The First Time I Sold a Drawing.
Who me? an Artist?
I had about 25 photos of the same shopfront on Patrick St. Dublin 8.
Taken over the period 5 years. Isn’t it charming? I just adore it.
It looks especially badass at night… in the rain.
For me it’s not just one thing about it. It’s a simple shopfront. It ‘feels’ old. Austere and extremely authentic. The lack of signage. Allowing the art speak for itself. It captured my attention time and time again.
I slowly became engrossed in it’s intricacy.
Eventually, I took this photo below. The shop after closing. The grills over the windows, interrupting the art. The texture on the glass and the variety of textures in concrete. The sheer complexity of this image and the implied history of the shop, inspired me.
Almost a full year later I started this drawing…
Six months later… I was still drawing.
Perhaps 2 or 3 hours a day. Methodically. I didn’t time it, but it took a long time. It’s an insanely complex image, and I’m thorough, and I was in love.
I was working on it in a café nearby, as was typical for me. When a friend working there, also an artist, as so many beautiful café staff and customers, have a tendency to be…
“You need to go in there, and show them your drawing! you HAVE to…”
And then.. literally taking me by the hand and almost dragging me out the door, to the door of the very building i’d been creeping on for a few years. She introduced me and told him what i’d been doing, and left.
I don’t remember really what happened next. Memory is such a funny thing.
The owner, and proprietor of this insane, beautiful, hyper-authentic shop… Ronan, I came to learn - listened to me and perused my drawing. perhaps 5 or 10 minutes later he offered to buy it off me. There and then.
All I truly remember are the emtions; Fear, dread, anxiety, suprise, relief, joy and wonder.
Sort-of in that order. I’m not going to tell you the price. I can’t even remember exactly how much right now. But it was more than 500 and less than wait.. should i even say? No… fuck it. You’ll have to use your own judgement. This is the artists dilemma, I’ve come to learn.
For I’m writing this looking back almost 4 years later…
My first sale! Cash in my pocket.
But, it was the experience… and the validation that meant more to me at the time that I can adequately describe here. It felt phenomenal. Both that he appreciated my work, and that he wanted it for himself!
He insisted that I promise to keep drawing. I’ve never fogotten that promise.
I couldn’t stop the tears from forming in my eyes. Despite years of practice. It wasn’t awkward, quite the oppossite in fact. So… I don’t know exactly when I became an artist. I don’t think there was a single moment. But I know that was the day I stopped wondering.
Thank you for reading.
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P.S. If you want a piece of my work from me right now i’d suggest → A print of my favourite Dublin pub - Fallon's, it’s small and intesnse and available for €40 at the original size or a limited first edition run of an A4 enlargement editions (€95) .
