As a writer, I struggle with titles. I often begin with a title and that informs my work, but if that title no longer works with the story, I have a difficult time finding a new title that really works with it. But today, I feel like I need to start with a title that focuses on some really important times of my life. These are the times in my life in which the people and places shaped my mind around art. I can't talk about all of my instructors and environments which were instrumental in developing my artistic talent or this post would go on forever, but I will try to narrow it down.
My first artistic instructors were actually musical instructors. I wanted to play the cello from an early age, so, much to my disappointment, my parents got me a violin and told me that if I stuck with this for two years, they would buy me a cello. So I did. My one-and-only cello instructor's name was Lisa. Lisa was the first instructor who taught me about proper artistic form. The two main reasons for proper form when playing the cello are to get a good tone and to actually be able to play more difficult pieces. Left elbow down will lessen your agility and if your bow isn't drawn across the string in the right place, your sound will go flat. These are simple skills that need practicing. But I didn't like to practice so it took much longer for me to learn new techniques. This began a pattern for me with all of my musical instruction throughout the years.
I don't have many pictures that I took from my formative years, but I like this one from Locarno, Switzerland.
I later abandoned cello for voice (although my old cello still sits in my closet). I had various voice instructors through high school and college and, while I ended up with a singing voice that I think is really great, my instructors had to really pull it out of me because I wouldn't practice what they wanted me to. It wasn't until college that I found a voice teacher that could identify what I really needed in order to sing well. I needed to both strengthen my singing muscles and relax the tension that I hold in my body. Strengthening and relaxing at the same time is difficult--and I found that I needed a voice instructor as well as yoga, pilates, and dance instructors in order to develop the skills to do it. All of these teachers, together but separately, taught me to integrate knowledge, practice, and ways of doing art.
This is me in a high school production of The Tempest. Shiny. So. Shiny. Photo cred: my mom.
But before I get too far ahead of myself, let me circle back and take a chance to thank the teachers in high school who taught me to feel comfortable with language. The drama instructor in my 11th grade year and I had a special bond. When we first encountered each other, I had been acting for quite some time, and she could see that in me. Her humor, experience, and intelligence got me excited about performing. She also got me to come close to mastering a monologue from Hamlet, which is still one of my favorite plays. I can still rattle that monologue off upon request. I also credit my 12th grade English teacher for being the first person that guided me to being comfortable with writing. The American system of teaching academic writing, to me, felt constraining. Ms. Whisenant freed me of the constraints that previous instructors had put on me. She imparted upon me this knowledge: A piece of writing does not need to follow any given structure; you can arrange a piece of writing however you would like to--however it makes sense to you. I started to be able to clearly put my thoughts on paper getting As on my papers instead of Bs and B-s.
For a website that mainly features my photography, it seems weird to not mention how I started taking photographs until now. But I've never had any photography instructors--I kind of wish I had; my high school had a great photography department. My history of photography begins like this: Just before I moved overseas for my parents to go to Turkmenistan and myself to go to boarding school, the Circuit City in my town was having it's closing sale (ah yes, the mid-2000s collapse of Circuit City was devastating, but apparently it's trying to make it's third comeback?) and my mother bought me a pretty basic Nikon DSLR. So it was my toy to play with when I started adventuring. My camera would hardly leave my hip whenever I would go on any sort of adventure. I learned to love to take pictures of flowers and landscapes and betraying peoples' trust but earning it back swiftly when I took candids that turned out to be really good. Each adventure in Switzerland, Turkmenistan, Turkey, Italy, Russia, Hungary, Israel and more gave me new insight about how I saw the world through the camera.
Look! It's a new type of photo! I started taking production photos for a theatre company that I do some production management for and this is one of the best. (Pictured: Aron Spellane, left, and Keanu Ross-Cabrera, right)
As I look back on my art, I realize that I have come a long way. My pictures better composed, focused, and exposed. My singing voice is strong and comes easily without too much warming up. Writing comes relatively easily, but, honestly, I haven't done much creative writing in quite some time. I was focusing on promoting a script that I started writing many years but just finished a submit-able draft this past year instead of actually writing. I now feel quite out of the habit, but I still feel like I need to promote this script more. But that's what 2018 is for. That's why I'm making this website. That and my photos. And as a way to write more frequently. So maybe 2018 will bring better professional things than 2017. Here's hoping.