Today we’d like to introduce you to Lisa Clough Lachri.
Lisa, please kick things off for us by telling us about yourself and your journey so far.
As a kid, I was always sick. Seriously, ALWAYS sick! We weren’t aware that I had celiac disease so my immune system was very bad. We’re talking strep throat, scarlet fever, and mono all at the same time bad. Actually, I suspect that awesome Christmas of 1994 is what triggered my fibromyalgia. The point is, being sick so often translated to being indoors drawing and coloring a lot. I was no child art prodigy, but I did spend enough time drawing that by the time I was in my teens I was above average in my drawing skills. At the time I was obsessed with orcas. I drew them non-stop. In ballpoint pen on my homework (if I was going to be terrible at math, I might as well pretty up the paper!), and in charcoal over watercolor. I didn’t have the funds to purchase more art supplies, so these kept me busy.
I didn’t jump into college like many of my friends did after high school. I didn’t feel well enough to both work part time and go to school. One afternoon I was walking around Laguna Beach CA with a friend and we came across this gazebo filled with a woman’s dolphin paintings. Her perspective was completely off on all of them. What was even more shocking to me is that she had price tags in the thousands. My thought was “Wait! Mine are better than this! I can make a living drawing whales like I love!!” Go ahead and laugh, I now realize that is SO not how the art world works. I don’t regret my naivety though because it sent me on this path.
I taught myself to paint through trial and error. LOTS of error. Like most artists, I started by displaying my work in local coffee shops and a small gallery (Angel’s Galleria which was located in the Pomona Arts Colony, Pomona CA) within a couple of years. By 1999 I started teaching my first art classes.
I spent several years teaching painting classes and selling my own work. In 2011 I was struggling to get traffic to my own website. My art hero Jaime Jimenez suggested instead of posting in progress photos as I had been doing, that I make a time lapse video of my painting progress to embed onto my website. This was a huge turning point for me. I knew NOTHING about YouTube at the time. The only reason I chose to use it was that the platform allowed free uploads and I was able to embed that to my site. I didn’t realize at the time you could even have subscribers! It took a few years but I gained a following on YouTube and eventually shifted my time lapse painting videos to tutorials, art product reviews and general tips for artists working towards building their own art business. Now with over 190,000 subscribers, I’m able to reach artists around the world to share my knowledge with. The internet makes it a wonderful time to be an artist!!
Through my videos I’ve had the opportunity to work with major brands like Derwent (my artwork is on the new Derwent Ink tense tins available in any art supply store), I’m sponsored by Fredrix Canvases, Smart Art Box, and I’ve done promotions for Winsor & Newton and Liquitex.
Can you give our readers some background on your art?
I mainly work in photorealism and surrealism. While I enjoy painting portraits, my core passion has always been painting and drawing wildlife. There is an intense joy that I feel when I recreate animals on canvas or paper. I primarily work in oils, acrylics, colored pencil, Inktense, watercolor pencil, and graphite. The medium doesn’t matter to me as much as the subject.
I want my work to bring the same sense of peace and joy to the room it is hung in as I experience while painting it. It feels like the world is full of so much destruction. Creating something beautiful counters that.
In your view, what is the biggest issue artists have to deal with?
Marketing. Artists brains don’t typically excel in sales and marketing. We have the world at our fingertips with the internet. This is a great time to be an artist, but artists need to spend more time learning the basics of social media, and how to and not to market. We need to learn to manage our time well and spend as much time mastering our skill in our art as we do our understanding marketing and business.
There is no reason for an artist to live up to the term “starving artist”, yet so many do just because they didn’t invest time in the business side of things.
What’s the best way for someone to check out your work and provide support?
My original paintings, prints, art tip blogs and videos can be found on my website at https://Lachri.com
My videos and art livestreams can be found at youtube.com/Lachri
Weekly 1-2 hour long tutorials can be found at patreon.com/Lachri
You can also see my work on the new Derwent Inktense tins in any art supply store.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://Lachri.com
- Instagram: http://instagram.com/lisa_lachri
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Lachri.Fine.Art/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/Lachri
- Other: https://youtube.com/Lachri
Image Credit:
Lachri Fine Art
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