I Don’t Want To Be An Artist, I Want To Make Art

Hey! I’m Holly Maybe.

I’m a 22 year old illustrator from the east midlands in England. I recently graduated from Lincoln University with a degree in Illustration. And I don’t want to be an Illustrator.

Yeah, I know that is a great opening, but here's the thing, sometimes you have to pivot. This is an incredibly hard thing for me to have to admit but I think that even though I haven’t been ‘professionally’ making art for long, I have been making it my entire life and I know myself better than anyone else knows me so I guess only I can say it. I don’t want to be an artist.

I have dabbled into what I thought I wanted to do, into selling my own work at markets and trying to work off commission and while it might be easy for others to say that the only reason I don’t like it is because I haven’t made enough money or done it for long enough, to that I say, I don’t want it to be like this. 

And yes, I can admit that it is incredibly disheartening to buy up plenty of stock and to not do very well at an event but I really don’t think that's why I found it to not be for me.

I am an art lover, I love art and I love it in pretty much all forms. (except AI “art”, BLEH) But I am not the kind of person who likes to be tied down to art. I have of course my gravitational pulls, as I like to call them, the art styles and media I prefer and hence gravitate towards. But I really just enjoy a bit of everything, so much so that I can make one art piece, be really happy with it and say “Yes, this is what I will do, this is me”, and then the next day I am in a completely different medium saying “No, this time, THIS is me”.

When I am older, maybe I can look back and say I found myself in an art form and that is my escape AND my source of income, but right now, that is not for me.

Modern day artists are not just artists. You need a wealth of connections, networks, and knowledge in areas completely unrelated to art on paper. You need to be able to manage social media, run your business, stock management, make connections to other artists, be a graphic designer, edit videos, make reels, post, post, post , POST!

Yeah, that’s not what I want to do. I am not made to be an artist and that’s okay.

When I was at my art markets I found myself exhibiting a completely different demeanor towards art than when I was simply a consumer. I couldn’t just appreciate art and artists for what they did. I found myself wondering around going, “I want to make what they have”, “I wonder where they got their art put on to socks?”,“I wish I was selling that”, “I wish I was making something”, “I don’t make anything nearly as good as these people”. 

Let’s get this straight first, finding inspiration in others is the whole point of networking, but when inspiration goes too far into being on the verge of jealousy and envy for what other artists can do, then you have gone too far. You are no longer making art for the reason you started. I had no goal, I just wanted to be everything all at once.

I no longer want to compete with myself for this non-existent goal in my head. I don’t want to be an artist.

I want to make art.

So, why am I writing about this and ranting on the internet?

Back in 2022, when I was completing my A-Levels and picking my university options, I made a choice.

I sat in my personal tutor meeting and said to my tutor “I don’t know which to choose, please help me choose”. And he said “Illustration, I think it’s what you want to do and it’s your passion, so do it”.

And I said “OK.”

That meeting is what set me to pick all my university options, my 3 year course I ended up taking and why I am here now.

My other option was journalism. (I took A-Level English)

 (Thankyou Mr Martin, you were a very big help in my life and I am forever grateful you were supportive of my dreams even though I now want to change them :D )

Now as someone coming out of an Illustration degree and not really being inspired to make that my career anymore I found myself stuck. I forced myself to keep my instagram up to date, go to markets, do commissions, update my website to appeal to employers and potential clients and I still find myself sitting at home, unemployed, reading my magazine subscriptions.

Maybe my passion is still in art, and maybe it is still in making merch, but here I am trying this.

It takes a lot of guts to potentially make a fool of myself here while I try to find my true passion within the public eye but I hope that at least a few of you who made it to the end of this will stick around to see where this goes.

Love,

Holly, Maybe?

xx

Thank you for making it all the way to the end, I really do hope that you stick around and support me trying something new. As a reward for staying until the very end, here is a picture of my cat, Maple.