Do you need a college degree to do art? No. Why not just start creating? It isn’t that easy. A lot of people believe that going to a school for an art degree means that you are going to just sit in a room and make stuff after graduation. That may be true for some people, but not most.

Art students have as many opportunities as everyone else. From advertising and graphic design to furniture making and woodworking to home and interior design. Don’t believe that going to school for art means you need to become the next Bob Ross and just paint all the time. Limits are endless with what job you can find after college. Companies have begun to look for employees with a creative eye. Times are changing in companies and everyone wants a fresh new look and approach to reaching their target audience.

Who is better to create a new look for a company than a recently graduated art student? Companies are still looking for professional resume’s. Yes, you can try and create things until you are recognized by a company, but it is a lot easier to get your foot in the door when you have a college degree. Most likely an employer is going to require it, actually. A college degree is an important thing to a company, even if you can do the same things without one. Although you may not need the degree to create successful artwork, you may need one to land a successful job.

Let’s face it most of us can’t go to school and not have a job on the side. Aside of tuition, a place to live and food there are other expenses to be considered. We don’t live under a rock and we want to buy new clothes, go out to eat, go drinking with friends (if you are 21, of course). This stuff costs money that not all parents can help out with. This is where your art comes into play. Since high school I have been making my way through life selling my artworks and doing commissions for people. No, it is not paying for my college tuition, or even for my apartment. But it helps me pay for the fun things like shopping and going out to eat.

Artistic ability is a tool that not everyone has. Some people cannot even draw a stick figure.  Use your ability to feed yourself and give yourself new things that you may not usually be able to do.

How do you market yourself? Create an Instagram or Facebook page. Get your parents to brag about your work (as I’m sure they already do), if you hear a business is looking for some new decorating go and talk to them about making stuff for them. It is a way to have fun with things while also making some extra money. Your pieces won’t be as highly priced as a professional artists work would be, but you aren’t a professional artist. You are giving yourself extra money so that you can have fun in the four years you have to do whatever you want.

In high school it’s a lot easier to express yourself and make whatever you want. In college it isn’t that easy. You are assigned more specific projects and can only work with specific mediums. There are classes specifically for drawing with pencil, painting with oils and working with metals. It can become frustrating especially when you don’t like the medium or the subject.

In college you don’t have much free time. It’s a time to meet friends and hangout with them whenever you want. You need to focus on your class work and making sure you get enough sleep. But if you ever feel discouraged about school or the classes you are taking this is when it is time to work on whatever you want. If you like the medium you are using, but hate the project, then create whatever you want with it. This is the art that does not matter if you are turning it in for a grade or not. This art is for you and your own personal enjoyment.

Don’t lose your love for art while in college, or your four years will drag. School is not considered fun, but doing something you love should be. Keep your personal work fun and you will learn to enjoy the things you don’t love in school.

Sometimes it’s hard to decide what your “favorite” art medium is. The good news? You don’t have to pick. Some artists do find themselves happy with one select thing whether that be ceramics, painting, metals, woodworking or whatever really. But it is not uncommon that an artist is talented at many different things. Don’t limit yourself just because you think you’re supposed to pick one thing. Explore your options. Even consider breaking the rules and combining your different mediums. The things you can create when you start combining things is limitless. I myself have started combining paint and pencil, and am beginning to reach new levels in my art that I never thought possible before.

I have said in previous posts to go with your gut. To find what you love and run with it. But if you love two things, run with them both. Art is meant to break rules and do the unordinary. Nothing can be considered right or wrong. Explore your options and maybe something great can come from it.

One of the hardest part of being an artist is seeing someone else do what you are doing, only better. Nothing is more upsetting to me than seeing someone who can draw better realism than me, or that has a better abstract approach to painting. It can become frustrating and discouraging to watch someone who is able to do so easily what is difficult for you.

I’ve learned that it is best to never compare. Someone is always going to be better, whether it is a peer or a professional artist. Every artist has their talents and to focus on them will make you a stronger artist. Setting goals for yourself will improve your art, and while watching other artists and learning from them can help you, you do not want to become so caught up in what you can’t do that you forget what you can.

Sometimes what someone else likes as a topic is not what you will like, and vice versa. Don’t get discouraged because someone else doesn’t like what you’re focusing on or what your idea is is not the current “trend” in art (which doesn’t really exist, art doesn’t have trends). I draw donuts. I have drawn donuts for two years now and I still get questioned as to why I do it. There is no story behind them, no meaning, but I do it because I enjoy it. It’s fun to me, and what is art if it isn’t fun? Why would you want to create something that everyone loves, but you hate it?

It can be beyond frustrating when no one agrees with what you’re doing, or is questioning it as to why you’re doing it. The fact is you need to be true to yourself and what you think you should be doing. Just because my donuts don’t mean anything now doesn’t mean I’m not going to find a rich donut collector some day, or get hired to create for Dunkin’ Donuts. Just because other people don’t see why you’re doing something doesn’t mean you should quit.

“You’re never going to get a job with that” 

“Oh, so you don’t want to make money then?”

“What’s your career goal, a starving artist?”

Questions I have heard more times than once since deciding on my major in 2014 (holy cow, 5 years ago now!!!). I will probably never stop hearing these questions until my career really starts and I prove to people I can make money with it. The stereotype of an art student being poor and never getting a job has been around for a long time. It’s often discouraging and makes students not want to explore the major. Fortunately it helps the students who have the courage to take the risk and study art. Employers like the idea of us having something different on a resume. We aren’t just another business major looking to get into advertising. We have the creative mind set to make things that people like, and we can show that on our resume’s and at a job interview. We spend our time in college building our portfolio’s to show to our future employers that we are different from other college students. This sets us apart from the rest of the college graduates because we had the courage to go into a field that not many others do.

“School must be so easy for you!”

“I wish I could just color for my major!”

We aren’t like other students. We don’t sit around and write papers and study out of textbooks. We work in art studios and create until we can’t create anymore. To other students this means we do nothing except pick up crayons and markers and draw. While, yes, we do create for most of our classes, it is not that easy. Professors are not easy on us. We can’t get away with turning in just anything. We work for weeks a time on one project, and often times it can get frustrating. A professor wants to see you do your best, but that means they will often criticize your art and tell you to change things that you thought were good about it. Other students don’t see us in the library until 3AM because we are in the art studios pulling all nighters and chugging coffee over a paint pallet instead of a computer keyboard.

Every artist has their “thing” so we call it. Some are 3D, some draw, some paint, others are good at graphic design and computers. Don’t feel that you need to be good at it all, especially in college. Most likely you already know what your niche is. That thing that you really enjoy and always love to do – that’s what you should go for. I made the mistake of trying to reach out in college and do things I hadn’t tried before. In some ways it was good for me. While I had worked with other mediums I knew my thing was painting and drawing, but I decided to take classes like Woodshop, metals and ceramics. While I was good at them, and thought they were fun, they did not help my college or future career much. They taught me new things that I would not have known otherwise, but my time would have been more successful spent improving my technical skills with what I was already good at. My advice is find what you are good at, and stick with it. While it can be fun to find new things, it is a lot of money to spend on a class that you may not even be good at or enjoy. I just got lucky and actually liked my classes that I knew nothing about. College is not a time to experiment your artwork, but to improve and perfect what you already know. If you really want to experiment with new mediums try taking a class in the community, or find someone who knows the material and get them to teach you. It will save you money, and the teaching may become more hands on as it will be a smaller class. Along with that there will likely be other beginners in a community class instead of students who know what is going on in a college course. My most important advice while in college is find your thing, and run with it. Don’t experiment outside of it unless it’s free or a professor recommends it. Take your time in school to perfect your technique and find what can make your art stand out from the rest. Work towards deciding on a career and what you would enjoy for forever instead of just right now.

Step 3: Putting together your portfolio.

Another pre-college stress for art majors is portfolio day. When I say I stressed for months about my portfolio, I mean it. Each college is different on what to put in your portfolio. Some schools want whatever you feel should be in it. Others want a particular amount of drawings, 3D works, still life drawings, you name it. It can be frustrating especially when applying to multiple colleges.

They key is to stress as little as possible, but stress enough that you care and don’t blow it off. Find your best works that you are most proud of and put them in first. These are your main selling points and is hopefully going to show who you are as an artist. This will show them your strengths and what you are most successful at. If the school asks for pieces that you do not have, create them. I did not have a lot of still life drawings before college, but some colleges wanted them. I couldn’t not put them in, so I had to make them. They weren’t great because I hadn’t had a lot of practice with them, but they worked for what I needed them for.

Remember that most likely not every piece is going to be absolutely perfect, and do not be discouraged by this. Each professor has their own specialty that they teach. A painting teacher will not be very talented at sculpture or ceramics, and vice versa. There will be multiple professors reviewing your work and they will each take into consideration your strengths and weaknesses. If you are strictly a 3D artist, but they want to see drawings, remember that they will see your strengths in your sculptures and know that you will most likely be working with mainly 3D work while attending the college.

Your portfolio really tells the professors who you are as an artist. While putting together your portfolio think of what you want to tell them about yourself, and what you want to show them about yourself. Making your portfolio a personal piece of yourself will tell your potentially future professors who you are. This means it needs to be taken seriously so that they also see you are serious about coming into college. But remember to HAVE FUN. Art is supposed to be fun and let you be yourself. If you put that in your portfolio the reviewers are going to realize that you are a genuine artist.

So,  you want to be an art major. Now what comes next? You’ve convinced your family and friends that this is what is right for you, and they’re supporting your decision (hopefully). Now it’s time to pick a school. One word – YIKES. This can be one of the most stressful times of your high school senior year. You see athletes getting scholarships and some of the students in AP classes wanting to go to big universities, but what school do art majors go to? Truthfully, almost anywhere, and there are scholarships for us to.

Start by talking to your school faculty. Your art teacher should be able to help you somewhat, and your guidance counselor definitely will be able to. If you don’t have any idea talk to them as soon as you can. Almost all schools offer some type of art program – state schools, private schools, big universities and art specific schools. I decided on IUP because it was close to home and my best friend from high school was going there too. One of my art friends from high school went to School of Art in New York after he graduated. Each school has their own way of teaching and different sets of courses. What school you pick is solely up to you. Researching the different programs and classes you can take the first step to narrowing what schools your interested in. The second is to visit the campuses and find out where you could picture yourself. When I toured IUP I could instantly picture myself making a life for myself on campus.

Keep in mind that the plan is to spend the next four years of your life here. You want this to become a home away from home, and so making the right decision in this is very important. Take into consideration every aspect of your decision. Is it too far/too close to home? Are you going to be okay with the weather? Do you like the classes that are offered? Of course no one is ever going to be happy with every single thing that happens to them in college. There will be some classes you don’t like and some professors you don’t see eye-to-eye with. While you should be stressed and nervous, you should also be excited. This is a whole new part of your life that you’ll only get to experience once. Enjoy the process, and the ears to come