Your Creative Push

Amanda Stalter is self-taught artist from southern California. She began creating art in the spring of 2014 and shortly thereafter began exhibiting her work in local galleries. Now residing in Brooklyn, New York, Amanda has been featured in magazines, Books, and exhibited her work in both national and international galleries.

Full shownotes: http://yourcreativepush.com/amandastalter

-What set her on the path of becoming a visual artist.

-The inspiration that can be gained from people who have already walked down the difficult path of a creative career.

-Why she went down the path of a musician for so long.

-Some of the initial fears that she had upon making the jump to be a painter.

-Dealing with aspirations of grandeur.

-Handling lack of support from people that are closest to you.

-The importance of taking "baby steps" to achieve your audacious goals.

-Her best and worst moments as a creative person.

-How being a workaholic means that you have to turn down fun activities (and also have to remember to eat food).

-How music influences her more than people might know.

-The inspiration that she gained from J.K. Rowling.

-How you are only failing when you stop trying.

"I really felt like I was treading water half the time."

"That's when I realized that everything I wanted to be was completely tangible."

"The thing that's the best to me is waking up every day and knowing that I get to do what I'm fully passionate about for a living and I get to spend all the time in the world really devoting myself to what makes me happy."

"There's no rule book for being a creative person."

"If you're not happy, you're doing it wrong. Period."

"Art, in all its forms, is kind of like a rebellion. So looking for guidelines is silly."

"It shouldn't be called 'failure.' I think it should be called 'attempts.' I don't think you're ever really failing until you stop trying."

"Your own internal fear is so much worse than what other people are going to think."

Devotchka - Till The End of Time [YouTube]

La Bodega Gallery Renovation [GoFundMe]

Pencil Kings Episode 128 with Cat Rose

Your Creative Push Episode 172 with Cat Rose

Your Creative Push Episode 102 with Mitch Bowler

Website / Facebook / Instagram / Twitter

Matt Kohr : Website / Ctrl+Paint

Michael Thomas is the creator and owner of Linkup215, an entertainment, fashion, culture, and artist platform, and a company based out of Philadelphia. Aside from running his company, he is also a teacher and an author of an upcoming book, which he discusses in the episode.

Full shownotes: http://yourcreativepush.com/michaelthomas

-How he and Jasmine Anderson had the vision to create Linkup215

-The importance of giving back to the community and to those less fortunate.

-Working with Philly Homeless and Sunday Breakfast.

-How he finds time to achieve all of his goals while still maintaining a job as a teacher.

-His love for writing, stemming from his father's influence and Encyclopedia Brown.

-The vision for his upcoming book, A Boy with a Dream.

-Losing his initial outline for his book and how he dealt with it.

-The importance of not dwelling on the bad things that sometimes happen, because thinking about them for too long will keep you stagnant.

-How he attempts to capture the uniqueness of each of the individuals he interviews.

-How information is readily available for the young and the old – it's just a matter of taking it.

"I find the time because I've got to make the time."

"This book brings a lot out of me."

"Something that you create, you just want more and more out of it."

"Anything can happen in a year. That's all it takes is one year. Your life can just turn around."

Sunday Breakfast

Instagram Linkup215: Website / Facebook / Instagram / Twitter

Amanda Stalter : Website / Instagram

Kate Shaw is a Melbourne-based artist who creates landscapes that are simultaneously sublime and toxic. Formed out of 'paint pours' and collage techniques, her landscapes capture the transcendent beauty of nature. She has had many solo and group exhibitions and currently her work is touring to museums throughout Asia as part of the Asialink curated exhibition Vertigo.

Full shownotes: http://yourcreativepush.com/kateshaw

-How she got to the point she is at today in her artistic career.

-The comfort and structure that a part-time job can provide while pursuing your creative passion on the side.

-How nothing stifles creativity more than having to worry about necessities like food and shelter.

-The power in finding a job that feeds into your creative passion.

-The importance of relaxing the body and silencing the mind in order to get to homeostasis.

-Tapping into the creative energy of the universe so that you can more effectively communicate with people around the world.

-Getting out into nature and unplugging from the daily demands of being a professional artist.

-The surprise that many artists and creative people have as they discover that by becoming a professional artist, they are also becoming a small business.

-The connection with nature in her art.

-What people can do in their everyday lives to help climate change.

-How she developed and invented her style.

-The resistances that occur when you are inventing something new.

-The strategy of putting something that you are struggling with aside until the next day.

-How asking too many opinions of your work gives your creative power away.

"I find if the body is relaxed and the mind is relaxed, that's when the creativity really opens up."

"I really believe in flow rather than push."

"It's time and money. That's all we have in our lives is time."

"If I've been working on a painting for a long time and I don't know what to do next, I just leave it and come back the next day. There's something about fresh eyes."

"You don't want to be asking too many opinions because then you're just giving all that away. You, yourself, actually know the best."

"I think a lot of times people are just looking for reassurance because they are afraid. But they actually know themselves if it's good or not good."

The Ethical Guide to the Anthropocene (The Guardian)

Nestle and Deforestation (Greenpeace)

Website / Facebook / Instagram

Alex Cherry is an LA-based digital artist who blurs the lines between art and design. He draws his inspiration from film, music, and pop culture to make stunning images that will always make you think.

Full shownotes: http://yourcreativepush.com/alexcherryagain

-The story behind his piece, "Starman" a tribute to David Bowie.

-Art versus design, and how we don't watch design the way we watch art.

-How to pursue your creativity by leaning on what you know, and for him that started with music.

-His first creative moments and his creative journey from there.

-How incredibly amazing the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Nintendo are.

-How we are lucky to live in the time of the internet, and we should immerse ourselves in how easy it is to share and find new things.

-Kanye West and his polarizing character.

-Bret Easton Ellis's idea of "Post Empire."

-How many people have separate selves that they put forth on the internet.

-How having a character or a persona can give you a confidence you don't have with your actual identity.

-The issue of copying and how we have to get over it.

-The importance of thinking about new things every day.

-A recent negative experience he had and how it led to an "artistic PTSD."

-The story about how he met his fiance through his art.

-A rapper suggestion for Youngman Brown to help him with his insecurities about his own monotone voice.

-The last words his grandmother said to him, and the impact that it has on his life.

"It's always these pictures that take the least amount of effort that resonate the most with me, and other people."

"I love music, and for me it was an easy thing to do, to piece something together and to find a song to connect that to."

"We have the Internet and tumblr. Just immerse yourself in it and don't be afraid to take inspiration from it. Be ruthless about that."

"The creative world is the exact opposite of the real world."

"I heard that 90% of communication is non-verbal, and it's so true. We put too much value in words."

"It's not the what. It's the how."

"You never know in which ways you influence people or potentially change someones life. You may never find out about that."

"You have to be lovingly detached from the ego."

"The best way to not produce any work is to think about the identity of that work."

"Just create what you think the world needs."

"Celebrate the difference."

"So much of creativity is like capturing lightning in a bottle. You can't really control the lightning, so you have to create an environment to capture the lightning."

"You don't tell a tree how to grow. You just water it and then it grows. That's how creativity is."

The Bret Easton Ellis Podcast

Gang Starr

Website / Facebook / Instagram / Twitter

Victor Mosquera is a concept artist working in the entertainment industry. He currently works at Ubisoft Toronto and his list of clients include companies such as Universal Music, Tor Books, Orbit Books, Volta and One pixel brush.

-How he forged his own path, even though becoming an artist in Colombia is difficult.

-The experience of learning from Nicolás Uribe.

-The idea of building your own tribe, learning from the people around you, and finding new opportunities along the way.

-Working with Seven Lions for his album art.

-How his style developed.

-How important his personal work is for him to detox.

-Having a "fuck it" mentality when it comes to creating your own personal work and wondering what other people are going to think.

-How sometimes it is okay to be the "master of none," and to just experiment with new things – you never know what doorways will open up to you.

-The difference between having a carefree attitude and an attitude without cares.

-Becoming obsessed with art and working all night long, but having to be careful with that the older that he gets.

-How he balances his time and how the limited amount of time that he has also influences his changing style.

-The difference between making art and posting it to social media just to stay relevant and making measurable goals for yourself.

-Making a physical product and giving it away as a gift if nobody buys it.

"The important thing is to start doing it. Once you're doing it, you can learn from your mistakes and improve on top of that."

"I don't think you choose a style. I think it's a reflection of how you see life and how you see your work, and it happens organically."

"For me, my personal work is like a detox."

Nicolás Uribe

Ross Tran

The War of Art: Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles by Steven Pressfield

Manage Your Day-to-Day: Build Your Routine, Find Your Focus, and Sharpen Your Creative Mind by Jocelyn K. Glei

Website / Facebook / Instagram / Twitter / Tumblr / DeviantArt

Courtney Brooke is a photographer and conceptual artist who explores the ties of the feminine to nature and spirituality through the lens of nostalgia. Her works focus on the concrete questions that grapple with our existence and by emphasizing aesthetics, she creates work through the labor-intensive processes as a personal exorcism ritual.

Full shownotes: http://yourcreativepush.com/courtneybrooke

-What she means when she says that her art and photography is like a personal exorcism.

-How she ended up sharing her photographic work and building an audience accidentally.

-How her Instagram started as a personal account, and then eventually she started sharing her work on there.

-The importance of having your own website or your own "domain" where you make the rules.

-The notion of separate identities as an artist and as a person.

-Having an "elevator pitch" prepared so that you can describe to people what it is that you do.

-The importance of being selfish and making sure to get back to personal work that you care about.

-Her view on what it is to be a human being.

-Dealing with negative feedback.

-Some of the Resistances that she has had to deal with in her creative career.

-The hesitancy to be a subject in her own photographs.

-Being a "copycat" of other artists and then also dealing with your own "copycats."

"When I am creating an image, it is like I am exercising out of myself all of that toxic energy. Creating is therapeutic for me."

"There's a lot of work that I just don't post online. It's not for everyone, it's just for me. I'm real selfish sometimes."

"For me, being human is being in touch with nature. Being in touch with my own frailty and my own fragility. Being in touch then is empowering, knowing that death is on my shoulder, whispering in my ear, telling me to live at every second."

"Do it because it's going to make you feel better. Because I promise it's going to make you sleep better at night."

"Stop doing it for other people. Do it because you're curious about it. Do it because you're interested in it. Even if you don't show it to anyone and stick it in a box underneath your bed. It's still there, it still passed through you, and it was cathartic."

Website / Facebook / Instagram / Tumblr / Flickr / Twitter

One year after the launch of Your Creative Push, Youngman looks back to the very first Introduction Episode to see what he got right and what he got wrong.

Even though it embarrasses him. To the core.

He also looks towards the future and shares plans for the show's second year.

Take a short survey about your listening experience. It will only take five minutes and it will go a long way in helping to make the show more helpful to you in the future!

Kelly Killagain is a South Jersey-based tattoo and fine artist specializing in line and dotwork. Among the many things that Kelly draws, tattoos, and sculpts, she focuses closely on the various relationships between humans and animals and how they can be used to understand human psychology.

Full shownotes: http://yourcreativepush.com/kellykillagain

-Attempting to balance two different creative passions, and at the same time attempting to balance personal work and commissioned work.

-Her advice for pushing past the feelings of not wanting to get the work done in the limited time that you do have for your personal work.

-The importance of remembering that even a creative session in which you don't produce something tangible is not a waste.

-The power of deadlines, even if it takes tricking yourself with "fake deadlines."

-Setting a timer and going at your work for that full time, distraction free.

-Her fascination for the interaction that humans have with animals.

-The difference between dog people and cat people.

-How one of her doodles turned into her senior thesis.

-How sculpting something can make something "real."

-Overcoming self-doubt and other insecurities.

-The role that society plays in keeping people away from a creative path.

-The difficulty that creative people sometimes have in defining themselves to others.

-How she balances her time, especially recently by giving herself a "day off."

"Not only artists, but I think all human beings right now are struggling with not being motivated to do anything because we are attached to our devices. Everything is so instant. You want something, you get it."

"That 48-hour grind before a deadline – I am so productive."

"I think artists, designers, and creative people of all sorts are extremely important to society and to our own culture. We are keeping a record of our culture. We are recording history with everything we do and informing and enriching our lives."

Neil Gaiman – Commencement Speech at the University of the Arts 2012

Steal Like an Artist: 10 Things Nobody Told You About Being Creative by Austin Kleon

Website / Instagram / Behance / Tumblr / 777Tattoos

Tom Harold is an Indiana artist who combines the precision of mechanics with the feel of a Dr. Suess book to create exciting, fascinating custom kinetic metal art that soothes even as it entertains. His rolling ball sculptures offer the viewer the sights and sounds that can mesmerize and entertain them for hours.

Full shownotes: http://yourcreativepush.com/tomharold

-How he was inspired by a George Rhoads rolling ball sculpture.

-How he let his lack of knowledge in welding hold him back from starting to create rolling ball sculptures.

-The power that comes from talking about something you are passionate about.

-How marketing is nothing more than sharing your story with your people.

-His advice for people with full-time jobs who are still trying to pursue their creative endeavors.

-The importance of finding a job in which you can either learn things about your creative pursuit or have free time to pursue it on your own.

-His struggles with perfectionism.

-Christopher Moore and the idea of finishing your book.

-Gratitude lists and being thankful for your completed works.

-Children playing and not caring about the mess that they make.

-Feeling as if your artwork doesn't address an issue or stand for something.

"Sometimes we aren't ready for something until we're ready for it."

"It was like this great translation machine for the joy of mechanics and motion."

"Find a job that either enhances your opportunities for being creative or one that allows you to save up all of your creativity for the evening."

"Creativity thrives on constraints."

"Let go and just enjoy the moment that you're in."

"If you really believe in what you're doing, don't listen to anyone who tells you it's not worth your time."

George Rhoads

Website / Facebook / Instagram / YouTube

Andrew T. Kearns is a freelance photographer/videographer based out of Washington. His career is spent behind a camera whether that's filming or taking photos, and it seems his free time is spent the same way. His latest project has been traveling and living on the road out of his car all while documenting his experiences through photography, social media, and more recently his vlogs. With a crowd reach of 450,000 he has built a significant influence behind his name and continues to grow his audience rapidly, alongside working with well known and respected brands.

Full shownotes: http://yourcreativepush.com/andrewtkearns

-How he got started as a professional photographer and videographer.

-Meeting Samuel Elkins and the influence he had on him.

-His New Year's Resolutions.

-The importance of maintaining a healthy lifestyle with healthy food and exercise.

-Springing into action with your ideas instead of thinking and romanticizing about them.

-How everyone shows their highlights on social media, which is why he tries to be authentic and show the imperfections as well.

-The importance of creating for a goal.

-The idea of past, present, and future you, and treating each one with respect.

-How he developed his style and some of his inspirations, including Jared Chambers.

-Striking a balance between finding the perfect shot and also enjoying the moment.

-How he gets the work done when he really doesn't feel like it.

-People who inspire and influence him, such as Casey Neistat, Gary Vaynerchuk, Ben Brown, Fun for Louie, and Sarah Dietchy.

"Going on that hike was probably one of the best decisions I ever made."

"There's a big lack of authenticity on social media today"

"It definitely holds you back if you put too much work before yourself and before play."

"Set a goal. If you don't have a goal, you can't score."

"Go and work hard. No excuses anymore. Just get at it."

Simon Sinek on Millenials [YouTube]

Casey Neistat

Gary Vaynerchuk

Ben Brown

FunForLouis

Sara Dietschy

Samuel Elkins

Website / YouTube / Instagram / Twitter / Tumblr