We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Sherry Strickland Martin a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Sherry, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Let’s kick things off with your mission – what is it and what’s the story behind why it’s your mission?

All along my journey as a professional artist I thought my mission was simply to make a living doing what I loved and what I was gifted to do. It was at age 43 I realized my purpose should be focused on serving others, as I wrongly felt my mission only served myself. I did not understand at the time how doing artwork was actually serving others in the way I expected God wanted us/me to serve and glorify Him. When I accepted a high school teaching position I then realized this was definitely what serving was about and it became my mission to serve God through teaching a new generation. In all honesty, I was serving others but my own family was lacking my presence when needed because teaching consumed me. I was not serving the most important ones God gave me. I struggled with that a long time, though I tried to be where I was needed regardless. It was hard sometimes. Not long before my early retirement from teaching I had been doing commissioned artwork on the side for other people and realized through their comments that my own artwork in itself was a mission of serving. Through followers and emails from Instagram/Facebook artwork posts, my study of God’s word and daily devotions, I came to realize that my simply painting what God called me to paint, commissions from others , sharing them and my thoughts with others was definitely a mission in serving what God has gifted me with. When a clients writes you sharing the tears of joy that your work meant to them, it truly brings it home to heart why you do what you do. This has happened multiple times over in the last few years. My mission is to serve the Lord in the way He orchestrates through the work I produce. The blessing in that is that it can serve many without denying any.

Sherry, 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?

Visual art has always been a God given gift I knew I must pursue, grow, share and use throughout my life. There’s never been a question in my mind as to where I belonged and my calling on this earth would be. By age 43 I had a productive professional art career as a watercolorist placing in Juried exhibitions, Gallery representation, working in the Art Licensing field nationally, interior design, fabric design, as well as doing corporate and private commissioned work. It was at that point I was asked to consider teaching high school art. I felt pulled to share what I have experienced in my career with a new generation, so I accepted. Long story short, what I expected to be a few years of teaching turned into 18 years, painting for myself and others on the side. I “retired” from teaching early in 2022, after a near death traffic accident my son was involved in that left him and and his family needing me full time for months. I put in my notice that very day knowing I was going back to my passion full time once we got through the crisis. My son is doing very well and I am now back in the studio full time, painting daily for the 4 galleries that now hang my work, doing commissioned work for clients and sharing my daily painting processes with interested clients and artists on Social Media. I have always been known for my watercolors, but when Covid hit, I longed to be outside and began oil painting outside of the studio, a medium I had stop using long ago. Today, my oils make up about 60% of the work I do. I paint what calls me. I live on the coast of South Carolina so the environment that surrounds me takes center stage. I focus on things, I believe, that most people may take for granted, or see but don’t fully observe in the ordinary: the patterns or colors light makes or changes when it hits a given subject, how something old and deteriorated can be something of beauty, how a scene can conjure memories, or smells or sounds. I try to paint what I see in a subject, how it makes me feels or sense. I believe the things I am most happy about is the where-with-all to do what I do every single day, like its a job, but its a “job” I am so passionate about it is part of who I am, not a job. More so, I get to share what I do and who God has called me to be with others.

Is there mission driving your creative journey?

Honestly, my main mission is to serve God using the gift He gave me to use and grow in this life. I believe we all are given a gift and/or a purpose, ultimately to bring glory to Him, each in its own unique way. Mine is simply to share all He creates through my visual interpretations with others. My artwork may simply bring joy to some, or give them a perspective they’ve not noticed before, or my process may teach a beginning artist something new. Through my life’s journey I want others to realize that following your gift or passion/calling is never a mistake because God orchestrates the path while you grow and nurture it. It’s really part of who you are and why you are here. You must however put in the work and don’t neglect it, it’s much too rewarding.

We’d love to hear the story of how you turned a side-hustle into a something much bigger.

At age 43 when I was called to teach high school after a nice and growing career as a professional artist, I fully thought I could handle both at once. Even with having to take certification classes because my Studio degree did not allow for teaching, I did juggle both well for a few years. My third year in, I was diagnosed with breast cancer and things got too hectic for all I was doing. I decided to move home, closer to my family, got a teaching job at the local high school and painted on the side when I could. I was in a new town that was not aware of my professional art career and clients were hard to come by. I met and married my husband not long after moving home, only for our first home and all my artwork, supplies and tools were to be lost in a rare wildfire in 2009. At that point, I simply decided I would continue teaching and on the weekends I would paint what I wanted for the joy of it and the occasional side hustle of commissioned pet or people portraits. I felt teaching was probably the ultimate service I was to offer, after all I enjoyed it and students seemed to relish what I could offer them. I continued this for 0ver 10 years and started showing my work and those of my students via social media. My new home had a beautiful Art Museum that first took notice of my students work, then noticed my own and approached me for a solo exhibition. We had a very successful exhibit using all the work I had done during my 10 year side hustling commissioned work and painting for the joy of it. One third of the paintings sold in the first two weeks of the show, most buyers from states and cities afar. This sparked a longing to get back to art production full time so I began painting what I loved more often and started looking for galleries again after almost 15 years out of it. . It took me another 3.5 years to take the leap (out of fear), but in January of 2022 upon almost losing my oldest son to a traffic accident, I jumped and have never looked back. God has provided and orchestrated everything needed on this journey back to my roots. I am in the studio or outside working every day just as if I had any other job and loving every single minute of it. I do not take it for granted. My work is now hanging in 4 gallery’s along the southeast coast, I offer giclee prints of many of my paintings and still do commissions for clients. I try to post the given days painting progresses or videos of production on social media daily and those have garnered interest and some clients as well as leading to budding artists writing to ask questions about techniques (which I am happy to share). My advice to side hustlers, Stay consistent, work knowing your full time is coming, use your social media to promote what you do, be yourself, prepare for the steps ahead and don’t give up! If its meant to be, it will be.    

Contact Info:

• Website: Www.SStricklandMartinFineArt.com
• Instagram: S.stricklandmartin.fineart
• Facebook: Sherry Strickland Martin Fine Art

Image Credits
The photos are my own.