We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Vincent Hisle. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Vincent below.
Alright, Vincent thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Do you think your parents have had a meaningful impact on you and your journey?
I think just about everyone is biased toward their parents. I think my parents were fairly unique in how they approached raising me and my siblings. One thing I know as a teacher, is if you invest quality time doing some sort of creative activity with your children, it will shape them into intelligent and creative people. At the very least it will shape them into curious people who are less afraid to try new things, and I would wager this was a huge advantage for me. I know a lot of creative people, even more-so than myself, who don’t pursue creative endeavors and its somewhat disheartening. I’ve witnessed this my entire life and its made me think quite hard about my upbringing and why I am the way I am.
My Mom ALWAYS had some sort of a craft planned we would do as a family, and we had an entire area in our basement devoted to it with a large craft table my father built. We did a lot of different things, paper plate turtles, scarecrows from construction paper, christmas ornaments.
My father was self employed running “Hisle and sons roofing” for most of my childhood and I would occasionally help him on jobs, even from a pretty young age. There was a period of time when I was around 7 that they took roofing slate and made arrowheads and other primitive styled art and sold it to a nearby store. So that exposure could explain a lot about me and my lines of work.
Even from a young age, my parents were highly supportive but also critical. I drew in sketchbooks all throughout childhood and either my parents, or my grandmother (who was also a professional artist) would critique me any time I showed them a sketch. They were wise enough to be kind, but to offer some sort of advice or critique. I have noticed, as a teacher, how hard that mix is to get right. It’s also quite hard to get a young person to take critique and act on it, so I often wonder about my personality as a young kid and how my parents were able to cultivate that kind of response from me.
All through my teens, my father, a close cousin and myself would spend summer nights or weekend nights staying up fairly late making other random projects. Things like model battle tanks out of sheet metal, chess sets out of slate, and other random things. That was, perhaps the time in my life I am most fond of, at least from my childhood or in a nostalgic way. A typical night was going to a pet store and grabbing feeder fish/crickets for one of our many animals at home, grabbing dinner and picking some sort of crazy project to start or finish. We would bounce back and forth between something like an eel or turtle etc slowly whittle away fish, and my dad cutting himself on sheet metal and cursing or something like that haha. It was a very fun time most weekends.
Vincent, 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?
I have always been into the arts, from a very young age. I have always heard people speak (especially on social media lately) about how the arts are just supposed to be part of everyones lives. I agree with that sentiment and that was my lived experience for sure. Neither of my parents were “artists” in a professional sense but both were very creative and artistic people and they shared that with me, so much so, that I became a musician and artist professionally.
In my childhood I spend a lot of time drawing, and friends would ask me to draw something for them, or themselves as a subject. I think this gave me a sense of identity. I was kind of a self conscious kid, as most kids are. I would describe myself as an empathetic, introverted quiet kid but wasn’t too afraid to make friends when opportunities arose. I had a friend a few years back remind me that I had drawn her a horse in grade school, and that it meant a lot to her because she was having a bad day or something, and I had completely forgotten about it over the years. I think that was a common thread in my childhood and continued into high school, only branching into music as well.
I think for a time, being one of the better drummers in school took over my identity. Or maybe just being the “talented kid” and to be frank I somewhat regret this. Besides not being the most humble kid, being good at a craft is not a whole personality. Thats a lesson I don’t think I learned until I was into my 20s. Young men often struggle to find that line between arrogance and confidence, and it is a fine one.
Another big part of my personality that is worth explaining is a need to impress. I think I’m able to look back and see it now, and no, it is not the mostly healthy of behavioral patterns. But I had a real need to impress people. Certainly in grade school but even into college and perhaps now, although I am aware of it and can relax it. I remember in college grinding and grinding at solo literature to prove a point, win a concerto competition, be a featured soloist etc.. There was a saying that stuck with me, “If we do not aspire to do great things, we will not do great things” But this was frankly leading me into a completely out of balance lifestyle. I had some big successes and big failures in music school. It was humbling and I learned more from the failures I have to say. I had a few pieces cut from programs because of my lack of preperation, seriously disappointing an important mentor of mine in school, in Scott K. Lang. If not for Scott, I can certainly say I would not have humbled, found some kind of balance or even graduated. I am a first generation college student, so at times I felt completely alone / stressed. being a music major is extremely time consuming, so needless to say once college got so busy I stopped drawing or painting and this was also a big blow to my spirit in some ways.
The end of my college career culminated in my senior recital, which even to this date, is the hardest thing I have ever done, and the achievement of which I am most proud. I think it gave me the tools to be an effective planner and the understanding that execution takes dedication and sacrifice. But for some time after I couldn’t even listen to music in the car. I had prepared so hard for that recital I was sick of music, sick of work, I was burnt out. I had put in many 15 hour days on my repertoire, I had slept in practice rooms with a piano cover as a blanket, I was toast. Around this time, a band I was in had broken up that was pretty important to me. Sometimes, it was the only “fun” or at least “relaxing” musical or artistic endeavor I had. It was the only time I got to spend with my high school buddies. I didn’t protest much on the outside. I understood why it was happening and didn’t want to make anyone feel bad about it, although it was a blow for me.
As an adult I think I am finding out who I am, and what balance for me and my family means. I have an amazing wife and 3 children. My wife is extremely supportive and I appreciate her so much for that.
In the years since college my interests in music and art have been renewed slowly. I would say I am now back to the level of enthusiasm I had for them as a child, or at least close. It has been a slow re awakening for me, but it has been nice to take my time and figure out what I really like vs what my friends or family may have lead me into etc..
The business you see today “Hisle designs” came about through the same fun experimentational spirit from my childhood instilled by my mother and father. A good friend and I were up late talking, and I had wanted to make a herringbone patterned wood sculpture myself. I had seen these in the art gallery in school among other geometric art and been deeply inspired by them, even just in a quick passing from class to class. I had this idea in my head floating around for some time and got him to agree to try the whole thing out with me that night. I cut tiles from some extra construction lumber I had laying around from when my father came over and helped me build my own workbench. We had recently purchased our first house, and this is another example of support from my father and its ripple effects. It is hilarious to me now because construction quality lumber tends to make lousy art, and we used water based stain which made the wood swell, but i digress. We cut enough to fit onto a big piece of plywood I had left over and began staining them. the plan was to make a gradient from blue, to green, green to yellow, and yellow to a nice deep orange/red. basically a rainbow without a true red, purple or darker blues.
I finished the piece sometime later on my own, but we had a ton of fun and it looked so beautiful so fast it got me extremely inspired to make more. The physical nature of the medium and how dimensional it is. you can touch it, and it has shape and texture, the wood grain gives it life. It is a medium that sits in between sculpture and painting.
I made an etsy for fun, just to see what would happen if I threw that piece up for sale. I priced it fairly low in hindsight but what I would have thought was expensive at the time. Somewhere around $400 for a 24″x48″. This was in 2018. I simply priced it similarly but lower than other works like it on the site, because I was just starting out. It was only up for two weeks before a design firm in texas purchased it and flipped it. I have no idea how much they made in profit off of it but It made me realize the value in what I was doing and gave me a ton of fuel to go further.
I have learned quite a bit along the way. Certainly I learned to use better artist grade materials, use new tools etc.. but what I think is most valuable is what the customer wants and how I’ve learned to provide it.
With art it is somewhat simple. They have a space, and they want it to look good. They actually generally trust you to do this. It can be easy to get in your own way, so I tend to keep it simple. My job as someone who does something custom is to get the input from the customer on who they are, what they want, and what their space and decor looks like right now. I take all of that information and give them what I consider to be an extremely elegant and beautiful solution. We could call it the “perfect” solution but that isn’t humble of me and we all know art is somewhat interchangeable and subjective.
I see myself as someone who makes something close to decor but it is still serious art. This is a blurry line, but the distinction is important because decorum sometimes is “stamped out” in a factory. I am designing, hand painting every piece and selecting and cutting wood myself.
The truth is, simple things are beautiful. The human mind at its core loves geometry, and patterns. I tend to work in blues and greens because people find them most calming. I have always been deeply interested in anthropology and apparently this is explained from a hunter gatherer perspective. Clear blue water is safer to drink generally. Green pastures mean food is nearby at the least. These colors please even the primitive parts of the brain. I am deeply and most inspired by nature, and instilling a sense of calm. Many artists seek to provoke thought. Some seek to provoke anger or political thought, or many other emotions. I have always been inspired and try to create art that calms the mind. That is maybe what I see the role of art in the home to be. Or really any place people are meant to be able to relax. If we really thought about this effect more, I would venture more people would purchase more art for their businesses. In fact, the biggest difference I have noticed from small local business to bigger more corporate business, or businesses who entertain clients with more capital, is that the latter invest more heavily into serious art for their spaces. Because they understand the effect it has.
Art is profound. It can have a deep effect on your mood and then in turn how you treat people or interact with the world. It is not a frivolous thing. The right painting can change your day, every day……
To me that is deeply powerful and worth pursuing as a passion and craft.
How can we best help foster a strong, supportive environment for artists and creatives?
Invest in your children’s creative and intellectual abilities. Sign them up for music lessons, dance classes, chess club etc.. I think if all parents knew the difference this makes, every kid would play a sport, an instrument, and have an intellectual or artistic hobby. It makes for a more well rounded person and a better society, in my humble view.
What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?
I’ve had many jobs frankly. Mostly in my teens and 20s. They had a broad range too. Drumline instructor, Pharmacy technician, aerospace, roofing and the list goes on. Some of them I enjoyed but didn’t like who I worked with. Some of them I worked with great people but hated the job. In general none of them are like being your own boss and managing your own schedule and talents.
That freedom is hard won and maintained but it is beautiful. There is nothing like it. If I want to pivot the direction of my art, I don’t have to ask anyone. Let’s be honest, some people have to deal with asking just to use the restroom and I dealt with that plenty at some of my jobs. That kind of thing can be incredibly disheartening and is worth escaping frankly.
My Father and Mother both raised me to work hard, I grew up doing plenty of yard work or occasionally roofing with my Dad. I feel as though I came up against unreal expectations of workload fairly often, sometimes no challenge at all or entirely impossible expectations. To be frank, true natural leaders among men and women are extremely rare and if I don’t have one above me in a given job, I wont be sticking around. So this has been the best fit for me so far.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.etsy.com/shop/HisleDesigns
- Instagram: hisle_designs
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100067193171828
Image Credits
I own all the images provided