Meet Joel Stevenson

We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Joel Stevenson a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Joel, thank you so much for taking the time to share your lessons learned with us and we’re sure your wisdom will help many. So, one question that comes up often and that we’re hoping you can shed some light on is keeping creativity alive over long stretches – how do you keep your creativity alive?

I’ve always found that if you just keep working, creativity will come. My art is very process driven so if I just follow the process over and over something will happen. I was once told to act on every idea and I have found that to be a great lesson. If I don’t act on an idea, I will never know what path that idea may take me down or what new inspirations may be realized.

Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?

I am a sculptor and painter. These pursuits allow me to explore that creative side of myself. I’m interested in relationships, how things fit or don’t fit together, how they interact, how they affect everything around us. We make decisions daily that affect our lives in little and big ways, my art is about these relationships. How shapes work together, how colors affect each other, where does a line lead you, how does nothing become something when it’s viewed in the context of it’s surroundings.

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?

I think not being afraid to fail is one of my strongest qualities along with the wonder of exploring and learning new things. I’m a very hands-on kind of person. These qualities teach me to see and develop a curiosity for new ideas. To discover new things, you have to experience them and really see them then you can better understand them so you can utilize them. This would be my recommendation for new artists, just do something, it won’t be perfect on your first try but trying it teaches you how to move forward and develop new visions.

We’ve all got limited resources, time, energy, focus etc – so if you had to choose between going all in on your strengths or working on areas where you aren’t as strong, what would you choose?

I think it is better to be more well rounded instead of focusing entirely on your strengths. Developing new and stronger skills seems to benefit all avenues of your work. Over the past year I’ve worked hard to develop better painting skills and better direction. Through this work in my painting I’ve seen great strides in my sculpture. My 3D work has diversified and become more vibrant and stronger and then this advancement in my sculpture has encouraged me to be more exploratory in my painting and has advanced it as well.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://JoelStevensonArtist.com
• Instagram: Joel.Stevenson.Artist

Image Credits

All images by Joel Stevenson Artist