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

Stefanie, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Have you ever had an amazing boss, mentor or leader leading you? Can you us a story or anecdote that helps illustrate why this person was such a great leader and the impact they had on you or their team?

As a freelance artist, 80% of the time, I am my own boss. And I have to say, I like my boss. I am kind, playful, funny, and I like to set myself challenges to improve my skills. I also encourage a life/work fusion, meaning I let myself work intuitively early in the morning or into the night, on weekdays or weekends, at the desk or in bed with my iPad. Paying attention to my physical condition and mental capacity and scheduling my tasks and workload throughout the month with it in mind allows me to be my most efficient self.

Stefanie, 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?

For as long as I can remember, creating has always been a significant part of my daily life. From early childhood crafts to designing my own living spaces as an adult, art has never been just a job. My mind is constantly buzzing with ideas 24/7, and there is no divide between life and work. I believe this way of living is the core, the heart of my work, and it reflects in the complexity and emotional range found in my pieces.

In the 9th grade, I fell in love with photography. Convinced that I wasn’t talented enough to pursue painting or drawing, I believed I found a secret loophole (a camera) to be an artist and express myself without having the skills that I envied in some classmates. These classmates created perfect copies of still lifes presented to us in class and earned good grades. Thanks to a handful of amazing friends, teachers, and the internet, I have since learned that I was very much mistaken with my harsh, self-deprecating, 15-year-old views of the art world.

I spent five years living and studying in the UK, where I explored a wide range of visual arts, from painting to sculpting, fashion, graphic design, film, and photography. The best part was the colorful mix of artists I encountered during this time, all having different interests, skill levels, and widely different views on what was considered art.

My time in England taught me that anyone can be an artist as long as they are brave enough to be their most authentic selves. Work hard every day to improve your skills, create a lot of work, and patiently endure that success takes time but is inevitable as long as you keep moving forward. After a small detour from 2012-2017 earning a bachelor’s degree in communication design and working miserably as a photographer and graphic designer, I realized the only way forward was burning all my ships and focusing all my time on what I really wanted to do all along: paint.

In 2018, I was finally brave enough to say, “Fuck it, I can do what I want, paint what I want. My people will find me.” And that’s pretty much what I have been doing for the past five years. At the start I painted abstract landscapes, fascinated by contrast in all its senses. In the past two years, I have discovered an interest in figurative painting (which had been buried deep inside because of my 15-year-old self’s fear of failure). I have been loving painting objects and scenes of my own and my friends’ lives and merging those visuals with my abstract work, creating “Where is Waldo”-like paintings. Think of my work as ball pits for adults. Dive in, let the colors surround you, and with the flood of visual cues I throw at you, hopefully, memories from your own life will emerge, connecting you to the artwork and me. Let’s feel connected through art.

Have any books or other resources had a big impact on you?

Anyone that asks me this question will forever and always get the answer “Big Magic” by Elizabeth Gilbert. I read this book for the first time in 2017 and it has transformed everything. I changed how I see creativity, productivity, how I speak to myself and my friends. It really is big magic.

And also pretty much anything Seth Godin publishes. His books and articles have often served as a kick in the ass, when I needed someone to end my pitty party and rediscover the boss inside of me.

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

My biggest goal is to live a life full of laughter, love and self-awarness. Through creating art and living a creative life I achieve exactly this. By sharing it publicly and passionately, I hope to take as many people as possible along for the ride. I want to give them a visual token to remember what makes their life meaningful (along with super cool art to decorate their homes of course).

Contact Info:

• Website: www.stefaniethiele.com
• Instagram: instagram.com/itsstefa
• Other: itsstefa.bigcartel.com

Image Credits
Stefanie Thiele