Things People Think Illustrators Can Do (But Usually Can’t)

Tattooing, making jewelry, printing and selling my own postcards, professional makeup, writing beautiful obituaries, photography, becoming a makeup artist for film and theatre, a costume designer, a calligrapher, a street artist, a caricaturist, painting commissioned portraits, training crocodiles.

Guess which one of these is the only thing nobody has ever suggested I should do after finding out I’m an illustrator?

Meanwhile, I honestly think I’d be better with the crocodiles.

Everything else on the list I either can’t do, don’t enjoy doing, or both.

For some reason, whenever somebody urgently needs good hand skills and fine motor control, they immediately think of artists. I wonder, if I were a man, would everyone also automatically assume I paint perfect eyeliner and know exactly how to apply mascara? I don’t, I have no idea. Whenever I need makeup these days, for the last five years I’ve just asked my daughter to do it. I simply cannot poke a living person’s eye with a brush, even if that person is me.

I’d actually love to make necklaces and earrings, but… “My five-year-old nephew could do better.” How many times have I heard that phrase! In this particular case, it would probably be completely justified.

As for tattoos and postcards, first I’d have to actually love them, and that’s difficult. Without love I see neither the point nor the market. I can sort of make postcards, and I know how, but they somehow get all worn out before they even reach the customer, and in general I have a rather complicated relationship with physical objects. Files are much dearer to me.

Calligraphy is pain. I actually love it, just not enough to give it chunks of my life, and in return it waves its awkward squiggles at me reproachfully. “Tanja, you didn’t try hard enough. Again.”

Although, to be fair, there are people willing to pay even for awkward squiggles. Once I had quite a nice commission where I was paid surprisingly well simply to rewrite several pages of some technical text in my ordinary handwriting. I never quite understood the deeper meaning of that assignment, but I happily took the money and rewrote everything.

When one of my classmates died during our final year of school, I was the one who got asked to make the memorial sign with his name and dates in beautiful lettering. Honestly, exactly the same story as with makeup, only somehow even more embarrassing. Of course I did it. My daughter didn’t exist yet, so there was nobody to delegate it to.

My photography is thoroughly mediocre. That’s not false modesty, just a statement of fact. I’m sure a decent online or offline course would improve my photos, but I can’t see where I’d squeeze it into my schedule, and more importantly, I can’t find the motivation. It’s not exactly like the world is suffering from a shortage of amateur photographers.

As a theatrical makeup artist I’m about as good as I am at beauty makeup, something I’ve tested repeatedly at children’s camps. And as for costume design and props… I have one absolutely horrifying story about that. Actually, two.

In the first one, I was asked to make a huge cardboard wheel for the Maslenitsa festival and decorate it with ribbons, flowers and whatever else came to mind. I spent two weeks diligently puffing away making this wheel. And I did it. It was the best cardboard wheel in the world. Unfortunately, that left no time whatsoever for flowers or ribbons, so the children ended up dancing around… just a wheel on a pole.

Festive atmosphere? Never heard of it.

In the second story, after about a month of working together, the head of the theatre group had already figured me out completely. She no longer wanted me trying dresses on children, sewing, decorating, lovingly preparing props or scenery. All she wanted from me was this: during the one and only performance, when Aladdin’s mother said, “One, two, three, fire, burn!” I had to press a button, and the beautiful expensive artificial fireplace she’d bought with her own money would burst into artificial flames.

Guess who forgot to check whether the plug was actually in the socket and managed to mess up even that ridiculously simple task?

A future crocodile trainer, obviously.

So yes, on the one hand I’m something of a universal specialist. I can sing, dance, tell you all about the ichneumon and the arapaima, write a rock opera, a term paper or even an entire thesis on almost any subject in a week without AI or the internet (tested many times, admittedly a long time ago). But on the other hand, within my actual profession I’m rather narrowly specialised. I’m really good at putting lines on paper and creating mood. Everything else I do substantially worse.

That has never stopped people from enthusiastically suggesting all sorts of careers where I’d surely thrive.

My favourite is how often people sincerely tell me,

“You know, you could illustrate children’s books!”

The last time somebody opened my eyes to this exciting career opportunity was less than six months ago.

So now it’s your turn.

What careers do people keep insisting you should have instead?