PT: You could have become anything you wanted to be, so why aren’t you an accountant or a bee keeper or something? Why are you an artist?

DZ: I don’t think I ever made a conscious choice to be an artist. In high school, I interned with an artist who was the spouse of my parent’s friend. She had me gold leafing paintings and sculptures she’d sell to ritzy hotels around the world. It was absolutely horrible and I hated every minute of it. She even told me, “I recommend that you never become an artist,” and I agreed with her. It’s because what I was doing there wasn’t my own, and that made it so boring. Now, I do the art thing for myself and I do the design thing to support myself, but I have to mix and match. I guess it kind of makes me sound like a sell out, but I’m really just trying to feed myself and pay my health insurance. Finding a healthy medium where I’m able to live comfortably and still feel inspired and feel like what I’m producing is art is important to me.

Right now I’m working on drawing for myself. I get burned out drawing for other people because it’s not my ideas. I like the feeling knowing I’m drawing something for absolutely nothing. I’m not this crazy artist who lives in his basement drawing all day and just walking around covered in paint splatter, but art is something that when I have to do it then I absolutely have to do it. Sometimes all I want to do is listen to the Rolling Stones, Miracle Fortress, or NWA and sit there and draw. That’s my own little world, and it’s an escape from everything that I’m thinking about. I just want to do it, and when I do it I feel good. If it ever stops feeling good I’ll stop doing it. I’m just trying to do what I want.

For more from Dan Zvereff, visit Zvereff.com, his flickr, or ask him your own questions via zvereff@gmail.com.

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