Tracey Fletcher King is an artist, illustrator, printmaker, and teacher from Brisbane, Australia. She has been creating and selling her art for years, but after surviving advanced breast cancer, she decided to stop second-guessing the business side of her work.
Tracey has two “main arms” to her creative practice, watercolors & painting and lino prints, both of which can be found on her website.
In this episode, Tracey discusses:
-Her experiences at school and how they shaped her as an artist.
-How the decision-making part of your brain and the creative part of your brain are interconnected.
-How the creative path is a U-shaped curve, and how it is never too late to start up the other side.
-Being diagnosed with advanced breast cancer and the deal she made with herself to say “yes” to everything.
-How she has worked on her time management as a result of going through chemotherapy.
-The way in which everyone is curating their lives on social media makes it difficult to not compare yourself to someone else’s perfect version of themselves.
-The importance of making decisions (and having them in the first place).
-Her take on creating art while you are in a dark period and whether or not it is beneficial.
-The notion of “positive censorship” and only allowing positive things to come into your life.
-Her advice for creative individuals who have had a long gap in their creative pursuits.
-The importance of keeping your old work so that you can look back to it and compare it to how far you have come.
Tracey’s Final Push will remind you that you are on a U-Shaped curve and your best creative days are ahead of you, even when things get messy!
Quotes:
“It made me realize that all my best creative years were ahead of me.”
“The older I get, the more creative I’m going to be. As long as I get out of my own way it will happen.”
“We all think we need these massive blocks of time, but the reality is that you never have enough time and that’s just an excuse.”
“Everyone’s curating their lives so heavily with social media that I think then when you’re doing something creative, it makes it even more high stakes.”
“Try to realize that it’s not high stakes. A bad painting is not going to really damage you in the long run.”
“If you’ve got to just hide and do it and not tell anyone for twelve months until you’re ready to show someone, what’s the big deal?”
“Always keep your bad things, because there’s going to come a day that you’re really pleased that you’ve improved so much.”
Links mentioned:
Connect with Tracey:
Website / Facebook / Instagram / Tumlbr / YouTube
On the next episode:
Rob DiTeodoro : Instagram
What letter of the alphabet represents your creative journey? Join the discussion in the Facebook group!
