Today we’d like to introduce you to Brook Bridges.
Hi Brook, so excited to have you on the platform. So before we get into questions about your work life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today.
I’ve always enjoyed the fine arts but I started getting more serious about my passion for art in high school, where I mainly focused on creating realistic portraits. I devoted lots of time and care to my work and looked to it as an outlet where I was able to grow skills not only artistically, but also personally as the artistic process tends to shape you as you shape your work.
When planning for college, I knew I wanted to focus on a creative field, though I was unsure of exactly what I wanted to do. I ended up deciding to major in architecture, as I am captivated by the synthesis of logic and beauty that great architecture requires. While currently my main focus is architecture-related projects, I still create fine art as a hobby and I still find myself learning from it after all this time.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not, what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
As most artists do, I’ve experienced my fair share of burnout over the years as it can be hard to maintain the same level of artistic tenacity when continuously putting so much into a project can take a lot out of you. I find that whenever I embrace and enjoy the process of creation rather than solely being focused on achieving a final product, I end up being a lot happier with my work and tend to feel much less burnout.
It’s hard to maintain a balance between staying consistently devoted to your work and maintaining a sense of passion for it, so every day I continue to try to find that balance.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
Most of my experience has been in creating realistic portraiture drawings. In my studies as an architecture major, I’ve been able to branch out a little bit into the territory of creating 3D models which has been a very interesting learning curve but at the end of the day, I still consider myself a portrait artist at heart.
I enjoy how, as simple as it sounds, portraiture focuses on human beings as the subjects and as an artist striving to convey someone’s likeness and spirit through artwork is a challenging yet rewarding experience. I would say I’m mainly proud of how far I’ve come with growing my skills as an artist, as it’s always a gratifying feeling when you can feel and see yourself getting better with each project you work on.
We’d love to hear about how you think about risk-taking.
In my work in fine art, I’m not prone to taking too many risks. I truly admire artistic risk-takers and am captivated by how risks define a piece, however, I wouldn’t consider my work as being very daring. I’m more of a logical thinker than creative, and I feel like that mindset can be apparent in my work.
I do enjoy stepping out of my comfort zone and trying new things creatively from time to time, but there’s usually a voice in my head that encourages playing it safe. I think some of the best artwork has been born out of taking risks, so I would love to work on breaking down some personal barriers and experimenting more outside of the stricter parameters that I’ve often set for myself when creating artwork.
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