Artist Career Training - Peter Bragino: Multi-Discipline Mixed-Media Artist

Welcome to our series of interviews with artists who are making a difference in their communities. My primary goal is to inspire you with living examples of people who make a living in any economy and who consider being an artist a real job and valid choice of profession.

Peter Bragino: Multi-discipline, mixed-media artist, designer, treasure hunter, and soul searcher.

Evolution of an Art Career

Estimated Reading time: 6 minutes

You can listen to ArtMatters!

This is my second interview with Peter. You can read and listen to my first interview here.

www.bragino.com

Peter Bragino is a multi-discipline, mixed-media artist, designer, treasure hunter, and soul searcher. No matter the medium, his art has always been a manifestation of his personal spiritual journey.

He shares his vision with the world in the hope of inspiring a deeper connection between you, the viewer, and your own life journey. Peter makes art to encourage people to live deeply, love fearlessly, and to appreciate this heavenly place called Earth.

While the organic aesthetics of Mother Nature are the main influence of his work, Peter aims to create much more than superficially beautiful objects. His art is meant to challenge your preconceptions, expand your mind, honor the sacred, and evoke feelings of adventure, exploration, and deep spiritual connection.

After serving in the Marine Corps for five years, Peter began his artistic career as a commercial airbrush artist in California. He fell deeply in love with the process of creation and quickly moved on to painting on canvas and creating his own visions instead of just those of his customers. Peter moved to New York over 14 years ago to study classical drawing and begin his career as a fine artist.

He has spent well over 7,500 hours studying his craft, at least 5,000 of which were spent drawing the human figure from life. From this, Peter has created over 35 sketchbooks, thousands of drawings, and hundreds of paintings and three-dimensional work.

A.C.T.: What major art, life and marketing milestones mark the time since we last spoke?

I’ve had some major shifts in my art career. Then I was working with other people through collaboration and taking on projects as they came to me at a gallery. I decided to focus on my personal art career. Then I went to a drum circle and that changed my artistic direction.

As a result, the major artistic milestone I’ve accomplished is my first comprehensive series of work entitled “The Grain of Consciousness” – twenty images that I’ve manifested through memories of my life and current visions pertaining to my personal spiritual evolution. I’ve also created and launched my first online store - a major undertaking.

All of this new creative energy ignited from my new studio in Amityville, NY. - the first time I’ve had a fully operational and show ready production studio dedicated solely to my personal art.

© Bragino. “Majestic Glow” mixed media, traditional and digital. “Grain of Consciousness Series”

A.C.T.: How has your artistic direction developed?

At one point a few years ago I decided that there were numerous parts of my artistic know how that I wanted to improve. I felt like I had a story to tell but my skills just weren’t where I wanted them to be.

I spent almost two years studying courses at CGMA online – Computer Graphics Masters Academy. I studied Environment Sketching, Character Design, The Art of Color and Light, and Analytical Figure Drawing.

This movement into new understanding has allowed a sense of Story to emerge from my art that wasn’t available to me just a few years back.

© Bragino. “Grain of Consciousness Series” in progress and on the studio wall.

A.C.T.: What are your current top business goals?

My top business goals for the next year are to diversify my marketing efforts:

Establish a solid marketing approach to selling my artwork in my online store
Participate in multiple outdoor festivals here on Long Island
Continue the open studio shows at my space in Amityville
Be ready for this years holiday season with a strong offering of images and products to provide my clients and collectors something new and exciting to purchase as gifts

© Bragino. Bragino Studio – Upstairs lounge.

A.C.T.: What major projects have you completed in the last year?

In the last year I’ve completed two major projects.

My “Grain of Consciousness” series is completed and available in print form at my website www.bragino.com/store. Each image on the store has 5 different printed products that are available. Each print is a different size and on different media and they range from $25 for an aluminum print to $750 for a really amazing collectors edition framed giclee print.

© Bragino. Sketchbook compositional studies for “The Grain of Consciousness Series” - 2015

The other major project that I completed is a very special prayer based installation piece that now lives at The Indigenous Cultural Education Center in CT (the ICEC). The project is called “Eternal Blessings” - a custom designed and engraved prayer box that sits in the center of two paintings. The paintings are Osprey Hawk wings (the logo for the ICEC).

The installation is in the sitting room of their ceremonial space where they host indigenous ceremonies from different cultures. People in those ceremonies interact with this installation by writing their prayers, blessings, manifestations, dreams, etc. onto a small piece of paper and placing them into the box in the center of the wings.

© Bragino. “Eternal Blessings” – Prayer based Installation at The Indigenous Cultural Education Center.

The box represents the heart of the hawk. When the box fills up it’s removed from the installation and the prayers are taken out to the fire circle where they’re offered to the fire in a small ceremony allowing the blessings to turn to smoke and to ride the wind like the Osprey.

© Bragino. “Eternal Blessings” – Custom designed and engraved blessings box detail.

A.C.T.: What new projects have you started?

My current major undertaking is a graphic novel that I’ve written and which I’m currently storyboarding out to turn into a graphic novel. It’s a major undertaking but I’m chipping away at it and pushing along. The story is called “The Quest for the Queen of the Forest.”

It’s a story that came to me through multiple channels. The main characters are a little girl named Aloura and her best friend, a panther named Maybeline.

These characters manifested themselves through my shamanistic journeying practice. The story itself was born through my involvement in Ayahuasca ceremonies which I’ve been attending for over a year now. One day shortly after an Ayahuasca ceremony the story in it’s entirely just came to me. Some details I needed to work out, but the main premise of the story was there. I’ve since written out the entire story, and now I’m storyboarding.

The final output will be finished illustrations with supporting text. I’m calling it a children’s book for adults. It’s about loss, internal conflict, friendship, an epic spiritual journey, and self-realization. This book is important in many ways to me and to my life. It brings so many things that I want to share with the world and facets of my being together into one project.

A.C.T.: How do you manage multiple projects?

I manage multiple projects by not thinking about multiple projects.

When I’m focusing on my graphic novel, even if it’s for an hour, I’m laser focused on that project and don’t multi-task at all.

I also schedule time to work on projects, so each one has its time and its slot in my creative flow. In a sense I’m chipping away at each one, but while I’m working on them it’s as if they’re the only project that I have period…

A.C.T.: What changes have you experienced in the art market and how have you navigated them?

I don’t know if I’ve personally experienced any changes in the art market. I feel like I live in a sort of space artistically where I’m riding the edge of the wave. I’m always looking for new ways that artists can promote their work.

The market in my opinion has been changing radically for the past 15 years, and I feel like we’re all kind of inventing how to navigate it right now. The Internet has created a ton of change, and I feel like I’m still trying to understand what that means to me as an artist and how to best utilize that change to support a sustainable career as an artist.

A.C.T.: Based on your involvement in the A.C.T. program and community of professional artists, how can other artists benefit from getting involved in our programs and coaching services?

My involvement with Aletta and Artist Career Training has been eye opening to say the least. Artists need the structure and the professionalism that your program offers. I didn’t know what it meant to be professional, be organized or be a business person until we connected. We have to be accountable for what we do, be on time, hold appointment, have a bio, etc. When professionals ask you for things, you must have them.

I really think that other artists need to understand that making art is just a portion of what it takes to have a successful career as an artist. By successful I mean to make your living as an artist. I’m not saying that the only success that an artist can have is to make a living from their art.

I understand all too well that success comes in many forms for artists, and I feel that anyone making art is a success in my eyes. However and this is the big however - making a living from your art is an entirely different thing. It requires discipline, business sense, organization, self-awareness, focus of intention, and accountability. It’s a tall task to say the least but it’s the truth.

Aletta and Artist Career Training have helped me to understand what it means to be a professional artist. The sooner we, as artists, take responsibility for our own professionalism the closer we are to making a living from this thing that we love so much. It’s not an easy task, but it’s one that needs to be considered from many levels. A.C.T. can illuminate those levels of professionalism that artist’s generally don’t understand. I know they have for me.