About this Newsletter + introductions

Let’s reintroduce ourselves

Do you want to go first?

• Who are you?

• Are you new here?

• What made you sign up/stay?

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I’m Adam,

I’ve been writing for a couple of years here.

In 2022 this newsletter was a featured publication on Substack. I’ve mostly been writing about my experience breaking into the picture-book industry in my 40s. (11 book deals in 2 years)

This year I’ve thought a lot about how to expand on the topic.

These are the main topics I’ll be covering:

1. Cultivating a daily art practice.

2. Strategies and steps to break into (and staying in) the publishing industry as an illustrator

3. How to keep going without burning out.

Modules

I’ll be delivering these topics in modules and that’s really where I need you to weigh in.

Cultivating a daily art practice (Free)

I currently do this once a week under the heading 10-Minute Artist Lectures, I think the name is a little confusing especially for first timers. If you’ve read any of these they are typically 1-2 minute reads, with an assignment or prompt at the end. I’m toying with calling the newsletter ‘Art Quest’ and build this game like theme around it, but I don’t know.

Let’s put it to a vote, what shall we call the weekly free newsletter about cultivating a daily art practice.

Strategies and steps to break into the publishing industry as an illustrator.(Paid)

So far I’ve been doing this as a weekly series. The idea is to create different series looking at different aspects of the creative journey. Not just from my experience but also from reading and talking to others. Currently I call this the Studio Attic (but I’m trying to get paid subscribers here and I think it sounds ‘cheap’)

What do you want to call the paid membership section of this newsletter?

Weekly Artist Chat - To help us Keep Going (Free for 2024)

The idea will be to host a space on the substack chat app, where illustrators of all levels can ask questions. I’ll be there for an hour in real time to share my take on questions, and we can also share our experiences with one another. (This is reader suggested feature)

How interested might you me in something like this?

Recordings.

Over the course of the year I’ll be doing live events online with various groups and individuals, these might be discussions on illustrator life, drawing sessions, critique groups etc.

I’ll tell you about these in advance and they tend to be free if you make it live, and recordings will be made available to paid subscribers.

So that’s who I am, and what this is.

Thank you for being here, If you like the sound of it do consider becoming a paid subscriber, I’ve loaded the welcome email with the best of the 600+ posts so far, and you’ll get that straight away.

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Otherwise, I’m happy for you to be here all the same! Let us know who you are and I promise you - being here will make your artist journey better.