Vesperisms is back with Season 3! Here I explain my hiatus, what's ahead, and the need for artistic independence moving forward. * Vesperisms: The Art of Thinking for Yourself is the podcast to help you make sense of your place in this crazy world by reclaiming an artistic worldview. Everything around us is trying to push us into boxes, but that's not how artists' minds work. Let's get off that detour and back on the main road to thinking for ourselves: as artists. * BERLINERS is coming, Fall 2022 from Knopf! Stay tuned for pre-orders coming soon. My other books, A Cloud of Outrageous Blu ..read more

As part of this series on Censorship, here is an interview I did with musician, piano professor and all-around bright light Ora Itkin. We discuss The Little Prince, the primacy of story, and the importance of underground artists, especially for Ora as someone who left the former Soviet Union at its collapse. Follow her on her channel, Open Space with Ora: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCekFKRxbOLydvhVCiMvC9vQ ..read more

OMG, you guys, is cancel culture even real? Do some people deserve it? What about "accountability" and "consequences"? What even *is* censorship, exactly? Thus begins a new series on Vesperisms examining censorship from a few different angles. * Vesperisms: The Art of Thinking for Yourself is the podcast to help you make sense of your place in this crazy world by reclaiming an artistic worldview. Everything around us is trying to push us into boxes, but that's not how artists' minds work. Let's get off that detour and back on the main road to thinking for ourselves: as artists. * My newest boo ..read more

Why do artists often feel like misfits, oddballs, wanderers? Could it be that we have forgotten that we belong in the borderlands, living a life filled with an inner flame, as poet Carl Sandburg said, that "the fireborn are at home in fire?" This is an adaptation of a talk I gave at The Breath and The Clay conference in March 2021. This is a conference for people exploring the intersection of art and faith, and is also the host of the Makers & Mystics podcast (check it out!). Though this talk was given to an audience in a faith context, I believe that artists of any spiritual persuasion wi ..read more

Now that the data are in, and we know how to proceed, it's time to make a plan for re-emerging. It's time to plan how we will gather, and to start doing it, because the mental, emotional and social health of our world depends on the small acts of hospitality we engage in now. * Vesperisms: The Art of Thinking for Yourself is the podcast to help you make sense of your place in this crazy world by reclaiming an artistic worldview. Everything around us is trying to push us into boxes, but that's not how artists' minds work. Let's get off that detour and back on the main road to thinking for ourse ..read more

Women are given a lot of confusing and unhelpful messages when it comes to pursuing a career in the arts. This episode isn't meant to cover all aspects of being a working artist mother—we'll pursue more over time—only the factors that go into whether or not to have children in the first place. Vesperisms is now on Patreon—join the deeper conversation, and help support this podcast! * Vesperisms: The Art of Thinking for Yourself is the podcast to help you make sense of your place in this crazy world by reclaiming an artistic worldview. Everything around us is trying to push us into boxes, but t ..read more

A long marriage is often called a "long conversation." Filmmaker and painter Ben Stamper and I have been married for over 20 years, and in that time, it's been an ongoing conversation on our two divergent (and sometimes harmonious) trainings, viewpoints and approaches to being working artists. We decided to let you in on a tiny fraction of that conversation as we talk about the subject of Abstraction: what does it mean, how do different genres see it, and how an a gallery-oriented artist and a commercial artist—often seen as being at existential odds—find common ground? You can see Ben's beaut ..read more

What can the Japanese art of Kintsugi—repairing broken vessels with lacquer and gold—say to us in this moment of fractured self, relationships and culture? We talk about the history of Kintsugi and its philosophy, what the art entails, and what it does to the soul when it is practiced. To have me teach Kintsugi to your school or group, please contact me via my website, vesperillustration.com/contact. * NEW! SUPPORT VESPERISMS ON PATREON! * In this episode, I talk about paring down my illustration tools. Here's what I use, if you're interested: Watercolors: 5 colors, by Winsor & Newton—Rose ..read more

What is true community? The answer to our epidemic of loneliness may lie in recapturing the meaning of that word. * Vesperisms: The Art of Thinking for Yourself is the podcast to help you make sense of your place in this crazy world by reclaiming an artistic worldview. Everything around us is trying to push us into boxes, but that's not how artists' minds work. Let's get off that detour and back on the main road to thinking for ourselves: as artists. * My newest book, A Cloud of Outrageous Blue, can be found at any bookseller—I recommend your local indie bookstore, who would love your sup ..read more

How did the Great Plague of 1348 pave the way for the modern world, and can we pave the way for a Renaissance...or not? This is the Season 1 Finale. * Vesperisms: The Art of Thinking for Yourself is the podcast to help you make sense of your place in this crazy world by reclaiming an artistic worldview. Everything around us is trying to push us into boxes, but that's not how artists' minds work. Let's get off that detour and back on the main road to thinking for ourselves: as artists. * My newest book, A Cloud of Outrageous Blue, can be found at any bookseller—I recommend your local indie book ..read more