jesfort_art

final and some details of my recent commission. I’m curious, what area do you think took me the longest?

my all time favorite thing as an artist is to see my work living in someones home. here are some process shots of a recent commission, and the final piece framed in their home. my heart is full.

as always, Jax was a key player in the making of this piece 🐶

she’s hung and she’s saucy

some work in progress details

I recently visited my friend Sam’s studio and he reminded me of something I learned in undergrad that I had completely forgotten. He said “you can’t be too precious with your work”.

I’m not sure when I started to slowly forget this, but I did. And my work was suffering because of it. It crippled me to create, enforced my fear to fail, and blinded me to my own freedom of painting. The very reason I love it in the first place is the freedom it allows.

I was being too precious about it, hindering any real progress. I was essentially murdering my own energy.

I challenged myself to use much larger brushes for this piece to open myself up to that freedom again. To reconnect with the energy of painting. The movement of it all.

It’s amazing how one small reminder can reinvigorate and reignite. I challenge you to go get a pack of the cheap big brushes from Home Depot and see what happens!

FLASH SALE for custom charcoal drawings! I’m offering 9”x12” custom charcoals for only $200! Now is your chance if you’ve been wanting a portrait, pet portrait, or saucy figure drawing. I’m only taking TEN of these so space is limited before the price goes back to normal!

Comment below or message me if you’re interested! Tag your friends below that also may want something!

This is the part of being an artist that isn’t as glamorous as many think. It’s always interesting to me when people are so fascinated by the “magical” lifestyle of an artist. And while yes, it is a dreamland because I’m doing what I love…it’s also still real life, and sometimes a nightmare.

Most of the time it looks like this. Messy, unwashed hair, no makeup, sweatpants, and looking like a tired hot mess. It’s stressing over whether or not you can sustain your life with your passion. It’s twilight beginnings that creep into dawn because you can’t quite capture your vision. It’s clients that drive you crazy. It’s business/financial strategy (something they don’t teach in art school). It’s frustrations…not only with the canvas in front of you, but with yourself.

Being an artist isn’t glamorous or magical; it’s what artists possess that make it magical. We forget all the reasons why it won’t work, and believe the one reason why it will.

been thinking a lot about the beauty of flaws. how flaws are defined as imperfections or faults that weaken or invalidate. but to me, the fact that we as humans are flawed is innately beautiful. while one aspect of beauty is symmetry, another important aspect is uniqueness.

one of the things I love most about painting is how it helps me understand myself and others better. humans are layered and elaborate. so is a painting. humans begin loosely with efforts to refine and cultivate oneself. as I do the same with a painting.

welcoming flaws and imperfections is ultimately a reflection of love. love for our virtues and scars, our strengths and vulnerabilities. it’s what makes us human. it’s what makes it all beautiful. the flaws are necessary…it shows that we are living, that we are growing.

✨new wip✨

does anyone else find that they work best when it rains? I’m not sure what it is about rain, but things are so effortless when I’m listening to the drops against my window. or maybe I’m just happy to be painting again? maybe both?

things are flowing again. things are exciting again.

The process has been glacial, but I finally installed my new lights and my new studio space is ✨almost✨ complete. Feeling extremely grateful that I have a safe space to create (even though my feet are never safe because of paint tubes spread all over the floor😅)

I can’t express the relief and excitement I feel to have the urge, need, and desire to paint again. To express without hesitancy, to work through internal discussion with external passion. To resolve, explore, and discover is a sacred journey…I’m happy to be on this path.

endlessly obsessed with light. grateful for my tiny oasis that feels like nothing short of magic.

Small charcoal study for a large painting I’m going to start soon! I’m excited for this one! What do you guys think? Are you excited to see this as a large painting??

*Swipe to see the process of this study*

This has been the most “Monday” Monday I’ve had in a while. Let’s get real for a moment.

This past month has been very gloomy. The cold, the weather, this season has stalled my creative process. And on top of that, we are STILL fighting this pandemic. I don’t know about you guys but I’m over it. And I had to remind myself that it’s okay to feel everything I’m feeling. In fact, it’s important that I feel it so that I can grow towards a place past it. Avoiding our realities can cause us to shut down.

I had a very blessed conversation with a dear friend of mine the other day. We talked about the importance of letting ourselves fully embrace every element of how we feel. This is the only way we can move towards truly embodying the best versions of ourselves. To say it plainly, living our truth. There’s a part of us that has to push through the things that scare us to live and create in absolute freedom.

Creating is freedom. Freedom to choose, freedom to push reality, freedom to accept every part of us. It’s the ultimate gift.

just a little reminder that you are beyond worthy of the future you are dreaming of 🖤

Welcoming 2021 with open arms because let’s face it, 2020 sucked.

Let’s talk about perspective. This week has been hard for me. No, not just hard. This week blows honestly haha

But as I’m laying in my bed being lazy and not wanting to do anything, I look over and see my workspace. Just like this. (For real, this is my perspective from my bed 😅) and it got me thinking a lot about changing the way I see obstacles that were thrown my way this week.

It may sound silly, but hear me out. I didn’t want to paint today. I didn’t want to paint yesterday or the day before. I stood in front of my painting simply uninspired because I was letting sh*tty circumstances cloud my joy.

Now that I’ve spent all day in bed (yes actually, not proud of it but that’s where I am in life right now), just staring at my painting from across the room...I suddenly started looking at it differently. Because I literally WAS looking at it differently.

It allowed me to open the space back up to joy. And hope. Earlier it felt like a drag, but now looking at it, it feels like hope and reassurance again. Hope that tomorrow will be better. And reassurance that if I pour love into what I do, nothing can stop me.

So I’m going to go pour some love into this painting...my source of joy and reassurance.

A little change in perspective. 2020 has sucked big time, but how can you change the way you look at it to find that peace of hope and reassurance again?

Things to think about...

If you don’t have a studio pet, what are you even doing?? Lol 10/10 would highly recommend! I mean just look at how cute he is!!

Also plz excuse my messy studio 🙈

Blank canvas. Clean slate. Fresh start.

There’s so much that can be said about a blank canvas. Even more when you build the canvas yourself. Don’t get me wrong, I still buy canvases all the time. But I like to build my surfaces myself as much as I possibly can. I think there’s something really beautiful about pouring into a piece before I even begin to paint on it.

I’ve built it, I’ve cared for it, and I’ve invested in it. Way before there’s paint or an image...way before the “WOW” factor.

It reminds me that when I make paintings, I’m not simply painting an image...I’m making a tangible and physical thing that exists in a space. I’m creating a whole new thing that will hold a physical place.

As an artist I find that this is a beautiful gift that creativity gives to me. The ability to not only have a visual presence, but to make things that can have a physical presence. Because I’ve been given this gift, I try my best to make whatever I create honor that. I want my work to be worthy of that presence. From start to finish.

I encourage you to really sit in this idea of a fresh start. Especially with everything going on right now. What kind of presence can you build? Will you honor the space you’ve been given?

Hello! I hope everyone had a fun and safe Halloween 🎃 Here’s a fun little abstract I did on Procreate the other night while I was hanging out with a few friends. Honestly no idea where all the pink came from but I think I like it..? Haha idk!

I haven’t done an abstract in over a year so it was a little difficult to get back in that mindset. But I remembered how important it is to not always be working with a reference photo. As a figure painter it’s sometimes easy to get comfortable with painting what I see. But abstracts are so great to stimulate my mind and creativity. To spark something new and unpredictable.

I used to think abstracts would just hinder my ability to paint reality, but I’ve found that working abstractly only makes my realism work better! Abstracts give a new jolt of life to your mark making that translate beautifully and energetically into realism work.

There’s so much power in a brushstroke. Abstracts are such a great reminder of this!

If you find it hard to start working abstractly, I encourage you to try what I did. I was simply doodling on Procreate while I was sitting with a few friends in my apartment. I did it as we were talking, hanging out, and enjoying our Friday night in. There wasn’t any pressure. Who cared if it turned out bad? The point is that it didn’t matter. I didn’t overthink it. I just did it.

Try it out and send me your doodles/abstracts! I’d love to see what you come up with!

Whatever you're working on right now matters. Even if it seems small to you, it could be the world to someone else. It's not always going to be a grand show. So continue to work in the silence and behind closed doors.

Understand this.
You're not missing out on anything when you're busy working on your goals and dreams.

Stay focused.

I promise you, this is worth the read.

If you read my last post, you'll know that I wasn't initially lured towards this sculpture to draw. However, this sculpture captured me for a different reason...a reason I wasn't even aware of until after I left The Met.

This exquisite bronze statue was done by neoclassical sculptor Jean-Antoine Houdon in 1787. Houdon intended the statue to be an allegory of the winter season and, therefore, entitled the piece "Winter". It depicts the nubile form of a young woman clad only in a shawl and it shocked the French artistic establishment with their perceived idea of eroticism. The Met Museum fairly describes her clothing as "elegant but hardly adequate".

"Cool history lesson Jes, but why are you telling me this?"
Well I'm about to tell you.

I couldn't help but feel drawn to this piece because I think it's a powerful representation of what it means to be a woman in society. We feel this raw and exposed coldness and so we tend to retract into ourselves. This feeling of a "chilled state" begs the viewer to contemplate what it means to (for lack of a better phrase) be left out in the cold.

This really resonated with me because it made me start to think about how far we have come in terms of bringing women to the table and making sure that we are a part of the important conversations. This piece made me grateful for the powerful women who have brought us inside the doors and out of the cold. Women like Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

As I'm sure many of you know, Ginsburg was a longtime, forceful advocate of women's rights and gender equality, and she earned the deep and abiding respect of her colleagues on the Court along with the American public. She was a pioneer and brought us to the table. I pray that I am a woman deserving of that fight and that I continue to remember and honor those that came before me. I pray that, as a woman, I will continue to fight for those that are coming after me. And I pray you will too.

"Women belong in all places where decisions are being made. It shouldn't be that women are the exception."
~Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Today I went and did my favorite activity..sketching at The MET. And oddly I picked a sculpture that I wasn’t really inspired to draw but I was very drawn to personally. And so I did it anyways. I wouldn’t say it’s my favorite sketch of all time, but I think it’s a beautiful metaphor for doing the things we don’t necessarily want to do even if it’s something we love doing.

I still came away from The MET today grateful for my sketching time. I’m always grateful for my work and my passion, even if it’s just a simple sketch every now and then.

Painting and drawing is my passion and sometimes I don’t always want to do it. I hate when people don’t allow me to have human feelings about “working” because “Jes it’s not work if you love doing it”. I hate this. Of course I love what I do, but part of this love is that it’s a very raw and personal love. And sometimes it’s hard. So I think it’s actually healthy for me to not always be giddy every single time I draw or paint. Because then how would I value the truly joyous parts? How would I grow if I didn’t struggle through my work sometimes?

Idk. These are just some thoughts from today. What do you guys think? Do you agree?