We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Brandon Rayfield a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Brandon, thanks so much for taking the time to share your insights and lessons with us today. We’re particularly interested in hearing about how you became such a resilient person. Where do you get your resilience from?
I get my resilience from the knowledge I’ve obtained over the years from overcoming past conflicts/ trauma. I’ve learned that you have to go through things in order to grow and sometimes some situations aren’t so bad if you change your mindset to look at the situation from a positive perspective. Growth is uncomfortable so a lot of the times the pain we feel is actually progress being made. God wouldn’t put anything on me I couldn’t handle and this have been proven to men throughout my life multiple times, so I’ve grown to role with the punches and just keep going.
Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?
I’m a fine arts artist from New Orleans, Louisiana. I have a bachelors degree in fine arts and have been practicing the craft my entire life. From the ages of twelve to twenty I wanted to be a tattoo artist because I always admired the artist and entrepreneurship lifestyle since a child, ultimately feeling like I was born for it. I branched off into the fine arts field as a got older, taking more art classes while studying at Jackson state university as I begin to become interested with painting, peeking my interest heavily. I transitioned from drawing into painting and started to develop a deep love for the craft. After graduating college with a bachelors degree in fine arts COVID-19 begin which derailed my plans for to attend graduate school. While sitting at home I decided to start my own art business and put my talents to use seeking full time employment as a fine artist. I uploaded my art to social media and saw a lot of traction from my post and even had a celebrity, blogs and major platforms comment/ repost my art early in my career. From that month foward I decided I would pursue a life of entrepreneurship. I uploaded new art every week to social media in a attempt to grown my name and platform. Since then I’ve moved to Houston,Texas for better opportunity and have been networking and creating hundreds of new pieces of art. From starting my own clothing brand, to modeling, to art shows I have developed my craft in many different ways to help elevate my platform beyond only drawing and painting. My main focus is to push my platform far as possible to become a full time artist and provide amazing art to the world. I use my art as a healing process and a way to spread positivity into the world piece by piece with each brush strokes and line creating raw emotions in my art. I love to create creative expressionism pieces that help people express themselves or emotions they aren’t good at expressing. I plan to build my platform in Houston and then expand to different states to inspire others making a impact on the art world.
There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?
God, Discipline and Confidence
Throughout my entrepreneurship journey I’ve developed a closer relationship with God. It helps me stay grounded and not rush the process rather than looking for a quick way to the top. I always look to do things organically the right way instead of always trying to move forward no matter the consequences.
Discipline taught me how to work even when you may not always feel like it. You learn how to willingly tap into that head space instead of waiting for the creativity to come to you. Things become more efficient and easier to maintain over a course of years with the help of discipline.
As a entrepreneur you get told “no” a lot, run into a lot of dead ends and things like that can be very discouraging. Strong confidence keeps you going because you know it only takes one “yes” to make up for a thousand “no’s”. Confidence has helped me step outside of my comfort zone as a artist and that’s where we typically make the most progress.
My advice to any artist just starting a business is to focus on developing your skill and not revenue. As you get better and grow over time the revenue will increase naturally but always focus on proving good business and your ability to execute.
Before we go, maybe you can tell us a bit about your parents and what you feel was the most impactful thing they did for you?
My mom would buy me art supplies whenever she had the extra money. My parents couldn’t really afford to buy me art supplies growing up but whenever my mom could she would always get me a new sketch book or pencils. It’s like she was investing into my career and didn’t even know it lol. Not having a lot of art supplies helped me develop skills to where I didn’t need certain tools to execute a good piece but also having tools to where I was fond of how to use certain art supplies.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://beetheartist.myshopify.com/
- Instagram: beetheartist_
- Facebook: Bee Theartist
- Youtube: BeeTheArtist_
- Other: TikTok: beetheartist_
Image Credits
Onexs Gardner
Deitras Melancon
so if you or someone you know deserves recognition please let us know here.