Today we’d like to introduce you to Ainsley Santa Barbara.
Ainsley, please kick things off for us by telling us about yourself and your journey so far.
My mom is an artist. So you know this story goes… Our whole home was filled with art supplies, crafts and creative play not to mention paintings, pottery, and sculpture around every corner. But by middle school, I was shunning my mom’s advice and critiques and instead painting in secret in my bathroom if at all. I loved art but put it to the side throughout most of the high school. Only when I reached college did I re-engage with art again, falling first for drawing and then for oils.
After college, I continued to take classes while working in finance and retail in New York, Washington, DC, and San Francisco. My paints and pencils were my constant companion, no matter how lonely I was in a new big city or new apartment. In fact, my aunt gave me a Metropolitan Museum of Art membership when I first moved to NYC, and I spent many lonely, chilly days warming up in the Met galleries.
Later, when I met my husband-to-be in San Francisco, he believed in my art in a way no one else had before (the exception being one of my best friends who used to dig my paintings out of the trash and hang them in her kitchen). He built me a studio in his own home and later converted our kitchen in our first apartment and subsequently our first home’s garage into an art studio.
In 2016, I started to show and sell paintings at his prompting and encouragement. And in 2017, I shocked myself by selling over 50 pieces. So after over 20 years of hiding my art, I finally have had the courage, thanks to my family and friends, to bring it out in the open.
Can you give our readers some background on your art?
For a long time, I painted strictly with oils in a very traditional “old master” style, layering in darks to lights and taking months to complete a piece. An amazing art teacher named Delores Kennedy at Chastain Arts Center changed that: she encouraged more spontaneity in my art and more abstraction, as well. These days, I use both acrylics and oils and a loose, painterly effect to give paintings movement and to reflect light and contour. I adore old artist heroes like Manet, Degas, and Matisse but also enjoy the texture and intensity of more modern painters like Diebenkorn and Rothko. There are also lesser-known artists like Alfred Chadbourn of Maine that I study to learn about how to use alternative color for volume instead of traditional old blues and grays. And right now, I’m working with my kids on some Miro-based art.
As for subjects, I started out mostly painting dogs, largely because I was smitten with our family dog (we even named our 2nd child after her!) Painting dogs allowed me to experiment with non-traditional color in the fur and shadows, as well, using oranges, greens, and purples in to give the paintings a lighter feel. From there, I experimented with landscapes, houses, florals and still lives but eventually found that portraits were the paintings that challenged me and excited me the most. Children’s portraiture, in particular, makes me laugh out loud and smile while I work. (It probably helps that I almost always have Beyonce or the Indigo Girls cranked up in the studio – singalong music, for sure!)
When I paint portraits, I try to paint the child’s personality into the piece. Often, I’ll photograph them in their favorite spot – be it a playground or front porch – prior to painting them so that I can get to know their personality and their environment. One of my favorite pieces was of a feminine little girl who was studying her Darth Vadar figurine while I photographed her. That is just the best! Kids being kids and letting their light show. It’s a hard task to try to recreate that feeling, but it’s also so much fun to try.
Artists rarely, if ever pursue art for the money. Nonetheless, we all have bills and responsibilities, and many aspiring artists are discouraged from pursuing art due to financial reasons. Any advice or thoughts you’d like to share with prospective artists?
It’s so hard. It really is. There’s very little financial payoff in art. But the emotional payoff is enormous.
I currently work a part-time corporate job to earn money and to exercise my left brain (since I also love spreadsheets and number crunching as well as making art!) And by doing that, I’m able to reserve an hour or two a day to make art, as well.
The most important thing is just to do it. I’ll never forget sketching my classmates in business school during a particularly dry class: I just had to exercise the art side of my brain. My mind needed it to balance out all of the finance and economics surrounding me. And it sometimes surfaced in the most bizarre moments – like business school lectures!
Chuck Close is a big advocate of getting to work and seeing what happens. He’s quoted as saying: “Inspiration is for amateurs — the rest of us just show up and get to work.” So I try to follow what he says, and even if it’s just cutting paper with my children, I try to create art every single day.
One last thought on this: find, cultivate and express gratitude to your advocates. As mentioned before, one of my best friends used to pull paintings out of the trash whenever she helped me move to a new apartment. And she still has some of those very same pieces hanging in her house to this day. She has believed in my art for over 20 years. So whenever I need a pick-me-up, I know I can call her to remind me why it’s important for me to keep creating. Same for my mom and my husband. Keep those relationships close – they will keep you going when you think you can’t go on. And when I look back on all of my favorite achievements, I see their handiwork in each one.
What’s the best way for someone to check out your work and provide support?
I have a website and an Etsy site where you can buy pieces: www.ainsleysantabarbara.com. I also show occasionally at events around Atlanta. And there are smiling kids in lots of homes.
Also showing on instagram and facebook as ainsleysantabarbara.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.ainsleysantabarbara.com
- Email: ainsleysantabarbara@gmail.com
- Instagram: ainsleysantabarbara
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ainsleysantabarbara/
- Other: https://www.etsy.com/shop/AinsleySantaBarbara
Image Credit:
Personal photos, all of which were taken on my iphone. 🙂
Getting in touch: VoyageATL is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.
