The Artists: Aprylrae Tackett
For your bemusement, Aprylrae maintains a blog. Infrequently updated, but always entertaining.
A wise man once said a picture is worth a thousand words - really, I know it is true, I saw it on the internet. Anyway, here we have the physical proof of my life, or rather - that which makes me as I am. Ha - and you all wonder why I don’t sleep!
Oh, and an actual bio follows if you dare...
This is how I wake up every morning...
...is she up yet? Dunno, poke her with a stick…
These really need no lead in...
This is actually a bookcase - War and Famine convinced Pestilence it would be com-fey...
AprylRae and the boy
I paint souls. I create images and forms which elicit emotional reactions or intrinsic contemplation in people’s daily interactions. Art and music are the only universal languages available – and speaking through them we can finally understand one another on an instinctive level. It is as simple as that – I love joy and hope and beauty and people...and irony. All of that is present in Art, from a simple ceramic cup with a rough-hewn edge and killer glaze, to a fine fabric quilt, to a simple sketch.
Born into an Irish/Cherokee family, especially one in Appalachia, creativity was steeped into my everyday existence. Before beginning kindergarten, I was helping with the quilting and elbow deep in clay. Colors and cloths and dyes became second nature all through elementary. This was also the birth of my business training. My great-grandma owned a small country store in which the whole family would help out – I learned math by making change well before school started, and earned my first dollar helping the milkman unload his truck. The other half of the family were accountants – it is frightening just what seeps into a child’s mind during dinner conversations.
The beginning of Jr. High met me with my own sewing machine and a sketchpad for creating my own clothes – the cloth often paid for by my pencil sketch portraits. About this time I discovered that sculptures can come in any malleable medium – and that people also really love a good smooth soap. Upon leaving for High School I found myself distributing sculpted chocolate pieces and wearing long sleeves to cover chemical burns from soap making.
High school launched me into the world of professional writing as well as nurturing the accidental artist. Growing up in the land of storytellers how could a body not write? Getting paid for it was a shock to be sure. My life has always been full of questions and discoveries like that – just a long string of accidentally obvious (at least to other people) questions.
It wasn’t until college that I realized the kids my age didn’t know how to spin wool or dye cloth with herbs. I was shocked to realize they thought quilts came from retail stores and had no idea that the patterns told stories. Then it happened – I had to pay for school books – the bane of many a college student, especially in a science discipline. Helpful suggestions abounded, most often with an unspoken “You want fries with that” appended. I found myself putting a personal spin on my second job as it were – I catered, painted murals, made wedding dresses and cakes, occasionally some pottery on the side when I could manage to trade some kiln time. That spring I learned yet another lesson – kids my age knew squat about taxes...so, we had a tax party at my finance’s apartment. I catered it much to everyone’s amusement, a half a dozen sets of taxes were were filed, and I found myself paid in beautiful cloth. The cloth was used to make some new clothes – whose designs were noticed and requested – those clothes in turn were paid for with brushes and canvases, which were transformed into paintings that were traded for a month’s car payment. That particular brand of snowball has followed me ever since. One flavor of art easily melting into another, supply for one creating demand in another.
While in college my first job was in a wonderful sandwich shop – it reminded me of years working in Granny’s store. Within a week I was opening by myself on the weekends (the owners’ first days off since starting the business, save days they closed), the first month found me receiving orders, and placing them myself the next. That’s the way things had always been – business was as accidental a skill as art, something quietly ingrained without my even noticing it.
So, I married and had children while in college – toting toddlers in my backpack across campus and to art shows – and finally finished, still intent on a life of science. I applied to and was accepted by MIT’s grad school program, thereby learning yet another lesson – even at my most hyper there was no way possible to do enough odd art jobs to possibly cover tuition, much less housing. I went back to school instead and finished pre-med, hoping for a change. The next year I finished and had to relearn that particular lesson. Finally, I put my computer and science skills to use and found what I was utterly convinced was my dream job. While touring the city I realized just how unhappy my three children would be living there. I finally grew up. Nothing brings out the latent artist like turning down a position you’ve wanted since you were six. A couple of weeks later, covered in paint, I looked around at the dozen plus oil paintings littering what was once our dining room and realized I was an artist. Creating had always been my outlet, and an efficient odd job, but at that moment I realized it was a part of me – a part I could share, a part that could make people feel.
In true AprylRae style the story doesn’t end there..."but wait – there’s more!”
After many unsuccessful attempts at working for people I found myself back in the dining room – table strewn with vivid colored CG prints, walls lined with charcoals and monochrome paintings. It wasn’t working. I considered teaching: I’d worked as a substitute and had been the service unit manager while leading a troop in the Girl Scouts. Heaven knows I loved kids. Conversely there was also charity work, every year found me planning a half dozen events or so – I viscerally needed to help, somehow. I wanted the feeling I got in the little sandwich shop at the corner of UK’s campus, the feeling I grew up with helping at Granny’s store. All together now – apparently I was a shopkeeper as well.
So, here I am, early 30’s co-owner of my own studio/gallery. We do a little of everything here – how can we not? I donate art to charity auctions every chance I get, create with whatever I can get my hands on, and now do classes as well. The spark of “ah ha!” in a student’s eyes, a client cuddling close a colorful quilt or budding butterfly style in a new outfit or gingerly holding a simple piece of pottery and whispering “this is beautiful...” - if that isn’t the perfect job then there never has been one in the history of humanity. Creating has always been with me, I think I’m jaded by it. I’m still surprised by each new reaction from people. I delight in each smile or thoughtful frown. Each client, each student, brings with them much more than they could ever leave my little store with. They take a simple creation that is as normal to me as breathing, and in its place they leave behind joy and laughter and understanding – and hope.
And irony.
I paint souls. I create images and forms which elicit emotional reactions or intrinsic contemplation in people’s daily interactions. Art and music are the only universal languages available – and speaking through them we can finally understand one another…
Oh, and I prefer chocolate to vanilla, love coffee, drink Diet Pepsi like a fiend, say “pop” instead of “soda” and my favorite color is a deep pulsating royal reddish tinged purple(#003300ish). I think mean people suck and Tibet should be free.
