Today we’d like to introduce you to Harrison Colvin.
Hi Harrison, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I often feel as if I’m just a conglomeration of everyone I’ve met over my life. I had a very religious upbringing in a very unconventional way. Sunday service was often held in strangers’ homes, bookstores, and grocery store sitting areas late into the night. Our religion was up-close, personal, and everywhere. I believed in a god with all of my being but I did not feel his presence in my life. I felt alone, holding secrets from my family and pushing my own thoughts away because I deemed them unfaithful to the script I had been fed. I cried out in pain when I prayed but I was only met with silence. I heard often of people who felt close to the lord in a personal way and I longed for that connection. My grandparents, who lived many states away, would come visit our family as often as they could. My grandfather was a storyteller. He’d had a life full of theatrical mishaps and amazing feats. His stories pulled at my heart and made me feel like I was with him in them, running beside him when he was my age. My grandmother was a storyteller as well, though she often spoke about other people’s lives and not her own. We would wander museums and gardens when they were in town. The whole time my grandmother would tell the tales of the artist and art alike. She brought paintings and statues to life before my eyes, filling me with an emotion I can only describe as religious in nature. I stood before canvas twice as tall as I, and marveled that people living so long ago had made such beautiful things just for the sake of them being beautiful.
When I began drawing, I wanted to make beautiful things that made people feel the way I did in museums with my grandmother. I had been surrounded by religious iconography my whole life, and while beautiful, the majority of it had left me feeling ashamed that I did not marvel before it the way I believed one should. As I have expanded my abilities I continue to find myself returning to the images of my childhood. To take images that once filled me with pain and twist them to reflect the experiences of love and anguish that I’ve experienced is the closest I’ve ever felt to talking to a god. In the moments when I’m painting and I can see the image so clearly carved into my canvas coming forth I feel truly at one with myself.
I mainly use folks I’ve met as my subjects, in the hope that someday I can be like my grandfather. I hope that others will feel as though they are before them in essence, experiencing them as I did. Without my grandmother, I’m not sure if I would have ever found the love for my medium that I have. When I work I am inspired by a million other artists before me, reminded that we are all just humans putting our perspectives into pictures to be consumed and put into another perspective. I have found peace within myself through these expressions of grief and love.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
Art is something that is difficult to hone. I’ve frequently done commissioned pieces as a means of making spare income and I find them to be the most difficult part of being an artist. Often when I make a piece for myself the image has been floating in my mind for a couple days, living like a screen burn-in until I put it to paper. Those are the works that I feel most often come out the best. But from every commissioned piece I’ve ever made I have learned new skills and adopted new techniques. I could not be the artist I am now without every idea someone else placed before me to bring to life.
As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
When people ask for my medium I often just say I make acrylic paintings. I feel most proud of my paintings; they come naturally to me the majority of the time and I’ve sold the most of them out of any of my other works. Lately, I have been playing with digital pieces, collages, and sparingly some sculpture. Over the past year, I’ve been incorporating embroidery and gold leaf into my work with great delight. I feel like it makes them look truly like mine. A painting isn’t really done if it doesn’t have some form of texture on it.
We all have a different way of looking at and defining success. How do you define success?
As long as someone is creating, imagining, inspiring others, then they are successful.
Contact Info:
- Email: erosappeal@gmail.com
- Instagram: cherubchampagne
