What’s With All The Squares?
Recently, I was in a bar in Atlanta talking about what I do for a living, which is paint, to a group of doctors who were very confused about how I could make a living doing just that (don’t worry, I’m confused too) when I casually mentioned I went viral on TikTok once as my last trump card in the conversation.
To my delight, and perhaps dismay, the whole group of strangers discovered they had seen my video on TikTok, which is why I’m going to assume you may have seen it. (It ended up at 4.5 million views, absurd really.)
Anyways, the video itself was kind of lame and out of the blue—it was about how color is political and how Pantone is dumb—and in it I painted small squares to prove a point about color theory. Mainly, that choosing white as the color of the year didn’t make a lot of sense.
this is what I painted about Pantone’s color of the year choice, which was white
I think it went viral because people like to argue about women having opinions, and angst drives engagement online, but that’s another topic for another day.
I ended up getting a lot of followers from that, cool I guess, but quickly realized those followers were interested in seeing more videos like the one that went viral, which at the time, I wasn’t making. The whole colorful grid itself was just to prove a point, but I had enjoyed making it and was surprised by the outcome myself.
I took it as a sign that I should keep doing it. Gotta keep the masses entertained, right?
Long story short, now I paint squares, which still perform better than any of my other content (weaving, acrylic paint pours, daily art practices, etc). Even videos of my face don’t perform as well, which I guess is fine considering my art is for sale and not my face, but that still stings my ego every once in a while.
Being a full-time artist means you have to be a chronically online content creator unless you’ve blown up in some other way previously. It’s something no one wants to admit to, and many people claim you can get around, but the fact is that to sell your work, you have to go to the marketplace. And that marketplace is social media, at least, for most small artists who don’t have representation.
Rage is trending, art is not
Unfortunately, going viral didn’t equal massive art sales. The video I posted was more of a rant than anything about my art, and I didn’t even get a spike in website traffic (sad). I had always believed that if I could just go viral once, all my monetary issues would be over.
I was wrong, as I often am, but I did find an art practice out of it that I enjoy. Purists will tell me that’s the point, to make art for its own sake, but purists don’t pay my bills, so…
I still paint organic, intuitive pieces, but mainly I spend my time drawing grids and painstakingly coloring in squares according to hue, value, and tones—while making videos to entice people to buy them. It takes forever, by the way, to color in hundreds of tiny squares. Hours to finish a 5X7, which feels offensive to me.
But there’s something about the end result that speaks to me. I’m not sure what it is yet, which is why I keep painting them in different patterns and color combinations.
All this to say, the squares are just beginning.
If you like them, feel free to buy them. If you hate them, feel free to tell everyone you know just how much you hate them (with links!) to increase my online engagement.
Cheers!
