The Time They Are A Changin’

Modifying Your Art With Time

This post is pretty important as it touches a subject that all artist will have to deal with at some point or another. Unfortunately age, illness, accidents and environmental changes will most definitely affect your art in some fashion or another but it’s entirely up to you on how you handle it. 

I wont go into all the possible ways of what can affect your style in the future as it could be different for everyone. However I will tell you briefly about my own artistic journey through this life and how i have had to change my style.

First off I look at every change as an adventure which for me is exciting, new and definitely a good thing. Keeps your art exciting and actually brings you a new audience while surprising your old clients. As for me I am completely different than the teenager that loved drawing and illustrating in photo realistic detail due to my changes.

Let’s start with the fact that I made a choice early on to make a living as a professional fighter, lol. As you can imagine my mother hated I didn’t focus completely on art as a young adult. She hated more I was fighting instead, lol. Yes i was very good but it does not change the fact that the longevity of a fighter is short lived compared to an artist. This is why I find myself relying on my arts now by the way. Anyway, lets start with the broken hands and how its hard to hold anything with them or maybe how its impossible to see stuff properly with a broken orbital. I hope you as my beloved reader, are starting to understand where this is going. So these complications effected my art on a short term time frame.

Unfortunately,  unknowingly to me it was going to also affect me long term in a major way. Starting with the tremors, then the head pain and the difficulty focusing. Yeah getting punched in the all the time catches up to you kids. So i ended my fighting career and started my full time art career. with a diagnosis of Chiari Malformation. I didn’t realize the complications and the adjustments that i would have to endure in the process. My art has gone from photo realistic details to loose, bold and wild strokes. Every piece I do now although has my touch is completely different due to what I may have been experiencing that day. My style may not be always consistent but you will always recognize it as Andrew French’s and that what matters. It’s mine, only mine, and I embrace it. 

Let me give you a hint about life that I have learned…. If you handle it as an adventure then these changes and challenges become moments of rebirth. You create a new you every time which is beautiful and you keep all the good parts of the old you at the same time. Enjoy and embrace whatever the future brings you my friends.