Remembering to love making Art with a capital A (pour moi)

🎨📸🪑🍉

High Thought is an intimate, weekly-ish infusion of (high) thoughts that are a mixture of frivolous and (sometimes) profound if I’m lucky. Written with consideration for those interested in the creative process or personal peek behind the curtain into a particularly chaotic brain room. Usually written in tandem with plants for encouragement and flair.

(The best experience is on the website or the app, in my opinion!)

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🌸 Good morning/afternoon/evening, depending on where you are in the world. : )

Ya’ll, this is me comin up for air! Since we last convened I’d been in pre-production for a big job in LA, hung out with friends ahead of the job, shot something for fun, shot the job, did the first part of post-production and now I’m waiting on other people before the last few things get wrapped up.

Driving around Pasadena (Giraffe), June, 2023.

Then, if you can imagine, I’m taking some time off. (From work, not this.) I was experiencing another bout of burnout after some taxing back to back work in which I felt a bit more like a technician than a photographer or a director or an artist. For those who don’t know me very well, I came to this job via art school because I’m romantic about art and because you need to make money to make art, I began assisting and then (sped up and simplifed), I ended up here. I never actually thought I’d be here making advertisements for a living. I really love it, though. Even my work as an artist over time and across many mediums always comes back to advertisements - and it makes perfect sense that I love Basquiat, Warhol, Barbara Kruger, Tom Sachs, Ed Ruscha. They’re all fine artists who share a fascination with culture and communication and messaging and business. I can see that some of my peers like it to…I can see it in their work and feel a kinship there. Something so puzzle-y about the meeting of art and aesthetics and strategy and business. It’s like a game! Lucky me that I get to do this job for a living. That said, when one side leans so heavy for so long, it feels less like art and more like repeating myself and executing variations on a theme. All parties win when there’s a bit more balance.

One of the most iconic mashups of all time, IMO!( Warhol Basquiat The Palladium, NYC), 1985