On communication and risks

Today I'd like to write about leaving the burrow and the risks involved.

Some people imagine an illustrator's work as a very lonely occupation: you sit alone at home all day, tucked away in your burrow, drawing little pictures.

Maybe that's true. For some people.

Not for me.

(That sentence structure sounds artificial, but that's just how my natural intelligence chops up phrases.)

My entire job is communication.

Sometimes, in order to continue communicating with people, I have to draw something. But there are weeks when I don't draw a single line. Instead, I discuss, plan, comfort, promise, brag, demonstrate, stick my nose where nobody invited me, squeezing my eyes shut because it's terribly difficult, teach, praise, praise some more, gently criticize in a way that makes people think I'm praising them, and invent—constantly invent—new ways to get my thoughts across and new ways to understand other people's.

And sometimes, like today, excuse the shaky handwriting, I run headfirst into misunderstanding.

In good times, I get perhaps ten to twenty new potential clients knocking on my inbox every week.

One or two become actual commissions.

Which means that every day I hear variations of:

"Unfortunately, you're not the right fit."

"We've chosen someone else."

"You're not good enough."

Sometimes the signals are subtle. Just silence.

And then the interpretation depends on a thousand factors.

If work is plentiful and life is good, you enjoy the free time and never think about it again.

If the timing is unfortunate, you can sink into the swamp because of that alone.

You don't stay in the swamp long, though, because eventually some clients do place an order.

And then what?

You've been chosen, congratulations?

No.

That's just a new level, baby.

Level One after Level Zero.

And naturally, new levels come with new monsters.

A thousand revisions means a thousand times you failed to guess what the client wanted.

The artwork was approved immediately?

Wonderful. Now you get to watch your unfinished, imperfect creation go out into the world, shining brightly with all its logical holes and flaws, and it will keep shining with them forever.

You drew everything beautifully, the client is delighted, and then leaves... what?

Three stars?

"Good work, but a bit expensive."

Well, hello there.

The project gets cancelled after three rounds of revisions?

Clearly you're terrible.

Other artists are better.

Other artists would have managed.

The game throws you out, and yet you keep climbing back in.

Tired?

Take a break and do some teaching!

Teaching leaves behind fewer material traces.

Nobody is going to say, "You taught us to draw a hippopotamus badly. Teach us again!"

Grateful children are always grateful, right?

Of course not.

A lesson itself is an hour-long opportunity to embarrass yourself in countless different ways, and no amount of preparation can cover every possibility.

There are people.

And people have expectations.

If it's a lesson with children, then there are people with expectations, and those people have parents, and those parents have expectations of their own.

And in an ideal world, at this absurdly complicated level of the game, you somehow need to satisfy the children, satisfy the parents, provide value that matches the price, and what am I forgetting?

Not hurt yourself.

Otherwise you won't last long.

The lesson should be enjoyable for the children, enjoyable for the parents, and enjoyable for me.

It would also be nice not to get the facts wrong, not to trample anyone's fragile self-esteem (including my own), provide meaningful entertainment and...

What am I forgetting?

Oh yes.

Actually teach something.

Before that—and not everyone succeeds at this—you need to remember that you have a lesson scheduled, log in early in case Zoom decides to update itself, and organize family life (more communication!) so that your own children don't burst into the room screaming questions in the middle of class.

A burrow-dwelling introvert can easily burn out before reaching the "teach something" stage.

And once you do reach it, you may discover that you failed the previous levels anyway.

The monster ate you.

Yesterday I ran the first session of my new "Migratory Art Club" at one of Gothenburg's museums.

I invented the club.

Advertised it in new (terrifying!) places.

Visited the museum beforehand with Maika to prepare.

Planned my life around it.

Even broke my old rule of never working on Sundays.

I ran a session for five completely new children aged four to sixteen and three drawing mothers.

And honestly?

I thought it went wonderfully.

More or less exactly as I'd hoped.

The children were busy, engaged, jumping around, laughing, drawing, participating...

Aaaand...

The feedback I received was:

"It was too intense. The children got tired. Usually they sit and draw for two or three hours. Here they drew for forty minutes and then couldn't continue."

Which simply means that reality failed to match expectations.

People came expecting:

"Here's some paper, let's draw this picture together."

A relaxing drawing session.

Instead they got fifteen strange assignments and a small explosion of the brain.

Which means I failed Level Zero.

The initial communication.

And if that level fails, everything that follows matters much less.

People didn't receive what they thought they were paying for.

So I crawled back into my burrow to lick my wounds and decided I couldn't manage another session next week.

I wrote to the parents who had expressed interest and told them we'd skip a week.

The reply I received was: