Carol MacConnell: 5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me When I First Became An Artist
You need to do a hundred paintings before you know how to push paint around. I remember when I started out, I was afraid to put paint on a white canvas. I would do one painting at a time. Always afraid to start the next one. I would recommend new artists start 3 paintings at once. When they’re done, start 3 more. It takes a long time to figure out how to apply paint to a canvas, how to mix color, what brush to use. The only way to learn that is by doing so get busy!
As a part of our series about “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me When I First Became An Artist”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Carol MacConnell.
Carol MacConnell is a versatile and prolific artist who creates painting solutions for interior designers and their clients that puts the final touches on their design. With 20+ years of doing commissions, MacConnell has solved many clients’ fears and demands to create a work of art to complete their design dream. Carol has 10,000+ followers on Instagram where she posts daily.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Can you tell us the story of how you grew up?
I grew up in a two-parent household, the youngest of three, in a small town outside of Cincinnati, Ohio. The school I attended had a mediocre art program. My mother was a teacher in my high school which was rife with drugs. I was offered the opportunity to graduate in three years and start college at seventeen. So my parents agreed that the sooner I was out of my high school environment the better! So I attended Miami University in Oxford, Ohio and graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts.
Can you share a story with us about what brought you to this specific career path?
Who doesn’t want to paint all day! No, really I worked for many years in advertising and marketing for several large corporations, having little time and money freedom to do any artwork. So I changed careers into television advertising sales for the local Fox affiliate. Although I had more money, I probably had less time. So I proposed creating a job share at the ABC affiliate in Cincinnati. I started working 3 days a week and going to my studio 2 days a week. I did that for 2 years before I became a full-time artist. That was 20 years ago.
Can you tell us the most interesting story that happened to you since you began your career?
I think starting to see like an artist was life-changing. To see four walls painted the exact same colors and to see how those colors change as light hits them. To look at every scene and think about how I would paint it. To see a gesture a person makes and think about representing that on canvas. Once you can see like an artist, it can’t ever be undone.
What are some of the most interesting or exciting projects you are working on now?
NFTs! (Non-Fungible Tokens!) NFT stands for non-fungible token. That means it’s a unique, easily verifiable and non-interchangeable unit of data stored on a digital ledger using blockchain technology to establish proof of ownership. That was a mouthful! I’m new to this but I just had two pieces of my art in the Red Dot Miami show during Art Basel. One of the pieces, Feather, also included my first NFT! (Unfortunately it was with a gallery that didn’t understand NFTs.) I launched it on OpenSea, the largest NFT marketplace. NFTs were the talk of Miami! I sat in on many panel discussions of the future of NFTs. Although it’s still all getting sorted out, NFTs are here to stay.
Who are some of the most interesting people you have interacted with? What was that like? Do you have any stories?
I do have a story about why I don’t do portraits anymore. A promenade doctor and his wife wanted portraits of themselves in their favorite home environment. I went to their home and photographed the wife in the garden pruning plants and the doctor in his deck chair, reading. The wife’s painting was perfect the first go-round but the doctor kept sending me pictures of him from earlier vacations, some twenty years earlier! That’s when I learned that we all visualize ourselves much younger than our actual years! I had people come into my studio and recognize the doctor immediately. The only person that didn’t recognize the doctor was the doctor himself!
Where do you draw inspiration from? Can you share a story about that?
I don’t need to look for inspiration. Inspiration is all around me. I have so many ideas in my head that I want to explore in paint. I’m inspired by social media, by other artists, by looking at nature, looking at cities, looking at junk piles! As Picasso said, “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” I paint everyday. So inspiration always finds me working!
How have you used your success to bring goodness to the world?
I’ve worked with many charities over the years donating paintings to their events. But the one closest to my heart is the Dragonfly Foundation that works with the families of pediatric cancer and bone marrow transplants. Christine Neitzke, the founder of Dragonfly, was a collector and friend before her son’s diagnosis of Hodgkin’s Lymphoma at age 12; in fact, she was actually in my studio when the doctor’s calls started coming. Four years ago, I developed a fundraising event called “6x6” featuring mini-works of art created by the artists in my building with all of the proceeds benefiting the Dragonfly Foundation. Also this year, I donated a 66x48 painting that became the theme of their gala. I also donated notecards as a thank you gift for every guest at the gala.
What are your “5 things I wish someone told me when I first started” and why. Please share a story or example for each.
I definitely have 5 things I wish I knew when I started my career as a visual artist.
First, you need to do a hundred paintings before you know how to push paint around. I remember when I started out, I was afraid to put paint on a white canvas. I would do one painting at a time. Always afraid to start the next one. I would recommend new artists start 3 paintings at once. When they’re done, start 3 more. It takes a long time to figure out how to apply paint to a canvas, how to mix color, what brush to use. The only way to learn that is by doing so get busy!
Second, You need paint to paint. Beginning artists start out by putting tiny drops of paint, the size of a pencil eraser, on their palette. What they really need to do is put out half of a tube. The worst thing is to mix up a special color and not have enough and then try to figure out how you mixed that again.
Third, you’ll never stop comparing yourself to others. It’s hard with so many artists on social media not to compare yourself with others. Really, we are our worst critics. I would recommend starting a small critique group with a couple of artists that will give you honest advice on how to move forward.
Fourth, don’t wait for inspiration to paint. To quote Pablo Picasso, “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” If I waited for so-called inspiration, I would never lay a brush on a canvas. You need to paint even when you don’t feel like painting. It’s your job to paint.
And last, never stop learning. There are free videos on youtube, weekly classes, workshops, books and so forth. That’s one of the greatest things about being an artist. Lifelong learning. I have taken online classes, flown across the country to study at the feet of the masters, watched how-to videos on youtube, bought books. I still take classes to this day.
You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be?
Bringing beauty to the world. There’s plenty of ugliness in the world already. As an artist, I want to bring as much beauty to the world as I can. It’s a small thing but a mighty one.
You never know what your idea can trigger. :-) We have been blessed that some of the biggest names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why? He or she just might see this.
I would like to talk to a visionary person. First, it would have been Steve Jobs. Of the living visionaries, I would pick Elon Musk. I would love to have a conversation about creative and imaginative ways to think about the future of my business. as an artist.
What is the best way our readers can follow you on social media?
Instagram: @carol.macconnell.art
Facebook: Carol Walker MacConnell & Carol MacConnell Fine Art
Linkedin: Carol MacConnell
This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!
