family, or has another job outside their main focus.

James, 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?

Art has always been a huge part of my life. It started with my mother and I, she was a single mom and we would always do art and craft projects, like painting ceramics or making potato stamp art! I continued to draw and doodle and take all the art classes I could until I graduated high school. After high school a myself and a few of my close friends would meet almost every night to create, that is when I discovered my ultimate passion painting! I loved it so much that I decided I wanted to learn everything about it and ended up going to college for a Fine Art degree. Art has always been a part of my life and always will. For my business I provide high quality visual art, from paintings, ceramics, drawings, murals and pretty much anything related to art. I sell original work, prints and always open for commissions. I also teach classes and workshops for the surrounding community.
What sets me apart from others is the pride and quality I take within my work. I am constantly learning new ways to create and honing my skills to become a better artist. I take what I do very seriously and professionally. When working on projects for others and businesses I do my best to be punctual, follow deadlines and produce the highest quality work.
I am most proud of my exploration of paint, and my ability to learn multiple styles of painting. Art is my passion I will always work to the best of my ability and never stop learning. I love to share my art and knowledge, to help inspire others to follow their dreams.

Question not found

If there was something I think non-creatives would struggle to understand about my journey is that it is by all means NOT EASY. It took years of practice and dedication to be able to do what I do. There is science, math and history behind every brushstroke that I make. I often hear that it is “Just art.” Well everything around us is created by artists, architecture, music, television, clothing, basically everything in our lives. It took years for artists to learn these crafts for the world to enjoy.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

For me the most rewarding aspect about being an artist is the inspiration I provide others. When some one reaches out to me to let me know how my artwork helped them it means the world to me. Or when I can see my work inspire others to work harder and try new things, it’s an unbelievable feeling. It doesn’t even have to be art related to help others. I would like to think how hard I work help inspired my mother at the age of 50 to go to college and achieve a degree!

Contact Info:

• Website: www.jamesoverstreetimagery.com
• Instagram: James_overstreet_imagery
• Facebook: James_overstreet_imagery