Meet Tom Christopher

We were lucky to catch up with Tom Christopher recently and have shared our conversation below.

Tom , so great to have you on the platform and excited to have you share your wisdom with our community today. Communication skills often play a powerful role in our ability to be effective and so we’d love to hear about how you developed your communication skills.

Showcase a story—don’t answer questions.
I learned how to capture any audience’s attention from the renowned art dealer Molly Barnes. She could light up a room with an enchanting smile and tell a story, connecting dots in the most direct way possible. I also emulated her humor, which she found without forcing it.

At the Roger Smith Hotel in Manhattan, she led legendary conversations and salons with figures like Clement Greenberg, Al Leslie, and Richard Bellamy—great artists and curators of their time.
Barnes would simply begin talking in a room, scanning the room with an openness that made everyone feel included. There was an unspoken understanding in her presence: everyone has a story worth hearing. She even invited Ultraviolet, the Warhol superstar, to speak. You might expect a Warhol figure, thirty years later, to be a tragic, drug-ridden caricature—but instead, she was absolutely charming: an elegant, gracious French woman.

That lesson stayed with me. The goal is to bring people into your world in a relatable, funny way, and let tell them who you are, which will show why you do what you do.

When I’m asked about my pathway to becoming an artist, I always begin by saying I was the kid in the back of the classroom, drawing nonstop and paying little attention to anything else. Most people can relate to that inner-child. We all have a self professed talent, so I explain that art was the only thing I was remotely capable of. Becoming an artist wasn’t a grand plan—it was a decision made by default. Everything else, others did better, or I failed at entirely. But I could draw. And that’s how I got started.
Interesting story, right?

Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?

So I really was the kid in the back of the classroom, drawing stuff, constantly hot rods classmates, and not paying one wit of attention to anything else. I remember once the school janitor was brought in by my math teacher to give me a lecture started off by telling me you don’t want to grow up like me. My reaction was why not you have a really cool job. Get to hide in the closet. Drink sweep a broom around. Tell jokes find free stuff all the time everybody likes you the teacher just show on her shoulders and left the room so you find out what you’d like to do which is drawing I’ve worked at Disneyland drawing portraits people in New Orleans Square while dressed as a pirate Moved onto courtroom drawing for NBC news drawing Lee Marvin coming back east to draw Black Panthers the guy who shot John Lennon those are really interesting jobs because you have no time and you have to figure out what they look like and get the story down journalistically and that’s where my education at Art center college really helped because he spend 9 to 4 every day drawing and working on stuff you go back at night school and then I held a job at CBS records doing posters
ONE DAY COMING BACK TO NEW YORK WE STAYED IN TIMES SQUARE AND I SAW THE GARAGE LIGHTS IN THE LONG SHADOWS. MEN WITH HATS PULLED DOWN, SMOKING CIGARS, WOMEN WITH HIGH HEELS GETTING IN AND OUT OF CHECKER CABS A LIGHT SNOW IS FALLING AND I THOUGHT THIS IS PERFECT. THIS IS WHERE I WANNA BE. IT’S LIKE YOU’RE WALKING INTO THE SET OF A FILM NOIR MOVIE AND I’VE KIND OF BEEN OBSESSED WITH PAINTING NEW YORK CITY EVER SINCE IN THE DAYLIGHT THE LASER LIKE LIGHT SCULPT, BIKE, MESSENGERS, CARTING TRUCKS, PEOPLE IN SIDEWALK SCRUMS jostling for space it was like an epiphany I realized my life calling to paint the epicenter of the great dynamo of the city

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

1. develop a skill learn how to do something as best as you can requires a lot of work. It’s not income generating, but find something you like to do or just work at it.
2. keep an eye open for opportunities to always say yes often had people present me with jobs. I’m totally unqualified to do. The only answer is to shrug and say sure because what’s the worst that can happen? You’re living at a dump on the bad side of town if you fail your job, you’re still living at a dump on the bad side of town if you succeed you have a chance of improving things
3. I met Slim Aaron’s the famous photographer he told me. “ son, I like your paintings, but here’s some advice always have some fuck you money around”

Who has been most helpful in helping you overcome challenges or build and develop the essential skills, qualities or knowledge you needed to be successful?

I would have to say it’s not one person, but it was a team of teachers at Art Center, College who really taught me how to draw saying tried and convey information give us enough physical information about what you’re drawing that we could do a painting from that drawing, not style, not technique, approach it almost like a visual engineer And that’s something I’ve passed on to interns when I’ve given them. A job is to draw the Brooklyn Bridge and they come back with pencil drawings that really don’t tell anything and I’ll say this is nice if the bridge were made out of wire which it is not show me how the beams are put together are they highbeams? Are they beams? Are they bolt? Are they riveted or their blocks holding it up or stone block cinderblocks what are the struts made of what are the cables made of or is it rope or is it steel give me information

Contact Info:

• Website: Tomchristophernyc
• Instagram: Tomchristophernyc

Image Credits

Photo by artist tom christopher