I​ really do enjoy writing, my G-Rated friends. I recall writing raw poetry style lines when I was in middle school and it wasn’t cool. I would write out of sight, so I would not be made fun of, because I had gone to the office many times already for fighting, and I didn’t want to be there because someone exposed me for writing. I never stopped writing. even though art is where I followed openly, I have enjoyed doing both, but this is probably why my writing does not have proper structures to writing principles. I simply write ideas and words that cross my mind at the moment that I am writing or typing. *So this is a warning for anyone who chooses to read my rants and does not understand.

M​any times I do not understand what I do either, I just do. It might be a difficult concept to grasp for anyone who properly evaluates, takes notes, takes measurements, creates outlines and proposals. All which help organize a project and present it to a reader or a client. This is why we have structure and rules in any subject humans embark on, in which we are following someone else’s guidance so that we don’t make the same mistakes and we can better communicate. I promise you guys, I am not intentionally making words rhyme that way.

I​ guess I choose to listen to my energy and surroundings, when I do something that I enjoy to do. I release my body and become an instrument that joins in the harmony for whatever it is that I am about to create. Let me give you an example with what I know best. By the way, I should warn you as well, when it comes to “airbrushing” in that community, I found out that there are many many negative things being said about me by other airbrush artists. One of my few airbrush friends I have accidentally told me some other airbrush artist he knows that are in the Facebook Airbrush Community talk bad about me when he tried to show his respect towards me. “Before you say anything about Alex, I want to say that he is the best father I have ever met!” Air says to them. I do try to emphasize the word ‘airbrush’ when speaking of these artist because I have noticed interesting things in my journey from Airbrushes to Airplanes, my G-Rated friends.

T​o tattoo artists, and any other artist I meet, I am taken serious as an airbrush artists. They say, man, you could do tattoos easily. So forth and so on. What I am to find, is that once you label yourself as a tattoo artist, the view of you has now changed. Suddenly you are competition to a tattoo artist. Now you are trying to steal ideas and techniques that they use to make a successful tattoo, that might have taken them years upon years to master, as I have with the airbrush using trial and error. In every discipline, they have their “right of passage” and so forth, I am assuming. I paid for my daughter to get lessons in makeup and the teacher treats her like a child that doesn’t know anything because she is “not even 18 yet” so what could she possibly know about business and beauty. Then that lady tries to send me pictures of my art in the background with her models, lady I don’t give a damn. But I guess each discipline has this right of passage and there are quite a few that will say to you that it took them several years and it should take you the same. There are quite a few, though, who will give you as many tips and skills that will save you time from trial and error.

B​ack to airbrush, I have learned all the how-to’s of airbrush when I was 16 years old. I always feel I can learn from anyone who is willing to teach, no matter how long they have been and I have been. We can all learn from each other if we are open to it. Or I will learn from you and keep going, it is all the same to me. But the thing is. even though I have learned some of the rules a long time ago about airbrushing and whatever, I never really follow them, in airbrush, in a particular order or structure or what have you. And those loops and circles that we should practice often, those swirls that many “airbrush tee shirt” artists learn to master, I don’t practice. It is just me.

S​o I have learned to airbrush, learned to tattoo, construction, drafting, and I love to write. I do not follow the rules that these disciplines as I should and as Tupac would say “the same things you admire about me are the same things you hate me for”. For me that means that I find clients that are looking for someone who will break the rules and make something look as close to what they had imagined it looking like. Or should I say they find me. Those are the customers I like working for too. People who will challenge all my current skills and do something I haven’t done before, and when money is no object to the client, is willing to say here’s 5K or 10K, do yo thang, I will make it happen. Think not, one project that my friend Ed and I worked on was making a post-apocalyptic denim jacket. The goal was to put art in the jacket, but make it look like it had been through some shit. So we simulated blood in the inside of the jacket, sanded down some parts of the art and jacket, and shot it with an AR a couple of times. So our client is walking with this jacket that looks like it was in the post-apocalyptic something and his jacket has bullet holes on it. I been wanting to make me one with same idea but not the same artwork.

M​ost of the time, when money is no object, and time is not being rushed, I find the right mood for that project after taking time to ‘meditate’ with the ideas provided by the client. Most of the time there isn’t an outline designed, sometimes there is. I set up all the equipment or materials needed and get started. I go with the flow. Just grab a color and go. That is all I can really tell you as far as the typical aspects of airbrushing. I use the same concepts with writing or typing. I get in this mood or receive this strong signal leading me to type what flows in my head. Therefore, I feel there is no structure, no rules I follow, or anything like that when it comes to writing or drawing. Obviously, there are plenty rules implanted in my head with each disciple, or I would have many more mistakes when someone is trying to interpret my finish product.

E​very now and again I get a client that asks if I can create a sample of how it is going to look. Many times I tell them it is best that I just do, because I have received the information they have given me and I will go with the flow. Some let it go, and I do what I do, but others choose not to accept it and find another airbrush artist. All good too. But this is also the way I write and a few might enjoy it and others will label it a piece of crap. Either way, thanks for reading my rant.

Just in case it was in question, mostly all of the photos I post with my blogs are pieces of art that I have created some time in my life.