Today we’d like to introduce you to Maria Sprow.
Hi Maria, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I started off as a writer and a journalist. My parents did not support any interest in art, they didn’t see it as a viable career and maybe because of that, neither did I. But I loved writing for a while, and then I just liked writing and then after a long, long time, I hated writing. Just Could Not Stand typing words anymore. So I ended a successful writing career with the goal of becoming a “successful artist.” That was in 2015.
It has been a difficult road but I’m happier in my soul working toward what I think I can accomplish eventually than I was before. By day, I am a page designer — “layout artist,” if you will — but these days I’m always an artist, and it took a long, long time for me to call myself that. I’m proud of just having that feeling because so much of “becoming” is getting past the self-doubts and the inner monsters that come along with creating and learning and expressing — especially when you have zero “natural talent” to speak of. But I love making things, putting things together, I really enjoy everything about photography, and painting, and sewing, and the potential that comes from all the digital tools available to us these days. We are so fortunate to have so many tools.
The pandemic really helped push me to find a way to express myself and put all my interests together. I had just started taking care of my mom when the pandemic began; she was dying of stage IV lung cancer, living with me, when nursing homes and hospice and everything else almost entirely shut down because of outbreaks in the beginning. Nobody knew what was happening. Helping my mom die during that time was the most difficult thing I could never have even imagined. The grief and isolation that came with it was completely overwhelming, and turning to friends at that time was … complicated. But I was able to escape and work through it with art, with all the creative tools I had at my disposal, and really start expressing myself. I started working more and more in mixed media, combining painting and sewing as a way to commemorate my mom, who loved to sew, and I bring a lot of that real-world work into my digital work.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
A smooth road? Lol. No. Life happens just so hard and so fast sometimes. It’s definitely been more of a rocky, dirt road for me but maybe that’s because those are the kinds of roads I prefer. I quit writing without having any real clue of what path I’d take from there, and my house went through a 4-ft flash flood almost immediately afterward. Finances (and time) are by far the biggest obstacle for me. I’m almost an art addict, I just want to make things and remember to sleep and eat food but instead I’m spending so much of my time and energy working for the basics.
To be a successful artist, you have to be able to do so many other things besides just “make art”. You have to really believe in yourself and market yourself to people who don’t “need” you, and I have ALWAYS struggled with self-promotion. In my head, everything I do now will be so much better in ten years if I just keep going. You have to understand business and social media and sales and you have to navigate all the myriad of ways in which you could monetize what you make. Having to be good at all these skills outside of creating is overwhelming and exhausting. I constantly feel like I’m just spinning around in circles, and every single degree is something I could try or something that could fail. As a creative, I am absolutely NEVER short on ideas. I could offer up ideas all day long every day but choosing which one to go with and monetizing them without a team is definitely something that I really struggle with.
But internally, I do feel a certain kind of peace and intrinsic success that comes from knowing that I’m trying, that I’m following my own path, that I’m trying to do my best to express the things I want to express. I’m passionate about creativity and nature and about how important those two things are to our health and well-being. Creativity is not an “option.” It is not something you are good at or bad at. It is a muscle, a connection, that we all have, and it is meant to be exercised and developed. I really believe that art saved my life last year, and just thinking about the beauty of the Earth, and I think the world would be a much better place if we all gave ourselves the permission to make and create and feel all the emotions of that process.
As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
The work people regularly pay me money for is in layout & design, and a lot of that comes from my journalism background – I absolutely love putting things together in a visual way that makes sense and captures the eye. I’m not a “clean” designer – I don’t use a lot of white space unless someone tells me to. I want my design itself to help tell the story of what it is I’m working on. I want color, I want the eye to travel and stop and travel and stop.
In my spare time, I absolutely love photography and collage, and abstract painting using mixed materials and fabric, and just, whatever it is. I love hiking and traveling and just trying to capture the warmth of the sun, some moment spent in nature that helped make everything else going on in the world manageable or worthwhile, and I always try to bring that into my art. I am always thinking about multi-dimensionality, spirituality, connection, what it means to be alone in such a beautifully savage universe while also being so not alone, what it means to be alive and what it means to be gone, and I think my work tries to explore that and explores what is real and why and how and how it’s all real in some way, whether it’s just a thought in my head or an actual tree in front of me.
I don’t know what I’m “known” for — I have 200 Instagram followers so it’s kind of a philosophical question of whether I’m known at all — but what I want to be known for is someone who is passionate about creativity, the importance of prioritizing creativity in our society and in our lives, and an advocate for creatives who are working tirelessly to bring joy to other people and to make the world a better place in all these amazing ways, and I’m really hoping that one day I’ll have done something to bring joy, connection and understanding to the world. I think that’s the most important thing we can really do with our lives.
I’m most proud of the works I have underway and just the journey I keep choosing to take. I have a few large projects that I work on that are unfinished but that inspire me every day to keep creating, learning and improving. I’m in the middle of writing and illustrating a children’s book about a girl who meets a caterpillar on its last night before making its caccoon, and I talk about fear and grief and death but hopefully in a way that brings people peace and comfort. And I’m working on a collection of tarot cards for creative souls — cards that can be used to help other people overcome creative obstacles, move along on their creative journeys and explore their creative selves. I call them “tarot for creative flow”.
I think what sets me apart from others is that I really don’t have any natural “creative” talents, but I’ll never let that stop me. I will find a way, I will work on it, I will figure something out just because I have this intrinsic drive and desire and compulsion to create. And I love learning new things. I’m really good at learning new software programs because I’ve tried out so many of them just at a beginner level. I love getting my hands dirty, love putting different things together and just seeing where it goes.
We all have a different way of looking at and defining success. How do you define success?
Success is complicated. It comes so easily to some people and with such difficulty for others, and the things we really value in this world — a person’s ability to make a profit — isn’t really what helps the world the most, and people are almost hard-wired to never feel successful. Everyone always wants more. Financial success has been very difficult for me. I find it hard to put an external value on myself. I know it would feel “successful” to be able to afford the rent here in Austin these days and still be able to grab a drink and a night out with friends, but Austin has become a financially stressful place to live, and that really saddens me.
I think real success comes from living the life you want to live, however you can live it, and just in being happy with that. Being able to find real joy in the simplest of things consistently and in having developed the tools, you need to get you through whatever nightmares come your way while still being able to dream and work toward those dreams is success. And success is knowing you’ve tried to make the world better in some way or have actually made the world better. Increasing joy, increasing love. Maybe success is what happens when you find a way to give back to the world more than you take in from it. There are things I’d love to do more of if I was financially able, like travel, but being creative allows my mind to wander around enough when I’m in my favorite spots here that I kind of always feel like I’m traveling, and I choose to focus my definition of success on that — that day in, day out, I’m happy because I’m creating, I’m feeling, I’m finding ways to express the things I want to express as a human being living in today’s world, with all the knowledge we have and all the tools we have and all the wild opportunities and challenges we have.
If I had to close my eyes and talk about what a world where I felt “successful” would look like, I’d own a house with space for an art studio and a she-shed in the backyard, I’d be able to go horseback riding on weekends and I’d have a team of people doing all the hard work of marking and selling and business for me, and I’d be traveling twice a year to beautiful locations and I’d be snorkeling in the Maldives. I’d make a living off of sharing my creative journey and helping others on their creative journeys. And I’d be giving back to the causes I believe in, I’d be an advocate for the environment, for equality, for the whales. Success will come when I’ve inspired people to save the planet, and not when I have a yacht, or four mansions, or a rocket ship into space (though space is nice and I’d love to go there sometime).
Contact Info:
- Email: artinistic@gmail.com
- Website: www.artinistic.com
- Instagram: @artinistic
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/maria.sprow
Image Credits:
Photograph: Sarah Sizemore
