I can’t believe we are well past the middle of the year. I was looking at my Archive folder on instagram and saw that it was almost exactly a year ago, that I turned my yoga studio into my art studio. It was around that time too, that I created my website. So in a way, it’s one year since I kinda sorta became a FULL TIME ARTIST. It’s such a big weird label to have. And a strange one because when you’re a mum of small kids, that’s kinda your FULL TIME job anyway for a couple of years. And now that they are 8 & 11, I feel like this is me, ‘going back to work’.
Anyway, I can’t believe it’s only been one year. Yet I feel like I’ve come such a long way. For those of you who have followed me from the beginning, I thank you.
For those of you who have just started following me, I am also a yoga teacher and have been teaching yoga part time as well as raising my children for the last 10 years or so. It’s my other beloved passion of mine besides art. And somehow I do feel like I’ve infused my yoga teaching/practice with how I talk and teach painting. I do love how that turned out.
Anyway, my backyard studio space has a story of its own. When we bought this house almost 6 years ago, the previous owner was an artist! She was a textile artist and she built this studio in her backyard and when we came to view it in the open house, we fell in love with the house and the studio. Back then, I thought wow. If only I was an artist. Oh well. This would be a great guest bedroom! So for the first few years, it was just a spare room for when family and friends came to visit. It was just a few months before Covid that I thought I wanna try turning it into and AirBnb! And so for 6 months, it was called “The Blue Cottage” and we were booked out almost every weekend. It was pretty fun! Making it pretty, hosting people, seeing the income flow in.
Then Covid hit. And no guests came. And after the first pretty harsh lock down, I was at that time teaching yoga at a local studio in the village. But because of covid and all the vaccination rules, I decided to just turned my studio into my yoga studio. And that was incredibly amazing and fulfilling. I had professional photos taken, I made my website and branding and all that. And people came to my classes. So for about a year, I used my backyard studio as my yoga studio where I would teach 2x classes a week. It’s such a gorgeous space and my students who came loved it.
But after awhile, I realised, I was only using it twice a week, for only 1.5hrs each and I know I wanted to pursue this art thing more. So I took the plunge and moved my yoga teaching back to the studio in the village, and turned it into my art studio. I painted the walls white (it was a pinewood colour), and threw in some tables and shelves, and it became my art studio. And come to think of it, I had a fantasy, a premonition that one day this beautiful space would come in handy if I ever wanted to film in it. You know like, maybe, Youtube videos or art courses or something like that? And guess what? It did come true. What do you know!
I don’t think I fully realise how lucky I am to have this space to call my studio. So many people struggle to even find room in their homes, their apartments. So many try to build a little shed in their backyard and have to wait for permits that take forever. So many artists have to rent studio spaces just to make art. But for me, I accidentally bought a house that had this space. This space that was built for an artist. Sold from an artist to a non-artist (me back then), who then became an artist. Now how insane is that?
I guess what I am saying is, somehow, life has this strange crazy way of placing the puzzle pieces together for us. And for a long long long time, I didn’t know or couldn’t figure out this puzzle. All could do was follow my intuition. And hope that life would fall into place. And it is scarily falling into place right now. This beautiful rural town we chose to move to. The house we chose to buy. The yoga I decided to pursue. And now the art career/ undertaking I am undertaking.
One year being a full time artist. How does that feel. You know what? It's been the most amazing working year of MY ENTIRE LIFE. It really has. I can't think of anything else I'd rather be doing. I wake up invigorated everyday. I want to work all the time and I don't even feel like leaving the 'office' (my studio) when the day is done. I love it so much. I really do. I feel creative every day. Not just for the painting, but for my business, for my videos, the content, the marketing, the events around it (I'm doing Open Studios in Nov! Arghhh!), the teaching, the connecting. Everything. I am truly living my dream. A dream I never even knew I had. Seriously how insane is that.
One day I wanna sit down and trace back really to how I got here. But for now, this blog post has gone on long enough. I needed to write this. Happy one year artist anniversary to me.