art v craft... [part 1]

...every now and again, someone will tell me that i have a wonderful job, that it must be great to be paid to exercise my creativity. now i'm not one to moan [no, really] but most of the time what i'm required to do is quite tightly briefed and there are [very sensible] limits to what i'm allowed to draw. sometimes, like any job, it can be really quite dull. it's commercial art, except, maybe it's not really art. it's more craft. most days i'm a craftsman more than an artist.

that's not to devalue what i do, or the work that i take on. sometimes though, i feel like i want - for want of a better phrase - to make art. to do stuff that's less functional, more thoughtful, less about solving a compositional problem, and more about asking questions... or telling a story.
...something that has a bit of depth to it.

things like '40', or stuff that we do for greenbelt, or comicbook stories that i've kept on the backburner for a while now, or lino cuts, stuff inspired and informed by our experiences in alternative worship and emergent church; but i struggle to eke out the time to work on those sort of projects - and then there's the financial issue - can you make the art stuff pay...? and if so, how? i've got loads of ideas and projects and things that i'd love to get to stuck into, but in the meantime i've a wife, two kids and a builder to support... and plenty of commissioned work to keep me busy...

[so, as i say, i'm not moaning, just pondering...!]

meantime, on the desk lately [includes robots]...