Tonight on Greentea: Aspie artist making it...MILLIE ! !!

Post Reply New Topic

I understand. I hate being on medication too, but as of necessity (depression and horrible negative spiraling thinking, same as what you said) I am back on it.

I lasted a whole year without, somehow.

When I was younger I never had medication, but I did go through severe periods of depression and negative obsession, (as well as periods of uplifting special interest obsession) and did barely scrape by in tasks necessary for living (such as passing school, and other daily things) and failed in many others. I got away with not managing because I was a "kid" and less was expected of me.

I don't have the same problems with sensory stimuli (for the most part) - but my obsessive thought processes can get really bad.

What was your childhood like before you first started going on medication?

my childhood was completely out there and strange. neglect, problems, autistic traits in family, dysfunction (but what does that actually mean??)

It has taken a long time to tease out what is AS from what is trauma related.....

there wasn't much support for any of us kids. My siblings and I - all 8 of us - really vrought ourselves up and managed as best we could. An educated "Ma and Pa Kettle scenario," with not so man sit down meals....... but the focus was on music, literature, the arts, religion, poetry..... and no-one hsowed us how to get a job or open a bank account or live in the world - no-one thought to. My mum lived in her own world, my dad had left and we still went and visited him on fortnightly weekends, and all was pretty chaotic, especially for me.

One sister moved out at just 16. Another had to live somewhere else from about 14 onwards because she and my mum couldn;t get on. it was pretty crazy.

Now for a few questions to millie the artist...

Who is an artist?
What is art?
How important is studying the works of the great painters in order to improve your own?
What has taught you more about painting than anything else?

I'm interested in all this from my point of view as an intermediate-level photography amateur... I've been really studying a lot lately.

Who is an artist?
Kids are the best artists. Kids and outsider artists - those ones who have different kinds of brains that help them to see the world a little differently. But in my view, anyone is an artist. The shame is, most people who are very talented, never fully realise it.
If we are talking about "professionalism," then an artist is someone who does art,w ho goes into the studio and works on their own and creates. Commodification doesn't have to come into it. The art scene is very corrupt. It has as much to do with art as the golden arches of Macdonald's fast food chain. Although I will add disclaimer here and say my new gallery is really fantastic and really understanding of me with an ASD. They understand I do not go to all the openings, tey know i am reclusive, they do not pressure me, and they contact me via email a lot and phone only when they really need to have a long talk. They respect my need for minimal contact.

What is art?
Creativity.
Spirituality.
Open to all.


Studying the works of other artists is for me, the best way to learn. I learn more this way, than with an interaction with a teacher, (for obvious reasons that have a lot to do with my autism.) Others may gain more from interaction with a tutor. I teach, but I cannot be taught by another person. My relationship with painting began with the masters. It was Signac who helped me realise at age 6 or so (?) that i was to be a painter. We grew up with a lot of creativity in our home. I lived for quiet time with dog-eared and scruffy art picture books about Velasquez and Goya, Picasso. I think the Spanish artists have always been my favourites. Although that is such an arbitrary statement really, as I tend to like whatever I am learning most from, at any particular time. I look - all the time. It fills me with joy. Rembrandt, Della Francesca for heavenly lightness and weightlessness. Braque. Matisse, De Kooning, Mary Cassatt, Elisabeth Cummings in my country. Ian Fairweather, some of the indigenous artists.

the thing that has taught me most about art and painting is doing it. There is no substitute for learning and doing.

I think i am still an average artist. I am told I am very good and "gifted" but at the deepest level, i feel average, and i always hunger to improve and develop. I am never satisfied and always striving and persevering.

Thoroughly artistic millie topic

We should sticky you, millie!

This is a great topic! And it deserves an AUTSCAR!

sticky millie. millie is stuck.

thanks sartresue.
and we should give you the creative language award, here on WP.

A couple more questions here, just things I've always wondered about artists and galleries in general...

Do galleries give an advance before they sell an artist's painting? If so, how much in % would be normal?
How does the artist know for sure if the gallery has sold his painting and so he's due to get paid for it? Is it a question of trust?
What's a common mark-up on a painting in %?
When an artist turns in a piece of work, does the gallery give them a receipt? How does the artist ensure the gallery won't steal the painting?

Galleries take on consignment for the most part. They rarely give any advances, although some amazing gallerists (now an extinct breed,) have been known to do so.

The artist does not know if the work is sold or not sold. It is a trust issue. However, good gallerists will notify you immediately as part of their business model. Good gallerists understand the symbiotic flow between artist, gallerist, client.

The split is 50-50 or 60 to artist and 40 to gallerist.

I have had paintings stolen. One went to my old gallery from a few years ago. the work was not good enough and when i got it down there I told them not to show it. I actually forgot about it. A woman contacted me to say she had bought it for 10,000 dollars. The work was worth nowhere near that. The same gallery stole a whole lot of my drawings.

You do fill out a supply form and keep records. I am not good a some of that stuff because of my executive dysfunction.
I also went with gallerists who were quite corrupt and I could not actually gauge them well because of my ASD.

omg millie, that's horrible! 10 grand! Couldn't you sue them? I'll keep the records for you if you want.

On the other hand, your "bad" painting was worth all that money, that's very good news!

I actually spoke with the woman and sent her another work for very cheap. it was about 5years ago.
don't be fooled by the price....it was not worth that. It was a VERY bad painting and the gallery marked it up way beyond its value and stuffed up all my pricing at the time and over-inflated me in this manner. I have learned the hard way with everything and i have made errors of judgment that non ASD artists would not make. But that is ok. At least it is panning out better now with this new gallery who are really nice people. I would believe the corrupt gallerists' words back then.

I got the money - my share from that painting. Irrational ASD meltdowns come in handy every so often.

That was very nice of you to send her another painting!

What happens to a painting that hasn't sold? Is it returned to the artist? After how long?

yes..they are sent back to the artist. the length of time in the stock room at a gallery depends on the artist and gallery. Some works can stay in a stockroom for a couple of years. others...well... one may want some returned more quickly. I usually leave it about a year or so. The recent work i did for my solo exhibition will stay down in Sydney for about 9 months i suppose. Some i shall ask to be sent to another gallery in the next few months. it is all very weird.

Can galleries send your work to their distributors abroad?

Does it mostly happen that the gallerist pushes you to produce more, or on the contrary, that the artist pushes the gallerist to sell more of their works?

Can an exclusive contract with a gallery that devotes itself to promoting mainly [b]your work be a beneficial thing?[/b]

Do you sometimes need to visit the gallerists as PR for you so they don't "forget" about you?

Galleries cannot really send your work anywhere without your permission. they may have affiliate galleries overseas and they may help you to organise shows overseas or tee you up with a gallery in anothr country. OR they may put your work in a visual arts international festival (BIennales etc.) I don't mix in those circles however. And that starts getting into the level of art scene hob-nobbing and pure wankery - excuse language but it was the only word that was specific enough - which i have little to do with. That side of the art scene is really of no interest to me. THat is the establishment career stuff. I have Asperger's. I operate on my own. I do not run in contrived or socially constructed packs.


Yes, the gallery can push you to produce more of the kind of work they want. This is the age old conflict between gallerist and artist. The commercial versus the creative. I always leave galleries when they do this with me. I produce what i want and not what the market wants. My works shifts because i seem to have several brains. I pursue my own logic. The galleries rarely understand. Occasionally you get great gallerists who do.

THe artist rarely pushes the gallery to sell more work. The artist is in fact the least powerful aspect of the artist-gallery-client triad, because usually - they have the least money! Critical success in the art scene is mostly illusion and smoke and mirrors. It is glorified advertising with a little "dash of odious panache" - and the art scene will have the majority of people believing its hype. THere are many, many incredible practitioners and artists out there who never make it, who do not have "the right connections" or "the right ingredients" to qualify for what is perceived as art scene "success." It is really all BS.
The only thing that actually matters is someone working hard and really enjoying their process and their experience of creativity.
I cannot say it enough. the art scene is in fact a glorified advertising scene for one off objects and artifacts. That is all. IT is the realm of PLANET EGO.

I actually had an hour long call with my gallery in sydney yesterday - where i just had a solo show ans sold nothing. Absolutely nothing. I was sick all afternoon after the call and the interaction - because these things take so much out of me. Anyway, I queried why they had not sold anything, discussed a number of fairly serious issues I have with them and got nothing but fluff talk in return. For every artist who is represented in a gallery, there are hundreds who have no gallery to represent them. Galleries know this. One must tread carefully - unless of course you have some kind of autism like me, and set about telling them their business model and their approach is both puerile and facile, which are two adjectives i specifically used yesterday. I also told them they had scant understanding of the artist and I was horrified by the air head girls they now have working for them and who i had to communicate with via phone when my exhibition was on. THE gallery manager is ok and somewhat insightful, but he still does ot quite understand my bluntness and my directness. Still, he knows i have integrity and am honest. I don't compromise on that stuff. I cannot. I do not have an "edit" button when I need to speak my truth. A change is brewing. I do not like change. BUt there is no alternative if my values are being compromised by wankers.

Visiting the gallerists and galleries as a PR exercise is supposedly very important. I am lousy at it. I do most contact via email and also phone. Most artists in "the scene" spend the large bulk of their time going to openings and being seen and making connections and networking. They then spend some of their time painting or working!! Some real artists spend most of their time working and rarely get involved in that side of things or if they do, are very selective about the dangers of the scene, and its pitfalls and its illusory nature. IT is a good idea to get to your galleries and say hi and speak to them. I went up to an opening with my new qld gallery last month - I spent the next day in bed with migraine and sick. That is autism and sensory overload for me. And i burst into tears that day because I am so different to all these artists who breeze through the social side of it and get out there and network and do all that yucky stuff. I can do a bit, but i find it exhausting and it requires a part of my brain to activate that does not seem to work in the way their brains work. When I was on too high a dose of anti-depressants I would indiscriminately monologue and spout opinions in true blint AS manner.

I would get a lot further in my career if i did that kind of thing. But it is a foreign world to me. I can say the niceties and then I do not know how to keep things going in a chit-chatty light manner. the smooth breeze of light conversation makes no sense to me. I really do want to live a life that is about living in accordance with my values, being decent and productive, selling a bit here and there. the star path is crazy. It is all illusion. It means absolutely nothing. I know artists who live that life. They are hollow in my view...there is a kind of moneyed shabbiness about it all...it is so far away from what I am on about as a human being. IT really depends on your perception of "success." What is success? for me, it is living truthfully and adhering to honesty and integrity with care of self an others as much as possible. It's an old fashioned way to be. But it makes sense to me and to a lot of other ASD people as well, i suspect.

the world is mad.
I just draw and paint all the time instead. I am poor at present. and as happy as I am going to be. I have my son, a roof over my head, my ex who is my friend, animals and my work. I have enough to live. I live in accordance with who i am as an autistic woman and artist. that is all there is. That is my success. i want peace. I am tired of anything else in life. It is hard for us. We need to find the peace and jewels where we can.

[quote="millie]the world is mad.
I just draw and paint all the time instead. I am poor at present. and as happy as I am going to be. I have my son, a roof over my head, my ex who is my friend, animals and my work. I have enough to live. I live in accordance with who i am as an autistic woman and artist. that is all there is. That is my success. i want peace. I am tired of anything else in life. It is hard for us. We need to find the peace and jewels where we can.[/quote]

Wisest words ever spoken. I too feel that my biggest success in life would be to LIVE IN ACCORDANCE WITH WHO I AM AS AN AUTISTIC. It's a right that we were never granted by society and that we so deserve, so if and when we finally take it for ourselves, it's heaven for us.

Millie, are there any questions I haven't asked that you'd like to answer? If so, please post them and answer them here.

every question asked....
every question answered.

and for the public record, thank you greentea. i have already pm'ed this to you - but this thread was one of the only things keeping me on the planet some weeks ago. I felt somebody cared.