I decided to post these drawings I did when I was a kid (see below). My Mom saved these for me, bless her heart.

I wanted to pontificate for a moment on what you are looking at. I was born with a sense of design. If you are an artist and know design principles then, you can look at the drawings and see I'm talking about. I firmly believe that artists are born, not made in school. So, I'm now off to a rant about schooled vs. self-taught artists. And I have a reason to rant about this.

The idea that any person can be taught or schooled to be an artist is wrong. And the idea that a self-taught artist can not produce art like a schooled artist is wrong.

The rant is not about what you already know... it is about labels. If you are doing work that looks like folk art or outsider art... and you are schooled... then you will be told that you suck, or you are faking it. I've been told this to my face and had work that was bought and paid for RETURNED. Why? Because I wasn't a REAL folk artist. This is how you are labeled and that is so fucked up.

Why rant? Did my poor feelings get all hurt and stuff? No. The true value is always found in the art and the story or person behind the art. People who are foolish about labels do hurt business, but I understand why they act as they do. It does piss me off, of course.

My personal experience is that I'm doing what I do now because I was able to work through and over come my training. Years of it and then years of commercial art work to discover what was always in me... Look at the work I did when I was a kid. There's the proof.

I'm so much more an outsider artist now because I overcame the years of brain washing in art history class. Art history... influences nicely labeled for the students. I overcame art trends, massive peer pressure and then I overcame years of trying to figure out what clients wanted and how to shoehorn their needs into current visual trends. My God... I overcame myself for goodness sakes... that's mind numbing when you think about it. The path I traveled simply to come back to what I did as a kid... so much work to see the forest for the trees.

In many respects... a person, like my Grand Dad was blessed. He was self-trained and did wonderful paintings. Self trained artists don't struggle with as many influences. I'm not saying there aren't influences. There are influences, like... should I paint a landscape because that is what people seem to like or I see flower paintings in magazines... or should I paint a screaming purple monster because... I that is what I want to paint?

Look... all I'm saying is that the same principals apply in any piece of artwork. It doesn't matter if you are looking at the drawings I did when I was 10 years old or the drawings of a mental patient or Jackson Pollock or Fill In The Blank. It's all in how you arrive at your destination. Labels are for the art collecting sheep... I rest my case and will now be labeled a psychopathic whiner...