Today we’d like to introduce you to Sydney Gruber
Hi Sydney, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
While I now have enjoyed some commercial success from showing and selling my art all over the country and exhibiting on world stages, my call to adventure began as a soft gravitational pull to paint. The summer after I finished my degrees in Psychology and English, I started refinishing furniture because working with my hands has always eased something in me. I romanticized the ephemera lingering on the found treasures that were leaving memories on my paintbrushes while I made paintings on them.
When I started painting and giving new life to these forgotten, discarded, sold-off pieces, I did not realize I would be changing my life trajectory. I started paying my bills with the finished pieces on my floor and getting jobs to refinish inherited family pieces lovingly flawed with the wear of time and in need of some attention.
I liked the feeling of being the architect of my life. I went from crediting my traction as a self-employed creative to a serendipitous sequence of events, to asking the question, “What if I started taking this seriously—can I do this forever?”
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
My road is smooth but comprised of a bunch of crooked lines called experience—they have been full of joy, mostly satisfying, and inherently necessary. If you know a peak, you have also known a valley.
The struggle takes different forms along the way but rather than concentrating on the circumstances, I prefer to interact with problems from a solution-based approach and consider the patterns. I’m also fortunate to keep a small roundtable of good minds and seasoned players in the game of life when I find myself seeking mentorship, guideposts, or dialogue exchanges.
Pressing on against the resistance is the main idea of the process, and it makes the nectar easier to recognize when you’ve found it. Something about the contrasts of the pressure and the pay out really makes the realization of a goal better.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
I spend most of my time in the studio looking for flow states while playing with paint—where time suspends itself from my awareness because I am nearly at the edge of myself lost in what my hands are making. I like the presence and absence in my natural painting state. To go inwardly and connect outwardly through what I make in the studio is the dream.
I specialize in contemporary focal point art celebrating the mysterious world of the abstract and the sublime language of color theory. It’s fascinating to me how I can make a painting that people can see themselves in and want to look at everyday. It’s like the extension of me meets the extension of you. It’s a beautiful, intimate conversation happening between me and the onlooker—full of mystique and rooted in the transcendent. It’s also my livelihood—so it’s an honor to connect in this capacity so steadily.
Every artist finds a way to use their gifts, and I like how I have found a way to use my sensitivities and talents to relate to the world and to people. People tell me they want to work with me because something I’m offering through my art or presence translates for them and connects to their strings.
I know that I offer blend of enthusiasm, tenacity, and total commitment to the bit in the projects I elect to develop. Whether it’s hand-painted furniture, custom commissions for designers, commercial client installs, outfitted traveling showrooms, or internationally selling chess sets—if I’m doing the gig, I do it my way and it brings me who I’m looking for.
Can you tell us more about what you were like growing up?
I’m told that I was deeply curious and was always asking questions. I’m told I was an old soul, and I tend to feel more like a kid now than when I was growing up. In self-assessment, I was a little weird, and I enjoyed other strange kids who made me laugh or put better books in my hands. When my nose wasn’t in a book, my mind was daydreaming. I was on the chess team. I wanted to sell the most Girl Scout cookies. I played on several team sports throughout school. My parents allowed me to paint my high school bedroom walls like an art installation which evolved as I evolved, and I had a little phase of eyeliner and angst from the teenage restlessness of wanting to grow up.
Pricing:
- My paintings are available to purchase online, and my venues and show tour dates are also announced on my website.
- —www.sydneygruber.com—
- I am happily entertaining commissions and new relationships in the new calendar year.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.sydneygruber.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/seekingsydneygruber/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/seekingsydneygruber/
Image Credits
W. Zegarra | Sydney Gruber
