Throughout my life I’ve always identified as an “artist”, whether it manifested as scribbling comics in my elementary school journal to writing verbose nanowrimo stories with my friend to recording anime speedpaints to hacking together a last minute art portfolio for college; I was always drawn to this spirit of creation.
But despite all that, I always hesitated when calling myself an “artist”. Back in high school, I had felt like it was something that needed to be proven. Every time I picked up the pen, I would fall into the trap of evaluating the meaning of my work based on the outcome. How many likes did it get? How many notes? How many people saw it? If no one saw it, did it even happen? If I had poured hours into a piece for it to be consumed in a second, did it even mean anything?
In an effort to get more views and likes I’d try and pander to whatever was popular in culture. If a show had just ended, I’d draw fanart of it. If I drew a girl, I’d tag #blackpink (even if there was no relation). I saw those quick drawings as necessary means to an end where I would have enough followers to break through the algorithm and finally, I could just draw whatever I wanted and have it be seen. Because of the sheer wealth of content competing for attention, I was outputting work, not for self-expression, but in hopes one post would become my lucky golden ticket to becoming known.
And so at the end of all that, I stopped really drawing.
I wasn’t drawing for myself or of myself. Instead, I was drawing myself into what I thought would cater to other’s tastes.
So now, years later, why do I create? What does that mean to me now? What am I doing differently?
I make art, first and foremost, for myself. That way, no matter the outcome, if no one in the world sees it, if no one thinks much of it, if no one likes it, it will have been worth it. Self-expression for me is a way to remember how I want to live in the world. It’s a way for me to make my values and dreams more real through processing my lived experiences.
I still make art for others, not to cater to people’s tastes but rather as a form of connection. We remember art that makes us feel seen and that helps us know how to live. I don’t cry easily, but I cry when I hear Mitski sing Star on stage and I cry reading this article about love and I cry playing this game where someone is lost in space. Maybe that’s why people love participatory art projects, where people respond on a piece of paper to a prompt. And when all those stories are all around you, you realize maybe you aren’t alone after all. And if one person could relate to my work, that would have been more than enough.
And in the end, my art, a record of the people and versions of myself that I’ve met, is a part of my existence that will never go away.