We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Katharina Mace a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Katharina , thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Let’s go back in time a bit – can you share a story of a time when you learned an important lesson during your education?

One of the most important lessons that changed the way I approach illustration is that failure is the first step in learning. Growing up in school, I always put the pressure on myself to get things right on the first try. Whether it was trying to learn a new concept in math or working on a speech, I wanted to get it right. Looking back on it now, I was afraid to fail because if I failed it felt like I was never going to get it right at all. Where I faced this problem the most was when I tried to write papers. I wasted more time trying to say the perfect thing in my mind before I even got a single word on the sheet. Failing, even just the thought of it, felt like a looming cloud I didn’t want to face. It was not until I was at community college my freshman year that my whole perspective on failure changed. My English 101 professor taught us that sometimes you need to allow your brain to just dump all its thoughts onto the page in order to be able to build a solid foundation. It doesn’t matter if the thoughts are coherent or not. The goal is to get your brain thinking loose and free, without the fear of failure.
If something doesn’t work out on the first attempt, that is total okay- it’s healthy actually! Failure gives you the knowledge of what may work and what may not. If your initial concept goes the complete opposite way of what you expect, welcome that new opportunity with open arms. When you feel like you’ve failed it is important, even crucial, to keep moving forward and trying new ideas. Failure welcomes the possibility for something unthought of before. It teaches us to stretch ourselves and to learn to trust our creative gut.

Katharina , before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

Being a professional illustrator hadn’t crossed my mind until Rocky Mountain College of Art and Design came and spoke to my high school art class. Growing up, I thought that I was going to become a professional musician who played in various bands and orchestras. I played flute seriously for around five or six years. I made top chair positions and top bands. I can still remember the moment where I thought that music was what I was going to do with my life. I craved to be part of that bigger creative body that went beyond myself. Due to circumstances during my freshman year, I lost that passion I once held for playing music; I felt betrayed by it. It was my high school art teacher pushed me to start considering art as a career and something that I could do with my life. The next school year I picked up the paint brush and never looked back. When RMCAD came and spoke to my class, something about them sparked a fire within me. I was intrigued by the idea that perhaps somewhere out there was a group of people who wanted to do what I wanted to do and were driven by what drove me. I took a leap of faith and researched RMCAD and what they had to offer. After looking through their program’s illustration resonated within me the most, specifically the children’s book program. Growing up I was raised to love books and to treat them with respect. Some of my fondest memories are reading books before bed with my dad or reading during a thunderstorm with my mom. These memories are so close to the core of who I am and drive what I do that it clicked in my head and heart to pursue a passion for illustrating children’s books.

I sell stickers, prints, original paintings, and create custom chalkboards. My focus for the past few years has been on creating stickers that people find joy in sticking. Where I am from in Colorado, stickers are an integral part of the culture. Whether it is a sticker from a local coffee shop or one from an artist at a craft show, stickers are a great way to support local business and to give people a chance to express themselves. A sticker can be a conversation starter or even a change maker. My goal is for people to hold onto a piece of something that brings them of a sense of childhood nostalgia and comfort. As humans, it is integral that we have sustenance to feed our souls. If my audience walks away with a sticker or prints that sparks that sense of childhood wonder within them, I feel like I have done my job.

What I am most proud of is the person who I have grown to be through my experiences. Who I am and where I am today is beyond what I thought I was capable of 10 years ago. Life happens and we must learn to grow and adapt from it. I am proud that I have been able to make art that resonates with people enough that they want to support me and my art. I am proud that I graduated from art school and met some amazing artists who pushed me out of my comfort zone and helped me to become a better version of myself. However, I am most proud and humbled to have a close group of people who love and support me. I love what I do and how people respond to, but at the end of the day I cannot afford to lose myself to the things of this world. I am a vessel creating for the Creator. Throughout the chaos in life, I remind myself daily to keep this as my focus. Through doing this, I know that I will be able to continue and flourish in my career for many decades to come.

Have you ever had to pivot?

In life, I had to pivot when I decided to stop playing music and to start painting and illustrating. I did go more in depth with this question on the previous question.

Are there any books, videos, essays or other resources that have significantly impacted your management and entrepreneurial thinking and philosophy?

Art Money Success by Maria Brophy is a book that has significantly helped me better understand the entreupranual side of running an art business. Brophy helps run her hunsband’s business by doing the books and keeping up relations with his collectors. Brophy’s book breaks down the different avenues that one must learn about if they want to pursue a creative career. Something that has stuck with me from the book is that an artists should have multiple ways of making a profit from a piece of art work. Whether it is sticker, prints, a coloring sheet, or all three, having multiple ways to make a profit off of a single piece of artwork can help an artist have a more steady income stream. Another resource that has been a big help to me is the podcast, Three Point Perspective. This podcast has helped me to understand the illustration industry in an easier way. From Q & A’s to interviewing people currently working in the field, this podcast has been a fantastic resource!

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.keillustrations.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/k.e.illustrations/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/katharina-mace-924427216/