We recently connected with Jimmy Millán and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Jimmy thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Are you able to earn a full-time living from your creative work? If so, can you walk us through your journey and how you made it happen?

I’ve been able to be able to earn a full-time living from my creative work almost from the very first day I quit my job (management area). By that time I was living in Jaén (the city I was born in), and I felt the need to express, to show the way I saw everything around me and to share it. The problem was I liked to many creative aspects -fashion, art, design, photography, music…- so I decided to start with making collages in order to put all my interests together on the canvas.
After a few months I had the chance to make a solo show and I sold 10 out of 12 artworks. Then I had a lot of commissions, exhibitions and, of course, I went online via Instagram. Once on Instagram, I was getting new customers, opportunities, exhibitions…and I decided to move to Granada (a more cosmopolitan city) where I had more and better chances to grew up, professionally. The proof: three years there, some works for magazines, an exhibition in London, collaboration with Westwing and Kave Home…and my next step was living in Madrid where I exhibited my art as well as in Málaga, Barcelona, Berlin, Busan and Seoul.
In perspective, I’m happy to say thay I think I wouldn’t change a thing in this near 10 years of creative career.

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 started with classic/analogic collages, creating portraits of world icons, people that I took pictures of and other clients. Along with the portraits I also created made up cities by mixing different ones, sometimes even including people at them.
With the past of the time my need of expression got higher and I felt like I needed to create from zero, using no photos this time, only papers, cardboards and painting. Nowadays I’m focused on painting on layered boards, showing faces (mainly) and different kinds of shapes covered by abstract and minimalism style drawings.
I’d love to get people to discover my work, not jus online but live cause everybody usually tell me that they love it more when in person due to the size, the volumesa and specially the shades.

Is there something you think non-creatives will struggle to understand about your journey as a creative?

I think people outside the creative world always think that’s awesome to live of what’s your dream is supposed to be. They straight assume that being an artist, in my case, is my dream come true… and I don’t usually tell this, but now I want to. Well, I love my job. It’s true, but I didn’t choose it because I found it attractive, I chose it carefully and being conscious of my skills and weaknesses. Also I had in my mind, from the beginning, these 3 facts: the willingness of getting higher goals everytime, the need to expand my world (my market) year after year and the necessity of trying to be as good as possible. And finally, and that’s the most hard to understand for outsiders… YES, I’m concerned of making money. Actually I want to have a good life and I work hard everyday for it, in case I didn’t I wouldn’t be doing this. I’m a dreamer, yeah, but also a professional.

How can we best help foster a strong, supportive environment for artists and creatives?

In my view, they should demand professionalism on us. As well as creative people should ask for it amongst ourselves.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.jimmymillan.com
• Instagram: Jimmy_millan
• Facebook: Jimmy Millan
• Linkedin: Jimmy Millan

Image Credits

Myself, Jimmy Millan.