Hey it's Antries and welcome to the savvy painter podcast. Mark Daniel Nelson is my

guest today. After a successful career in illustration, Mark decided he would be more fulfilled working on his own art.

He took his business acumen from the illustration world and applied it to the fine arts.

There are some smart decisions and just being in the right place at the

right time, Mark created his own path to artistic freedom. In this episode, Mark

describes the calculated moves he made to build his career

and how he learned that those calculations will only get you so far.

To sustain an art career, the artist ultimately must discover their own authentic voice.

That thing that keeps him fascinated and engaged with the art.

Here is Mark Daniel Nelson.

Hey Mark, thank you so much for being on the show with me today.

Hi, Antrice, thank you.

I'm honored that you'd think of me.

Thanks.

Sure.

I want to talk a little bit about when you first started out as an artist.

Can you talk about if there was a moment when you kind of felt like you were ready to be a professional artist and you were going to go for it?

Yeah, I was, actually I started out after art school in illustration and I did quite a bit of like magazine and advertising work stuff like that and so in a

sense I already thought I was an artist I don't know that a lot of people still

think that illustrators count as artists but but I sort of did. But I do remember

very clearly going to a show, there was an art show at the Denver Art Museum that was, I think

it was realism and impressionism something like that and I saw some

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