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AUGUST 15, 2018

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Meet Charles Wallis


LOCAL STORIES

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Today we’d like to introduce you to Charles Wallis.

Charles, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
I was encouraged to become an artist when lady from our church saw some of drawing and bought us some art supplies when I was in my early teens. Her act of kindness and encouragement started a fire that burns brighter and brighter. I majored in art at Baylor University. I went to work in graphic design and spent 10 years in advertising as an art director and creative director. I left the advertising field to pursue another career all the while doing a few paintings along the way. I kept a drawing board/easel set up all the time. When I figured that I had enough income to keep the wolf away from the door I stopped working in the “business world” and started painting most everyday. My first painting I took to a gallery was a Western Art piece. It took me three weeks to complete and another two months to get the courage to take it to a gallery. I took it to Adobe Western Art Gallery in Ft. Worth.

They accepted it and it sold within a few months. They have since then accepted many of my pieces. I painted mostly Western and Wildlife art for the first three or four years. Somewhere along the way I become fascinated with abstract art and art that had specific meaning to my own growth to becoming enlightened with a new and more universal consciousness. I produced my first abstract solo show around the themes of an open heart and mind. Another solo show around the concept of empathetic and highly sensitive people (artists, writers, actors, musicians and research scientist. Just like some have better hearing than others and some have better eyesight than others, these empathetic and highly sensitive people have a more sensitive central nervous as an innate part of their being. Light, sound, color, texture, patterns all affect them different than most. They tend to react different from the rest of the world and tend to be more introverted. I have learned to embrace that part of myself that once made me feel like an outsider and it informs my life and my art. My painting focus now is on modern impressionism and fauvist interpretation sprinkled with abstraction and non-objective pieces. I find modern impressionism is the most challenging and brings me great joy. The essence of all art is finding pleasure in giving pleasure to others.

Has it been a smooth road?
It has not been necessarily a smooth road. Being more sensitive than most at first rejection would drive me down a rabbit hole. It still bothers me but now I can laugh at it and let it pass. Like most artists I didn’t think about marketing my work, but when your house is full of art, your family has your stuff all over the place and your closet is full you have to start painting over them or sell them. This is the struggle for most artists since they signed up to create and tend to be introverted. They have to become high functioning introverts. I have learned to take every opportunity to show my art. Georgia O’keefe said you need to sixty to seventy paintings on hand at all times that can be organized into an exhibit with a common theme. I followed her piece of advice and started creating series of paintings numbering thirty to forty around a common theme. I would write a proposal showing many or all of the pieces with written stories about each piece. This resulted in solo shows when presented to galleries. I usually have two to four solo shows a year now.

So let’s switch gears a bit and go into the Charles Wallis Artist story. Tell us more about the business.
I consider myself a master painter. Even though I am focused on modern impressionism at this time. I am versatile can paint in a super realistic, traditional or abstract style. This is pretty much against the most common advice given to artists for success which says “develop a style that people recognize and stick with it” to become successful. I paint what interests me as a subject and choose the style to render it.

How do you think the industry will change over the next decade?
I expect that art buying will continue to grow through social media and many artists will become involved in the direct sales of their art.

Pricing:

  1. Pricing of art is always a challenge for artists. I started pricing my art at a low price to get acceptance. For example I was selling an 8X10 painting for $50-$75 dollars. Today I sell them between $195 to $325. I try to strike a balance in pricing by size and time spent, I used to price for a return on my time of $20 an hour…now I try to price to get a return of $150 to $200 and hour and will soon move to a value pricing.

Contact Info:

  1. Website: www.charleswallis.com

  2. Phone: 817.235.2137

  3. Email: charleswallis67@gmail.com

  4. Instagram: ghosteyechas3

  5. Facebook: Charles Wallis Art Space

    

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