The Morning Sky out of the Window with Rohan on my Lap Cooing Softly
The Morning Sky out of the Window with Rohan on my Lap Cooing Softly
Insider #137 with the PNW sky and a request for your help in upcoming projects.
Dear Insider,
A watch is, I suppose, one way to tell the time. But I often wonder what it means to live by the ticking of a clock that is not mine. Instead, a centrally-controlled, scientifically-calibrated clock that puts everyone everywhere on the same time. It is a wonderful, impersonal, incredible, cold thing. It does not sit right by me, and I suspect it does not sit right by anyone else either. It is so useful and so inhuman. Throughout the day, there are infinite infinitesimal clashes between the time and my time, and the time and your time. The clash is inside our minds and, over the years that this new normal has been normalized, we have learned to accept defeat.
But what if we are right? Should a human mind, and a human life, run to the ticking of one second per second? Should time, and therefore days, and therefore weeks, and therefore years, and therefore life, be measured this way? Is it ever? There is a life I build on various calendars, and a life I lead in the interstitial spaces of those 60-minute blocks. Productivity, appointments, deadlines. Whimsy, artistic licence, and the stubborn streak we call procrastination but could equally be called man’s-search-for-freedom-between-the-cracks.
The SneakyArt (Insider) Post is written for patrons and paid subscribers of my work. Every Sunday, I share a behind-the-scenes look at my work, and a deeper look at my independent journey as an artist and writer.
In today’s post, some sights from the morning, and questions about upcoming projects. I need your help!
In Notes from Underground, Fyodor Dostoyevsky's protagonist scoffs at the idea that any futuristic machine could structure and control human activity. This book, written in the 19th century, imagines a future where actions, motivations, cause, and effect, are pre-determined by data-driven algorithms. The protagonist imagines this future, and laughs at the people who believe that it is inevitable. Then, conceding that he knows so little that it is perhaps inevitable, he laughs at the idea that it could actually work. What man wants above all else, he says, is the idea of his own freedom. Sure, a machine could calculate our best interests for us. Sure, it could tell us precisely and correctly what that is in the short term, in the long term, in all the terms in between. But still, it would not actually work. Man will harm himself and others around him, if it means he can feel free…
🖼️ Work Completed
This week, I finished drawing for a local cafe chain. To celebrate its 20th anniversary, The 49th Parallel Coffee Roasters commissioned me to draw at their locations. The art is being put together as posters for every branch, and will also be featured on mugs and other merchandise. I am excited to see how it will look!
I was so excited to have this opportunity, so eager for the exposure, and so desperate to not lose the chance, that I bargained against myself and grossly underquoted myself. Asking for what I believe I am worth is a difficult task that does not get easier over time. As an artist, the work does not have objective value. It has only the value I create for it. It is my job to push for that value. And when it does not, that failure is also (partly) mine.
Are artists, writers, illustrators, designers equipped to handle this responsibility? I do not think we are. But it is a burden we should be grateful to have. It is a freedom not afforded to countless artists throughout history, to all our heroes and idols who toiled through more rigid systems of valuation and success. It is a privilege to be alive right now. This is the best time in human history to be an artist.
Insider, what do you think? What are your joys and anxieties? What gives you hope? What snatches it away?