Artist Interview With Joan Dromey

Today’s Artist Interview Is With Joan Dromey From Kingston, Massachusetts.

Whopple: How long have you been an artist?
Joan: Growing up, I did artwork on my own, took art classes and studied art fairly extensively in high school and college. Not having a talent for graphics or illustration, I couldn’t quite see my way to making it a career. So after college I went into business and took a lengthy sabbatical from doing any artwork. I resurfaced again when my children were very young, but then went back into hibernation when I returned to working full-time again.
Then, because I took an extended vacation following a corporate acquisition, I decided to take up doing some artwork again. That was just about four years ago and I chose pastels to begin again with – and I haven’t stopped painting since.

Whopple: Tell us about your first attempts to be creative.
Joan: I don’t honestly recall not being able to draw and/or paint….when I was as young as four, I was doing endless drawings of horses, dogs and cats. I think I nearly drove my 1st grade teacher crazy because my desk was always stuffed full of sketches!

Whopple: Do you make a living with your art?
Joan: Well, I am not a professional artist and thanks to being a victim of tuition poverty (two kids in college), I can’t quit my day job anytime soon. I will say that my hobby supports itself and I am able to pay for materials, framing and at least one major workshop a year thanks to sales of my artwork and reproduction prints.

Whopple: How many hours a day do you create?
Joan: Oh, that varies enormously because I have a full time job and a relatively lengthy commute. Usually I am in my studio at least one evening and most of one weekend day every week (some glorious weeks I get more time in). So approximately 10 hours a week….and that doesn’t count hours put in on the business side of art to identify shows/exhibits I’d like to apply for, trips to the framer and any related reading/study of technique (I don’t require a lot of sleep).

Whopple: How did you pick your creative medium?
Joan: Well, in my second time around artistic career, my choice was made because I (a) had a set of Rembrandt pastels I had never used, (b) they were portable and (c) pretty easy clean-up – and I have since fallen entirely in love with the medium.

Whopple: What are your inspirations?
Joan: I’m inspired by the world around me – I live near the ocean and in an area where there are a slew of ponds (supposedly Plymouth has 365 of them – one for every day of the year). There is something really special about places where the sea and the sky meet…my work tends to focus on what I think of as “the forgotten landscape”.

Modern life is very busy for most people and I think we tend to rush unheedingly past things that are very beautiful without noticing them, because we are all too intent on our next destination and we’ve lost the ability to enjoy the journey. Truly in most of my paintings, it’s all about the light – the quality or warmth or sheen of the light and how it strikes or travels across an object or the land.

Whopple: How do you recharge when your creativity hits the wall?
Joan: Well, probably because I took a 20 year sabbatical, I haven’t even come close to hitting the wall in the four years since I started painting again! I find the inspiration in my backyard, in the immediate world around me, in other places I’ve traveled to and even in ordinary objects or how late afternoon sunlight hits an old building. Truthfully, if I had creative block I think I would jump into my car and head for Gurnet Point or the Cape Cod National Seashore just to get close to the landscape…that works for me when I’m not blocked and I expect it would do the same if I were.

Whopple: What was your first job?
Joan: My first job as a kid was being a “page” in a big city library – working in the stacks to sort and put away books. In my first ‘real’ job, I was a financial investigator for major banks and law firms in the Boston area (and I have some GOOD stories from that one).

Whopple: What are your favorite snacks when you are creating?
Joan: I have to say that I hardly ever eat when I am painting (maybe I should paint more often!). I tend to drink a lot of iced tea or Diet Dr. Pepper and, if I snack at all, it’s usually something really quick like peanut butter crackers or trail mix of nuts and dried fruit.

Whopple: What gives you hope in the world?
Joan: The people I have met since taking up artwork again give me a great deal of hope – I have never seen such positive, caring, generous and supportive human beings in any other profession. One of my great joys over the past few years has been the friends I’ve made through my local art associations and in the online arts community.

It’s interesting too that so many of these people are active in their communities for non-artistic endeavors (charity work, recycling, volunteering at animal shelters, activism on behalf of disadvantaged people). So in my own little sphere I see many reasons to be hopeful – and then I try to avoid too much of the nightly news since that generally counteracts those feelings.

Whopple: What do you wish you could do?
Joan: I’d love to transition into doing artwork on a full-time basis and would really like to travel more for the purpose of experiencing and painting on location in other parts of our country and the world. There is so much beauty out there – and I’d like to paint my share of it!

Whopple: What are your artistic goals?
Joan: I’ve been fortunate enough to realize several goals (acceptance to a juried show, and then to a national juried show, receiving an award, selling work) over the past few years. At this point, I know there are artists out there that I can learn a great deal from and I’ve been fulfilling my plan to take at least one major workshop each year with an artist whose work I admire.

I want my own work to continue to move forward and progress and I’ve recently begun trying my hand at still life and figurative works. I have done some good quality work but I don’t think I have done my best work yet (at least I hope I haven’t). So I want to explore more of what I may be capable of and I think that means carefully selecting other artists to study with as well as pushing out of my comfort zone. I’ve acquired some degree of mastery in pastel painting with landscape subjects and now I need to examine what direction to take that in and what other genres or techniques will advance my understanding and the quality of my work – and I’d like to apply and be accepted into The Pastel Society of America. Think I’m almost ready…so wish me luck!

Whopple: What Is Your Favorite Art Related Book?
Joan: My favorite art book for images/technique is Elizabeth Mowry’s “The Poetic Landscape”. However, my favorite work of fiction about art/artists is “My Name is Asher Lev” by Chaim Potok.

Whopple: What has been your most exciting moment as an artist?
Joan: Two things stand out for me – one is the first time I sold a painting to someone that was a total stranger. That was such validation for me since it meant that the work was good enough for someone to want to take it home to live with and that knowing me or knowing of me had absolutely no part in tipping the balance of whether to buy or not to buy.

But so far my biggest thrill came last August when I was told that my painting, Backyard Blues, had been awarded 1st place in the International Association of Pastel Society’s 2009 Web Show. I would have been happy to just have work accepted into a show of that caliber – I was told that there were over 400 entries from the U.S., Canada, Australia, France, etc. So to have my work singled out for recognition in an exhibit of that caliber was such an honor. Quite frankly, I’m still amazed that it happened and when I look at the works in that show, I can easily see that any of the works in it are worthy of an award. That was my lucky day though and it has been a huge source of encouragement for me to continue to pursue pastel painting.