There is so much more to being an artist than I could have ever imagined. I’ve come to learn that being an artist means that sometimes I’m a businesswoman, woodworker, teacher, graphic designer, academic, photographer, website designer, marketer, or a writer (like right now). But sometimes, I’m just overwhelmed. So while I was cramped in the corner of my bedroom painting ‘Equestrian Attributes’, and darting downstairs to check how my the paint on my frame for ‘Ella’ was drying amongst the clutter of several years’ worth of junk my family and I had been storing, I knew it was time for a proper studio/ workspace and that this quarantine gave me the best opportunity to build one.
We always called one of the rooms in my basement ‘the workroom’, but clearly the name was opportunistic given that the only thing the room was used for was storage. We decided it was time that the space was turned into what it was always intended to be. This is what we started with:
Do you get anxiety looking at these photos? I get anxiety looking at these photos.
First thing’s first, we moved everything out of the room, reorganized it, donated some things, and threw other things out. I can’t tell you how satisfying it was to have this room empty for the first time since the basement was completed (back when I was about eight or nine years old). We cleared out the room on the weekends, but everyone went back to work during the week, so once it was time for the renovation, I was mostly on my own.
I painted the walls a light grey, the molding a glossy white, and my dad ripped up the old rug. I learned that painting edges is hard even for an artist and that whoever painted this room last was definitely in a hurry.
Next, it was time for the part I was the most nervous about. We chose a dark wood laminate for the flooring, and I decided to install it myself because at the time, I thought that if I could build a frame for an artwork that doesn’t have 90° angles in the corners, I could do anything. But my confidence SWIFTLY dissipated as I listened to the man at Lowes reminding me about the different kinds of underlayment I could use, and to use shims to create gaps between the laminate and the walls, and to stagger the edges of the laminate boards, and how I would have to saw under the door jams, and install quarter rounds to hide the gaps, and use a table saw to fit the last row of laminate against the wall, and that I’d need a specific tool to hammer in the pieces of laminate that go up against the wall. I let most of this information go in one ear and out the other because I knew that YouTube tutorials are truly beautiful things.
After a few hours of watching hefty men with southern accents tell me all about how to install laminate with the multitude of tools they assumed all their viewers owned, I managed to somehow successfully install a laminate flooring! I’d say it was fun, but it… wasn’t. I learned that underlayment is incredibly annoying, table saws are terrifying, and that my back was not prepared for me to be crouching over for three days straight. Despite those unsavory aspects, the final look and the satisfaction I got from knowing that I built it myself made my efforts very worthwhile.
Next, this big empty room was begging for some furniture. I bought a standing easel and repurposed some tables/ shelves we already had. I set it up as a workshop on one side (for building frames), and a studio on the other. I built a table top for some cabinets that used to be in the kitchen when my parents first bought the house, a small, removable top for a rolling storage unit I had so that I had a mobile place to put my palette/ brushes while I painted, built and installed curtain rods/ curtains made out of floor flanges (my first time in the plumbing aisle of Lowes was a wild experience), dowels, and drop cloths to separate the two spaces, and I topped it all off with the excessive use of a label maker.
This renovation took about a month from start to finish. Since completing it at the beginning of August, this room has become my version of an office, and while I planned to limit myself to working 8 hours a day (you know, like normal people), I spend maybe an average of 10 hours a day during the week working down here. This room is my haven, my little one-woman atelier, and a massive improvement from my tiny desk shoved into the corner of my bedroom. A year ago, I was too tentative to even call myself an artist, but now I have a workshop where I can really stretch my legs and build my business. Until I one day have a place of my own, this will be where all the magic happens.
Welcome to my new blog. I want to take you along with me while I begin my career as an artist, whether you’re a struggling artist like me, someone looking for a little bit of artistic motivation, or maybe you are interested in buying a work of mine and wanted to learn a bit more about the artist behind the art. Whatever your reason is for being here, it’s nice to meet you! I’m Claire.