Overview: Savannalore is an artist, writer, “creative hype-woman,” and “bad art” advocate in Austin, Texas. In this conversation, we talk about why she makes art that she calls “beautiful trash,” and how it’s been a process for overcoming a life of conformity and perfectionism.

We talk about blowing up on TikTok and how she handles haters. We dig into impostor syndrome and how comparison is the killer of joy. And what, during the isolation of the pandemic, Savannalore learned from some imaginary friends at an imaginary place she calls Lava Lamp Coffee.


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EP 112 SHOW NOTES, LINKS & TRANSCRIPT

Connect with Savannalore:

Website: savannalore.com
Savannalore on Instagram: @savannalore
Savannalore on TikTok: @savannalore
Lava Lamp Coffee on Instagram: @lavalampcoffee
Savannalore on Twitter: @savannalore


Connect with Adam Williams / Humanitou:

Humanitou on Instagram: @humanitou
About Adam


Art Credits

Drawn self-portrait by Savannalore
Episode cover illustration: Adam Williams


Intro/Outro Music

“Tupac Lives” by John Bartmann | freemusicarchive.org


AUTOMATED TRANSCRIPT (mostly)

INTRO

Adam: Hi! Welcome to Humanitou. I’m Adam Williams, creator and host of this podcast series that digs into everything about humanness and creativity. 

Today, I’m talking with Savannalore, an artist, writer and creative hype-woman vibing in Austin, Texas, as she puts it.

“Savannalore” is one word, and it’s the name that the artist Taylor Spence has used for her creative self since she was 12 years old. It’s also the name nearly 200,000 TikTok fans know her by, for her “beautiful trash” art tutorial videos.

Savannalore | Humanitou PodcastThere are a ton of great pearls in this conversation with Savanna. She explains why she makes art that she calls beautiful trash, and how it’s been a process for overcoming a life of that conditioned societal conformity that so many of us grow up with, and a strategy to break free from those expectations that she felt for perfectionism.

We talk about why Savanna doesn’t really mind the haters of her art and actually why they even are a good thing. We get into why she so openly shares her techniques with people all over the world, instead of being territorial about them. 

We get into some breakthrough moments that she’s had in recent years, for letting herself enjoy making quote-”bad” art and not wasting energy with comparisons to others … and so many things that hang up not only those of us who identify as creators, as artists, but simply as humans who have a hard time turning off that inner voice of fear and doubt.

Savanna and I also talk about a personal silver lining that came out of this past year of pandemic isolation and challenge, a creative project she calls Lava Lamp Coffee, with its many imaginary friends. I think it’s pretty cool. 

Of course, we get into a lot of other things, too. As always is the case. So … onward.

Here it is. My conversation with Savannalore.

[TRANSITION MUSIC]

Adam: Savanna, welcome to Humanitou.

Savannalore: 00:01:58    Hey Adam. It’s an honor to be here. Thank you for having me.  

Adam: 00:02:01    Absolutely. Look, I’m going to start us off in a weird place. Um, on your bio, on your website, you have the first line in telling us about who you are is I grew up a total weirdo and I want to tell you that in our family, you know, so my wife back and I, we have two sons and we embrace weird. We love it. We encourage our boys. Don’t know weird. Isn’t a bad word. It’s it’s who we are owning. Cool. So how did you grow up a weirdo?  

Savannalore: 00:02:29    Um, I have loved art ever since I can remember. It’s been probably the one constant in my life and obviously art. Isn’t the, it’s not, it’s not what people tell you to do. They say like go to school, get good grades, whatever. But the art was always the most important thing to me and the music. I listened to music all the time and I was always in my own little world. So everyone was getting into like sports, getting clubs. They’re hanging out together, being social. And I’m just still in my bedroom, reading my books in my own world. I mean, as a punishment, instead of like being grounded from hanging out with my friends, my dad would just take all the books out of my bedroom and that would be the end of the world for me. So I really lived in my own head and that, that was weird to a lot of people.  

00:03:24    It doesn’t sound that we are now because I feel like social media has definitely made every single individual reality, more normalized. So things that were weird, like back then, like 15 years ago, they don’t sound as weird now, but I don’t know. I just had a lot of weird interests. I didn’t like, like the same movies that everyone else liked. I’m still obsessed with things like Coraline and nine and just like creepy stuff. I loved the dark and twisty side of all artwork. So I didn’t play with the typical like bubbly girl toys ever. I always wanted the creepy, weird horror stuff. And I eventually conformed because that’s what everybody does. Right.

But I always in the back of my head, like knew who I was outside of conforming to everybody else. So as I grew up, like all kids, do they eventually adjust, brush off their identity in order to fit in with everybody else for awhile. And everybody goes through this at one point or another, because that’s what you do. But I guess it’s how long it takes you to come back around and realize that like your true self is who you’re meant to be in the first place. So why waste time do nobody else is doing, because that’s not who you’re here to be. Anyway.  

Adam: 00:04:48    Unfortunately it seems like we, I’m going to say all, um, you know, a huge generalization, but that we all end up doing that, right. That we take on these. Um, actually I had a recent conversation about that and referring to Richard Rohr, the priest and author spirituality author, who talks about those halves of our lives, the first half being the vessel that everybody else is telling you, this is who you are. This is what you’re supposed to be. And then the second half, we’re like, no, but that’s not who I am. And I’m trying to shed that and figure out who I am and then fill that vessel with what really has meaning to me.  

Savannalore: 00:05:19    It’s like breaking out of the fears too, that are instilled in you because when you’re being told who you are, your entire life, that comes with a certain fear of, okay, well, what happens if I don’t do this? What happens if I don’t listen to the adults in my life? Because at that time you’re a kid and you feel as if you should be able to trust the adults who are telling you who you are. So eventually you have to deal with the balance of, okay, clearly this isn’t right for me. I should be able to be who I am, but I also want to be able to trust the adults in my life who are telling me that I need to conform. So which, which is the right direction. It’s, there’s never a clear, there’s never a clear choice. And, um, that makes growing up really hard for everybody. I think.  

Adam: 00:06:09    Yeah. You know, you, you assume that when you’re given here’s your worldview, right? This is how you live life. It’s like you’re being handed this manual the only time in our lives, by the way, right. That we get an instruction manual to life, but it may not be the one that we actually want. It may not be one that we groove with. And so, yeah, that’s hard. Um, did you have friends as a kid then? Or did you really, really just stick to that solitude in yourself?  

Savannalore: 00:06:35    I had friends when I got older, when I got, when I was younger, um, I had the typical like neighborhood crew, but I was the type of person to really stick to one best friend. And then like, I w I grew into a social circle later in life because I joined sports. I was a huge athlete. I was big into volleyball, so that helped me socially, but not when I was younger, I really did the one best friend thing and then hung out with myself and I was fine with that. I never really felt like I missed out on much. Were you good at volleyball? I was okay. Yeah, I was okay. Um, I played in college, so I definitely think volleyball was a huge part of my identity. And that was, that was tough. Like having that ripped away from me after graduation, I graduated college in 2017 and I’ve always like battled with myself internally, like wondering who I am and volleyball was a huge crutch. Like athletics was a huge crutch and I attached so much of my identity to that. So I think I grew as an artist by finally losing that athletic crutch, even though I miss it a lot.  

Adam: 00:07:49    Yeah. You know, my, my sport, my identity was with basketball. I, I just loved it though. I mean, it was an absolute passion and you talking about volleyball in that way makes me realize that I can go into any town. I can go to almost any park and find a basketball goal. And as long as I have a ball, I can shoot, I can at least stay tethered to that thing. But as a volleyball player, that’s different. Isn’t, it  

Savannalore: 00:08:15    Was a little bit, but I was actually, I’m just having a conversation with somebody about this. A couple of days ago, I was playing volleyball at Zilker park here in Austin. And it’s really easy to go up to a volleyball court at Zilker and just hop in because people are friendly and they just are looking for players. And that is one of the places where I will always feel at home. It doesn’t matter what city I’m playing in. It doesn’t matter if it’s a sand court or a indoor court, I’ll always feel at home and most outgoing. So I like, I call myself an extroverted introvert too, because I really just want to be by myself and in my own head and reading books and writing and stuff. But I also want to be social. That’s just not my first choice. Volleyball will always bring out the most outgoing side of me. And I’m really thankful for that because without volleyball in my life still, I would be a hermit.  

Adam: 00:09:17    Well, and it’s a way I think, uh, to make those connections, even if at first it starts off quiet. If you’re a decent player who can help your team, you know, somebody sees, Hey, this, this person knows what they’re doing immediately. Then you start gaining that respect and it starts breaking down the walls and you have those friendships. So yeah, that totally makes sense to me. And it’s part of how I navigated, um, you know, the years for me after high school and college and, and so on with playing, um, I no longer keep up with playing. I go, shoot. I actually shoot with my sons, uh, who are eight and 10 now, you know? So in that way I get to pass it on. But like, I want to ask about where you grew up. Okay. You’re in Austin now, but where was it that you grew up and, you know, kind of filling out some of that picture of the environment of what that conformity and sense of structure was around you, expectations were around you  

Savannalore: 00:10:13    Sure. Uh, I think I appreciate Austin so much now because I grew up in the Midwest and I grew up about 40 minutes North of the twin cities, Minnesota. So I was in suburbia, not a lot of diversity at all, and a very traditional old fashioned outlook on how you’re supposed to live your life. The last thing I wanted to do was to get stuck in a small town forever. That sounds like the most nightmarish way that I could live my life. And I’m so happy for the people who do that and are happy with that and are comfortable and they are fulfilled. And I want nothing more for those people than for them to be fulfilled, not like trying to trash on people who stay in their home towns. That’s fantastic for some people, but it just wasn’t what I was going to do because I felt like my identity was very suppressed.  

00:11:12    So I then went to college in South Dakota because I guess that’s what one does when they want to get out of their small town. Is they go to a smaller town in the middle of a bigger field. Not really, not really sure how that happened. Actually, I got a, I was invited, um, on scholarship for volleyball. That’s how that happened. And at that time, athletics was the most important part in my part of my life. 

So I went and I loved my time there. It was great. The people were kind. I had a lot of fun and I competed and that’s what I wanted to do. But my artistic and creative side didn’t get a chance to flourish because one, the school I went to just was, they prioritized other things. So business athletic, training, nursing, these are the big things in the school I went to and creative writing, which was what I majored in and art and graphic graphic design was coming up a little bit, but it wasn’t quite there. They just weren’t prioritized. So it was another four years of feeling like even though I could Excel in these things, I would still always be the underdog.  

Adam: 00:12:25    Our stories really seem to align. Um, I’m not going to go too far and distract from, from getting to listen to you. But I also grew up in the Midwest, the same sort of thing. And basketball took me to a place for college, smaller place, all this sort of stuff. I mean, we’re, we’re really echoing each other here. I think for me in college, I wanted to study art and here I am well over 20 years later. And I still think back like it, it’s still kind of a button for me to realize that I wanted so much to study art, to do more with studying writing, but I was afraid to. So when was it that you made that sort of breakthrough for yourself to say here’s all the conformity here’s going and doing the quote, good things, studying the things I’m supposed to and so on and knowing I really want to do something with art. When, when did you crack through and start shedding that first half of life thing and moving into the art where you really wanted to be?  

Savannalore: 00:13:26    I, I’m not sure that there was an exact time that I cracked that because I never felt fully separated. I felt like it was muted. If anything, because aren’t really, isn’t something that I do. I consider it more as like another organ in my body. Um, it is something that I’ve always been, it’s always been with me. And even at the times when I was ignoring it and being a bad host, um, it was still there. So it was more about getting out of the brain fog of, uh, like the rat race, like one thing after another, after another, when I finally had time is I think when I realized artists still, who I am after all of this work that I’ve put into school that I’ve put into athletics, it’s still art. And I think of it as like I have these three personalities.  

00:14:22    So Savannalore is my art name. It’s my artistic self. And it has been since middle school. And my last name Spence is my athletic self. That’s the only thing anyone ever called me on the court or in the sports world. And then my first name is Taylor, who is just my daily self. And those three are constantly battling and they’re very different. So the beliefs of my athletic self sometimes carry over into my artistic self and that’s, that’s been helpful because I’m extremely competitive and I always need to work the hardest and be the best. And it’s helped me Excel in the art life. But it’s also hindered me a little bit because that also leads to comparisons constantly. And that isn’t good when you’re trying to be an artist, because if you’re constantly comparing yourself to other people, especially if you have a social media presence, that’s only going to limit you.  

00:15:25    It’s not going to help you like it would in the athletic world. So learning that balance has definitely been rough, but helpful and enlightening. And I’d say as far as like cracking the conformity, I think grad school did that for me. When I went to grad school, I stayed in South Dakota and grad school was a whole different ball game, not to continue with the athletic theme here, but it was rough and not to get like too far into it, but it was a pretty low point for me. And I just had felt like I was faking my identity for so long to keep getting the awards and to keep getting the accolades and to keep trying to find happiness outside of myself and outside of that creativity that I had always known, it was me. I kept pushing the creativity away in order to be this academic person that I’ve.  

00:16:31    So am not like the academia world is not for me, but it took me two years to figure that out. And I felt I left without even completing my degree. And I kept thinking that I was going to regret it. And I didn’t, I finished all of the coursework. I only had a thesis left to, right. And I got out of Dodge because I was totally different. I had scrapped everything that meant anything to me, just to be this academic person, just to be an English teacher and a student. And I had completely put my artistic self on hold. And like my artistic self had had enough. She was over it and she said, get out. And so I did. And I don’t know if there was one single breaking point. I know this is kind of a long tangent, but  …

Adam: 00:17:24    Sounds like a pretty important one right there. I mean, how long ago was that? About a year and a half ago, I think. And you’re feeling good  

Savannalore: 00:17:33    Now I am in Austin. Like I think this is where I’m supposed to be. I feel so good now. I had just spent way too long in a place where I wasn’t I was done. I think I, my welcome, because I wasn’t meant to be there any longer. And the little GPS, like in my heart was saying, okay, you’re on the wrong track. Now you need to leave. And like, I think we all have one of those internally. I think we all have a little GPS of what we’re supposed to be doing and we’ll feel that little yucky feeling if we’re not where we’re supposed to be. And it’s just about recognizing it and listening to it.  

Adam: 00:18:16    Absolutely. Yeah. I think learning to recognize that it’s there then actually to trust in it, you know, allowing the volume of that to get, to get bigger and the noise that’s coming from outside of us and telling us the quote should, this is who you should be, what you should do, where you should be, allow that to soften a bit and trust in, in that internal guidance system. And speaking of that, your GPS took you to Austin. So what was it that drew you to there from South Dakota?  

Savannalore: 00:18:51    My family already lives in the San Antonio area. So I knew I wanted to be down here because I had visited multiple times and I really loved the vibes, but I chose Austin just because a it’s beautiful. It has a lot of greenery, so it would make the move easier if I had some familiarity around me and growing up in Minnesota, all green all the time. So I loved that. And it’s such an artistic, weird community. That’s in the motto. Keep Austin weird. Okay. So anything was going to draw me to a city. It was that  

Adam: 00:19:25    I love Austin. And with all love to anybody listening in Texas, I’ve always sort of viewed Austin as an Oasis. Um, culturally, socially, politically, whatever, you know, it’s, it’s a special place.  

Savannalore: 00:19:38    I agree. I still drive past the city skyline on my way home from work every day. And I’m just like, I live here. Oh my God. I actually am here. This is great. I’m I’m living in the now finally.  

Adam: 00:19:51    That’s awesome. Um, you know, so we’ve already kind of touched on this idea of question and everything, but that’s another piece of things that you have expressed is this idea of just questioning all those rules that were given and all the things that we are told we’re supposed to do. And I’m wondering what you’re questioning maybe right now, as happy as you are in Austin, in those things, you know, it’s a process to shed those other things and to keep working every day within that place of joy and, and truth within ourselves. Right. So is there something right now that you kind of wrestle with that you question like that?  

Savannalore: 00:20:26    I think the, the normal question would probably be, where am I going next, where I’m going to be in five years. These are the questions we hear most often, but I don’t know. I question how I’m going to best brighten the world. I guess. Like, I want to, I want to be somebody who leaves the, a little bit better than I found it when I got here. And I’m not going to do that by being like another quote unquote successful person, like the world doesn’t need anymore, like billionaires or Lambeau owners, or, you know, like I, this is that kind of success is definitely not anything I will ever strive for because I truly don’t believe it matters in the long run. I would rather question how I’m going to, uh, help other people. And I don’t know, like everyone wants to help others, but I have met so many people who feel as if they have no right to create art.  

00:21:34    And when I reflect on how art has helped me get through some of the hardest times in my life, I feel so sad for people who don’t, who feel like they don’t have access to that. And art is way too powerful, a healing mechanism for somebody to just write it off as if they’re not good enough for it. So I think my question is, how am I going to help people realize that art is for everyone who cares about skill level, who cares about, you know, what you’re going through or what kind of talent you have, it’s it’s for you, if you are a human being art is for you. So that’s my, that’s always my constant question. How am I, how am I going to help people realize that  

Adam: 00:22:19    We’re definitely going to come back to the art and more of that conversation, because I think that there is a lot more there, but before we do, I want to ask you about success and that definition, that’s kind of an ongoing question for me. And how do I define success? And you mentioned comparison to, you know, will I catch myself comparing myself, not only as an artist, not only as a podcaster, not only in terms of definition of success, right? It’s, it’s in everything and comparison is the killer of joy. So let’s come back success. What is your definition? What does matter to you in that sense?  

Savannalore: 00:22:55    Success to me. So sometimes it’s hard for me to describe these things that already have like a collective definition from everybody. So my version of success is very internal. I live mostly inside my own head. Whereas most people think that their thoughts distract from life. Like, I think that life really distracts from my thoughts. Like I’m just living in here. So as long as I can be okay in here, like I’m successful. As long as I can wake up and be excited to create something, if I can wake up and sit down with my coffee and be genuinely happy with a book I’m reading or, you know, a journal that I made.

And, and if I contribute to the world in some way, and not just to be a little leech, like absorbing constantly, without putting anything back out there to balance out the universe, I feel successful. That’s how I feel successful. And I think that’s so important for me to keep in mind that success is always going to be from within, especially after spending so many years constantly looking at success as physical titles, physical awards, pieces of paper that people hand me saying, I’m good enough. Like I spent way too many years chasing that to ever want to fall back into that mindset again. So my success comes from within myself.  

Adam: 00:24:33    I’m going to ask you a question that puts you on the spot, but it comes from a selfish place sort of from a therapy type of place for me, because with what you’re saying, I can have these thoughts just like you. I can say it’s internal. I can write them in my morning journaling and all this stuff, but it is hard. It’s hard to stick with that. So the question I have for you then is do you find it hard, uh, you know, to, to actually keep that definition firing you up and not let it waiver? And if so, what advice do you have for me or somebody who’s like me saying, Oh, that all sounds good, but man, is that hard?  

Savannalore: 00:25:13    Oh, of course it sounds good. Um, it’s the most difficult thing that I’ve ever done in my life. It’s not easy and it will never stop being difficult. It’s going to be a lifelong battle, but discovering this mindset is I think the most important part, because no, we’re never going to fully feel successful. Like it’s part of human nature to want to compare. And I don’t know, fall into feelings like grief and shame and fear, and we’re never going to get away from that. But I used to think it was more difficult than it is nowadays. All I have to do is like, at least think about my, I don’t really think about it in terms of my definition of success, but I think about it more as who do I want to be every day and do I have bad days every week, I have bad days all the time.  

00:26:18    And I have no idea how to make them go away when I have them, I just have to kind of get through them. But I’ve realized that most things are just an illusion anyway. And I say that because good and bad is pretty subjective. Um, something, something good can happen to you or something bad can happen to you. And really it’s all what you perceive it as. So I’ll be having a bad day and sometimes that’s it. My day is over it’s sludge brain fog over. I’ve started again the next day. And if that’s what you have to do, that’s what you have to do.

But as I have come into this mindset, sometimes I’m actually able to take a breath and sit down and say, why do I feel this way? Why am I so hurt at whatever happened that I’m going to let it ruin my whole day? I can only control how I behave. I can only control who I am. I can’t control anyone else. And I can’t control what happens to me. And sometimes that’s enough to make it lift. And on those days, I’m thankful for that. Um, it doesn’t always work that way, but all I can do is keep trying  

Adam: 00:27:36    It’s constant work. I mean, every day, every minute. And, and yeah, I think that’s the truth is that none of us intellectually we can come up with great answers that sort of, I think our beacons that we follow in, in that practice in that internal work, but in the end it is work and it’s always there. So fair enough. Um,  

Savannalore: 00:27:56    I also forgot to mention that I do use Lava Lamp Coffee as a way to sort through those feelings and keep my awareness in that mindset as well. A Lava Lamp Coffee is probably one of my least like known things that I do I feel like, but it’s where I work through everything I feel and everything that happens in the world in a metaphorical way with like little characters and every feeling that I have, like, like I give it a personality and then I talk to it. So that’s kind of like meditation for me. And that helps also on a creative level.  

Adam: 00:28:33    Well, let’s go ahead and talk some more about a lava lamp because I think it’s such a cool idea. And I think the way I’ve read that you have, or do describe it is as imagined coffee, house companions. It’s like people that you’re encountering in the world, but like you just described, it’s really also conjuring these things that you’re you’re processing and working with. So yeah, just, I mean, is there more to tell us about th about these Lava Lamp Coffee friends that you’ve you’ve created?  

Savannalore: 00:29:01    Sure. I find that analogy and metaphor are much more useful to describe the human condition than normal everyday language is because I think English is extremely lacking when it comes to abstract thoughts. But I, I think that it helps to just close your eyes and tell yourself your inside world is just as real as your outside world, because we have the stigma of imaginary friends. This is child’s play. You don’t take it seriously, but what, but what if it could actually you, what if you could take it seriously if you wanted to, what if it could be real if you wanted it to? And so I just, when quarantine happened, I could no longer go to the coffee shops that I worked in every day. So I had to just create a new coffee shop in my living room and I named it lava lamp, but, but then it started to grow and I started to confront my fears with it.  

00:30:03    And what, one of my favorite metaphors that I came up with was a character named hydrangea Hydra for short. And the story I wrote was, uh, she is outside at a picnic table, coloring in a very long coloring book. The coloring book page like unfolds like an accordion and it was extremely long and it comes with an outline on it, like all coloring books do, but she’s slowly coloring it in and my character goes off and, you know, asked her what she’s doing. And she’s just commenting. Yeah. My life’s gotten a little flat lately. I’m adding some shading in some depth and to make the story short, we all start like our life is a coloring book page. It just has this big outline on it. So we’ve got some main things that I think that I believe we’re here to work on, but our free will is how we color it.  

00:31:03    We can color however we want to. And the dark times and the low points in your life, they’re there, the shading and the depth. So without those, your life wouldn’t be as beautiful in the end. You wouldn’t have as many great experiences in the end. And like that metaphor alone, like that was one post that made me feel so much better about all of the negative or what I perceived as negative at the time experiences that I’ve gone through. Now I can look at them as all right. They’re just the shading in my coloring book. It’s going to make it more beautiful later on. And those posts have helped me so much just think about life in a different way.  

Adam: 00:31:47    That is so fantastic. I love how you just explained all of that and that there are backstories and so much, uh, meaning and power in it too. And just this idea, right? That you, you talked about reality on the outside, in reality on the inside. And I think an a real argument can and will has been, and is made perception is reality. It’s whatever we are perceiving, which is coming from the inside, really colors, how we view the outside and whatever we think that reality is too. I mean, we could go forever just on that subject probably, but I love Lava Lamp Coffee. That’s so cool.

So what I’m curious about you, right? It was attached. It’s attached to this idea of, um, the quarantine, a pandemic and all this stuff. That’s where it, or when it leased, it originated. So my question then is, as we all speak optimistically here that somehow we’re, we’re moving forward and going to clear this pandemic thing, and somehow go forward with life. Will you be saying goodbye to these characters? Is this something you’re going to continue to do? Um, you know, what is it you’re taking out of that and how do you see it going forward?  

Savannalore: 00:32:56    I definitely think of Lava Lamp Coffee as a real place at this point. So there’s no saying goodbye for it for me. I, I, I’m so thankful that even, even though quarantine, wasn’t fun for anybody and offered many, many struggles for everyone, I am thankful that level am coffee came out of it for me, because I, I plan to make it into a larger work than just an Instagram page. And I’m working on that and I’m having a lot of fun doing that. So maybe one day level am coffee will be a real place. That that would be the goal. I, I would, I love envisioning other people physically walking into lava, lamp coffee, and me creating this vision that I have in my head for everyone. Because as much as people like reading these things that they’ve told, they told me they like it. They can’t envision it the way I envision it. And I would love nothing more than to show people what I see in real life. So hopefully one day it will actually exist.  

Adam: 00:34:05    You know, um, we’re going to step back sort of to some of the origins, I think for more, a broader view of the work that you do, the artwork will you speak to perfectionism the place, you know, that you’ve come from with that in your life and where you are now in relationship to it.  

Savannalore: 00:34:23    So I used to be the biggest perfectionist in the world, and I used to wear that label with pride. I thought that it was a good thing. I thought that somehow it made me more excellent. I’m not sure like just to use academic jargon, but we all have probably been that person that uses the word perfectionist on a job application, because we think that’s what an employee wants to hear. And we are raised with the idea of perfection over learning and understanding. We are raised with memorization and regurgitation over critical thinking. And so I read a book called bird by bird, by Anne Lamott. And this is one of my all time favorite books because, and is fantastic. And I love her, but I started studying her more. And one of my favorite things that she says is right, shitty first drafts. And she is an amazing writer. And if she’s writing shitty drafts, then that means she must be doing something right.  

00:35:42    I was like, okay, if this iconic writer who I love so much is writing shitty first drafts, then why can’t I do shitty first everything and come up with the same result? Like, and the more I thought about it, the more I became a little jaded at the society that told me growing up, that I had to shoot for excellence every minute of every day. That’s ridiculous. That’s not, that’s not what humans are here for. First of all, um, perfection isn’t even in our wheelhouse where human beings, it’s automatically not what we are here for. Uh, we’re not computers. We were not bots. Like my brain is not a, it’s not a robot, it’s an electric meatball. So the more I thought like that, the more I realize that you really just have to take out, do everything with a grain of salt, and that made art so fun and it made writing so fun instead of thinking of the end result from the first sentence, all I did was focused on having fun and my whole life got better. After that.  

Adam: 00:37:00    It’s funny, you mentioned the job interview thing and how we’ll mention perfectionist with pride. Like when they ask that generic question of, you know, well, what is it you need to work on or improve on, or what, you know, what is basically a negative about yourself? And of course, nobody ever wants to say the negative. So they say, Oh, well, I worked too hard and I’m a perfectionist. And you know, these things that are sort of, um, sideways compliments to ourself, we think in that context, it’s just, it is strange that we are shaped with this idea when really what I think it does is create so much fear and anxiety and self, um, you know, abuse, really? Why are we so afraid of messing up? What is this fear, this expectation of others, um, validation approval, here’s your gold star. Yeah, you were perfect. You know, what does that even mean?  

Savannalore: 00:37:50    Fear of failure is something that I, I think everyone has to be born with this because I have yet to run into a human who doesn’t fear failure in some way, but I, I’m kind of looking forward to the newer generation because as in my personal experience so far, they seem to have this a little bit less, especially with cell when it comes to self-expression again, in my experience, not mean it to generalize or anything, but a lot of the older people come from a lot more traditional backgrounds and they tend to fear what other people think more than the younger people do. And I think this is why we have the stigma around, um, like, like mental illnesses and tattoos, and just like a bunch of random things that are stigmatized that really w like why, what is the reason for the stigmatization here other than fear of what other people think, and those fears have come from another era that we don’t live in any, any longer.  

00:38:53    And I am looking forward to seeing how the world changes, because I think we might be on the tail end of all those self-expression fears. I hope, and I, I don’t care what society does. Like I have already told myself I’m done with all of the fears. I’m just going to be who I want to be, because the person in my head who was so much fun for so many years, that I wasn’t being on the outside, I was instead being who everyone else wanted me to be. I wasted so many years, not just being who I wanted to be. Like, I could have been having fun the whole time. So maybe we should just all take life a little less seriously.  

Adam: 00:39:39    You know, I know that one of, uh, I don’t know, I’m going to say tools or paths or something that you’ve created to sort of embody this, this effort against perfectionism in yourself and to encourage it in others, you, you call it beautiful trash. I want to talk about that because I’m going to, I’m going to admit that the first time I ran across your work on Instagram and saw the beautiful trash say hashtag, or maybe you’d actually set it in, in the text. And I, at first I was not sure how to take it, but of course you explain it well in your site, you explain it well. And so much of the work that you do. And I, want us to clarify, what do you mean by it now? And then we’ll, we’ll talk more about it.  

Savannalore: 00:40:23    Yeah. So this beautiful trash really took off in a way that I wasn’t expecting at all. And I think that probably speaks to how badly we need a change in mindset when it comes to personal work. A lot of people, especially on TikTok have said, it’s not, it’s not a style. It’s just bad art. And you can’t just make up your own label for being bad at art. And those are funny to respond to because I’m like, thanks. Yeah, I need to be cashier. Right? Thanks man. Like no one control me because I already called my art trash. So, but it’s not about the art, that’s the thing. It is completely about rewiring how we think it’s not about me teaching people to be artists. It’s, it’s a method of freeing ourselves really. And I think that once people try it out and realize what the intention behind beautiful trash is, all of a sudden they feel this wave of relief.  

00:41:28    Like, Oh my God, I get to just try something. And no one is expecting me to good at it. Actually the intent is to be bad. So I have this freedom to create something with no expectations at all. And that’s something that we don’t really get anywhere. We always have expectations either from other people or expectations that we place on ourselves to be a certain way. And that’s so exhausting and the tension just builds and builds and builds. And we don’t really realize this is happening until someone tells us we don’t have to be good at something, just do it. And once I, once the messages started rolling in, I realized how badly people needed to hear that they don’t have to be good at something. And my first video, I had no idea people needed to hear that so badly, but now I’m really thankful that I posted that first video because I almost didn’t because of fear.  

Adam:  00:42:31    It’s just sort of laughable to me this idea of random people out in the world, getting on social media and judging and saying what you’re doing is bad. And first of all, I, I love your drawings. I love your art, where the, this idea to call that bad. And that actually is part of why I think for a second on that first time I encountered your work and I saw beautiful trash. I’m like, wait a second. I love this. So it just took me a second to process the, the purpose behind it. And you just explain that so, well, I’m going to add to that a quote from one of your Instagram posts, because I just think it was so great. And so on point and so hope you don’t mind, uh, I’ll do this real quick. You said, uh, last year on one of your Instagram posts, you said, “I’m just a fragment of beautiful trash floating around in the world and figuring out who the hell I am.”  

00:43:22    And it just gets to the heart of really, there’s a such a human aspect of this. It’s not, it’s not just about art. It’s not about becoming all of us becoming professional artists. And it’s just, it’s, it’s, it’s awesome. You know, and, and the comments, which, okay, I’m going to ask then about trolls a little bit more on TikTok, where you do these videos that really encourage people. And this is where you’re talking about getting so much feedback of what people, you know, the way it helps them, the way it helps them probably crack through some of this idea of their own fears. You’re also, of course, because you’re successful in that way, drawing haters. So I’m just curious about that experience. I assume I trust you have a good ratio of love to hate coming on there.  

Savannalore: 00:44:10    Yeah. There’s definitely more positive than negative, but as few as the haters are, I actually enjoy when they comment, because I’m like, Oh yes, a chance to change somebody’s mind, or a chance to respond with kindness and like, try to tell them what this is about. And obviously a troll is a troll. They’re not on TikTok to get their mind changed. But one time I had somebody say, I don’t remember what it was, but it was a negative comment. And I said, Hey, um, this is, you know, about releasing perfectionism and you should really try it. I think you would really enjoy this. Uh, please let me know if you like it or not. And I’m sure they weren’t responding such. I mean, I’m sure they weren’t expecting such a response. And so then they said, Oh, sorry, I’m an asshole. You’re right. I just tried it.  

00:45:11    It’s fun. And I have so much fulfillment from, from a tick tock comment. I mean, that was such a victory for me. I was like, yes, I just took somebody who had a negative mindset about art in some way. And I got them to admit that they were wrong and that they liked it. Like nothing’s better than that. So that’s all I can try to do. Uh, negativity. Ultimately, it doesn’t really have anything to do with me because people scroll so fast on TikTok and leave mindless comments, and that has everything to do with them and not the creators. So I don’t take anything personally, but I do get really happy when someone changes their mind.  

Adam: 00:45:56    Yeah. I’m sure I’ve come to this idea. Well, I’m sure I’m not the only one, but that success has to include haters. Right. When you, I don’t remember how many followers you have on TikTok, but we’re talking, I mean a few hundred thousand or something, is that right?  

Savannalore: 00:46:12    Uh, yeah. It’s like 178, I think right now.  

Adam: 00:46:16    Okay. So with that, there’s going to be those people who just kind of thoughtlessly fling these, you know, little fragments of their own pain and fear out there. And so I, I think it’s just, unfortunately, got to be part of with that success. But what you’re really doing then is I look at this as, you know, sort of an open source. Hey, here is the code that I’m writing. The, the plan that I have, the ideas that I have for how you can, can better, your life can feel better about yourself, can do this through creative therapy, really. And so many people hoard their ideas and their art and what no one to do anything like them. Right. And get very territorial. But instead you’re saying, Hey, I’m an open book. Here you go. Do it.  

Savannalore: 00:47:04    Yeah. Well, my, my art ultimately is what I gift the world and beautiful trash. Isn’t about me gifting the world, masterful art. It’s about me gifting the world happiness through doing. And so that’s my art and beautiful trash is great, but I don’t consider that like my, like what I’m focused on as an artist, does that make sense? I am focused on painting and at the moment, and I’m focused on writing, but beautiful trash is something different. So I don’t mind when people draw in that style because that’s what it’s there for. 

And when it comes to drawing haters, I think that if you are making something that everybody in the world likes, you probably haven’t been spending enough time making it. If everyone in the world likes your art, then it’s probably not really yours. I don’t think that. I mean, I think that if someone hates my art, that I must be doing something right, because it shouldn’t be like art shouldn’t be for everyone. It shouldn’t be that generic. I don’t think so. I don’t mind having people who don’t like it because every single art style is a language anyway, and there is no universal or language. And so everyone speaks a different language. I’m out there to find the people who speak mine  

Adam: 00:48:37    Yesterday. I saw a quote on Instagram from Rick Rubin, the famous decades, long famous music producer. And, and he was talking about art as ideas. And if, if the art is without idea, then really it’s just decoration. Now I don’t want to judge people who make art that is considered decoration, pretty flowers or balloons or whatever it is. Great. Go do that. But I am fascinated by the idea of art being ideas in the way we communicate and express the, these things, you know, how we feel or what we’re trying to work through and how we process the world and how we connect with each other.  

Savannalore: 00:49:17    Sure. I, I think that if what we’re at, like almost 8 billion people in the world, right? So if we all have our own reality inside of our heads, that means there’s 8 billion, little worlds out there that are fodder for artwork. And this is why I probably will never get into hyper realism. I am in awe of people who can take an image from the world and copy it perfectly onto a piece of paper. That’s very talented of them. Love that for them. I’m just not interested in that because I wouldn’t be showing my viewers anything new. And when there are so many worlds in everybody’s mind that we can explore, I think that’s what I want to focus on is what we can’t see, not what we can see. So again, our languages hyper realism. Isn’t mine. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t have a giant purpose in the world elsewhere. I’m just not going to participate.  

Adam: 00:50:22    Well, the techniques of that are just mind blowing. You know, what people can do and apply, say canvas and things that, that you walk up saying, is this a photograph? And that is amazing and fantastic, but I’m a kind of in the same, same boat there that, especially for me coming from a background as a photographer itself, that I’m not looking to just do that part, but instead I have something different to express. And for me, a lot of times that comes out in the abstract. So I want to ask you about creative process in the sense of, if we go back to something you said earlier, and about the way people, I think, look at art and that they can’t do it, or they don’t see themselves as artists. And I think part of what that is is that people place artists in some sort of elevated place that says, well, you must just have that special talent, that special gift, whatever it is, I don’t have it.  

00:51:14    And I think part of that is the perfectionism and expecting that the first time I draw and I can’t do it well, I guess I just don’t have the talent. I don’t have the gift. I’m not special like that. Right. And you know, so much of what we’re talking about to me touches on this, this idea of perfectionism and all these things. But actually I put up a blog post on my site yesterday, talking about beautiful oopses. You know, it’s the beautiful, oops, the thing you want to throw away and then realize, wait, that is not only maybe a critical step to where I’m going and what I’m learning, what I’m developing for technique in a, in a visual. It might also just actually be the most compelling piece of art.  

Savannalore: 00:51:54    Well, the first thing that we make, when we sit down to create a piece of art, even if it’s a rough draft of, if it’s a sketch, if it’s the first two lines in a new poem that are awful, it’s still the most direct line we have to what was just in our head a second ago, even if it doesn’t represent what was in her head a second ago, it’s like the direct path. It’s the closest thing we have to a map to our imagination. So I love when artists post their sketches, online, things that look like scribbles to me and to everyone else, but are probably the closest thing.

The closest thing we have to a window to see into their process. I love that stuff like before it has gone through all the curation and all of the like poking and prodding and sculpting to like get it perfect to display somewhere, um, that that’s all editing to me afterwards, which is great. Like, I, I love my fully rendered and color drawings and that’s a blast to create, but the sketches are the most real, in my opinion.  

Adam: 00:53:05    I love those too. When you look back at studies that that people have done or whatever those initial ideas are that they scratch out and then they go make some big, beautiful painting from it. But I look at the studies as art in themselves. I love seeing that or on social media, when people show behind the scenes, the process of how they got to they’re going, because I have had a tendency myself to look at, those are the mistakes that I want to hide. I should be embarrassed that, Oh, I didn’t do it perfect right in the first go like, that’s just ridiculous. I love seeing other people make the journey.  

Savannalore: 00:53:39    That’s part of the art, the history and the way the art was put into the world. It’s a journey that is a huge part of it. Something that we shouldn’t hide ever, artists processes. I could listen to podcasts and watch videos on artists, talking about their processes all day long. I, I love it. It’s gold. It’s such valuable information. And this is one reason why I’m so excited for the age of the internet is because these things weren’t really available to us. 

Like 20 years ago, artists didn’t get on a video and talk about their process. They just put their work on display, like the final result. And you never saw what went on behind the scenes. So this next generation of artists they’re going to be wild because they are growing up knowing all the processes and they’re going to take so much inspiration and it’s, it’s going to explode into a Renaissance. I just know it.  

Adam: 00:54:39    I want to, I want to step back for a second to this idea of, I can’t draw in the videos that you do that helps encourage people because in all the feedback that you get, I’m kind of curious if some has stood out to you as how it’s touched them or how it’s helped them break through this whole, I can’t draw kind of mentality.  

Savannalore: 00:54:58    I have gotten a lot of messages and comments saying that I helped them get back into art, or they never considered themselves an artist, but they picked up a pen and now they can’t stop drawing. It’s unreal. The first time somebody do edit my video on TikTok. I teared up actually, because I couldn’t even believe the fact that there was now a piece of art in the world, somewhere that came about, because I decided to put a video online. I couldn’t even believe that I sparked that. I was so grateful that that happened. And I wish I could remember that first duet, but I it’s unreal. I have, um, teachers who messaged me with photos of their students, little kids in classes, and they put my video up and that’s their lesson for the day is they drop beautiful trash in art class.  

00:55:51    And I can’t wrap my head around the fact that a bunch of little kids are learning so young that it’s okay to be bad at something. And when we say be bad, it’s like the goal like to be, we’re changing the definition of what bad is, right? Because it’s not, it’s no longer negative. It’s, it’s fun. Like being bad at this is fun. And if we make the rough draft process and the sketch process, and those first uncomfortable stages of art, if we make those stages fun, then we’re going to have so many more artists in the world. And I can’t even fathom that I have had anything to do with that, but I’m just really grateful to have inspired even like five people. I don’t care. I’m just happy about it.  

Adam: 00:56:47    That sounds so amazing. And especially the classroom thing, because that’s, that is where that transition happens, right. It’s like as a kid. Okay. Yeah. You can imagine you can have imaginary friends, you can do these things, but as you continue to age up, you’re supposed to let go of those childlike things and you’re supposed to start learning how to conform and do it all the right way. So to be part of that, I’m jealous. That’s amazing. That’s wonderful. And, um, I, I can only hope to have such an impact in the world. Right? I think any of us, we’re talking about rippling, good rippling, light, rippling possibilities. That’s how we effect good progress in the world. I think.  

Savannalore: 00:57:28    Yeah. It’s unreal. It’s one year ago. I would never have if, if, if I would’ve told myself one year ago that the beautiful trash would have spread like it did, I would have called myself crazy. I know people say that all the time, but I really didn’t see this coming. So I’m just thankful that that people resonated with it and that other people have now realized their creativity because of it. That’s always, the goal is just to get more art into the world.  

Adam: 00:58:00    I’ve so far have been remiss in pointing out to people that on TikTok and on Instagram and all these places that people can find the work that you’re doing, but also the videos that you’re doing, that it is under the name, Savannalore, one word. So why don’t we tell everybody where did that name come from? You know, what is, what is its meaning to you?  

Savannalore: 00:58:19    Savannalore came about, because I used to read a ton of fantasy as a kid, and I saw the words, wand lore, and dragon lore all the time. I was like, wow, that kind of sounds cool. Lore is a suffix. That means like the history or knowledge of a thing. And I tried tacking it on my first name. Taylor Lord doesn’t sound good. So scrap that immediately. And so I tacked it on my, my middle name, Savannalore, and it just like roll off my tongue and I loved the sound of it. And it sounded like an artist. So I kept it.

I was probably 12 and I just kept, I signed everything, Savannalore, like in my journals and my sketchbooks. I didn’t start signing my art’s Savannalore outside of my personal journals until I was in college. But I been going under the names of Anna lore to myself personally, for years. Like it feels like a part of myself. It feels like a real name for me. It definitely doesn’t just feel like an alias. So people think that it’s like a first and last name. So oftentimes they’ll say Savanna and then space capital lore. But no, just one word.  

Adam: 00:59:40    I want to ask you about the mindset for this teaching. We’ve, we’ve talked so much about the videos that you’re doing in this way, that you’re encouraging people in the feedback you’re getting back. And it occurs to me that there is an abundance versus scarcity mindset. And we did touch on that a little bit ago when I said, Oh, Hey, open source. You’re sharing instead of hoarding. But I’m wondering if there are roots in that abundance mindset in that whole generous sharing way of life. Did that come from something much sooner before they are? Were you raised that way? Or do you remember there even being a time when this occurred, you, Hey, it’s better to give then than to hoard.  

Savannalore: 01:00:21    I don’t know if it ever really occurred to me to keep the beautiful trash style to myself, just because it was a lesson. Like it started as a lesson. I didn’t really make beautiful trash before the TikTok thing. Like, so it, it was born to be shared, but as far as hoardy in art, I think that gatekeeping is kind of old-fashioned. Um, there’s definitely a difference. This is, it’s a very blurry line, especially when it comes to tech talk, but there’s a difference between plagiarizing artwork and using it as inspiration. I’ve had to tip toe around that line a little bit because young people don’t really know the difference yet. They can. A lot of the times I’ll see like a direct copy of one of my tutorials and then see somebody put it up in their Etsy shop and say inspired by Savannalore.  

01:01:25    But it’s like my character that they’re selling. So that’s a little weird, but, um, but a lot of them are so young that they just haven’t learned yet. And so in order to combat that, because I do want to share, but I also want to teach people the difference between stealing from an artist and taking inspiration from them because inspiration is fantastic. Inspiration is like, it’s a collection. I look at it as, so when you’re taking inspiration from an artist, you’re not just copying their work and recreating it. You are taking bits and pieces and fragments from multiple artists and multiple artworks sometimes over the span of many years. And finally it culminates in one piece of art that you create that is inspiration. You are like making a cocktail of all of the art and experiences that you have ever resonated with and you were putting them in one place.  

01:02:32    And that is the most real artwork that I can think of. That’s like the true, true inspiration. A lot of the kids on TikTok just haven’t had as many years to do that as older artists. So their definition of inspiration is different. And I try to keep that in mind because they don’t have like hundreds of sources of inspiration. Like I do that I’ve collected over the years. They only have like five favorite TikTok artists. So I am very, I don’t take it personally.

Like if somebody takes beautiful trash and calls it their own right now, just because that’s kind of what it’s there for now, when it comes to pencil kids and like my paintings and other things that I do, I would probably be a little bit more on the, I don’t want to say like hoarding, but I would prefer that people didn’t copy that because that’s a different, I’m sharing, beautiful trash to be copied. I’m not sharing other things to be copied. So in the end, we’re all making art. That’s the most important thing. And like, if someone copies me, I mean, it doesn’t bother me that much, to be honest, because I’m just happy that they’re putting art in the world. So I’m not going to make a big deal about something that just makes me happy anyway.  

Adam: 01:03:59    Okay. The social media thing that I think has also, when you talk about a younger generation, I think that a social media era, so the last 15 years or whatever it’s been since these major, um, channels of being created, the idea of plagiarism, of reposting, of sharing things out there without crediting who it is, I think an awful lot has been lost there in terms of spreading that knowledge and taking in that knowledge of what, where did this come from? Who was the source? Who is it that I’m feeling inspired by? And instead there sort of has become this attitude that we can just share whatever, however we want without regard for the creator of it. And, and so I think that probably factors into some of what you’re saying too, that the ones that are really young, they don’t even think necessarily. I’m guessing that they don’t think about just copying you and saying, Oh yeah, it’s mine.  

Savannalore: 01:04:51    Yeah. I find that is more of a problem on TikTok than on Instagram. I still see like good crediting going on in Instagram. Not always, but most of the time they throw my name on an inspiration and that’s fine. That’s I love the tags one so I can see everyone’s artwork. Cause I love to see everyone’s art, but two, it does channel people back to where it, which was my tutorials. And I’m really thankful for that. Take talks a different story because the mindset is that TikTok is a trend to app. So everything on there is a game to be copied. And that has really damaged a lot of artists because you want to use the app. It’s a great way to spread your artwork. The organic growth is fantastic, but that copy mindset just doesn’t translate to the art community like it does to the like lip-syncing community in the song, writing community, like the art community is different.  

01:05:54    So it’s really hard to take the TikTok rules and apply them to the art community. But that’s what the young kids try to do. And they don’t understand why it’s different. So again, I try not to take it personally or get upset because it’s not their fault on one hand, but there’s a lot of artists who do try to explain kindly and say, Hey, like if you were to create like a drawing of Mickey mouse that doesn’t make Mickey mouse yours, you’re just drawing him. So yeah, there’s, there’s that line. And all I can do is try to explain to people with kindness because aggression never works. And I, it’s not in my nature to be like, mean about anything. So some people call me a pushover, but I’d rather be a pushover. And nice, honestly,  

Adam: 01:06:46    It takes a lot of energy to hold up those lines and always try to draw the boundaries and tell people no and all this stuff. And like you said, you’re happy about all of this creating more art in the world. So why, why fight against your inclination to just be happy and, and move forward? I, you know, when you were talking about, I’m going to say steal like an artist, because that’s the title of a book by another Austinite, Austin Kleon. I don’t know. Do you know him?  

Savannalore: 01:07:16    Uh, not personally. I wish. I do know of him. Yes.  

Adam: 01:07:20    Gotcha. Okay. So he also lives there in Austin by chance, and he has a few books and one of them is called steal like an artist. And of course you’ve described it as is the, the intent of all that, right. We get inspired. We are these mashups or cocktails, like you said of, sometimes we don’t even know what the sources were. It’s stuff that we’ve taken in that, you know, from, who knows where, um, many years ago. But to add to that, I feel certain here. So I want you to kind of speak to this, that what your style has become with your beautiful trash is something that has evolved over time for what you create. I mean, it, it is uniquely yours in the sense of, yes, we get influenced, but over time you’re consistently creating work. And that always leads to adjustments and tweaks and new ideas. And, you know, so that it really does become something that is just yours. Does that sound right and fair in, in how you’ve come to where you are with it?  

Savannalore: 01:08:16    Absolutely. I’m constantly creating an, I always have been quantity, I think is really key to evolving an art style because what I used to do was I would wait, I would wait until I had the perfect spurt of inspiration. And I think this is what a lot of people do, but then you only create a piece of art every couple months, or at least is what I was doing. And I thought that I was, I thought I was creating consistently. I thought that was what consistent looked like.

But then I realized that I really needed to be creating every day. And the more I created, the more the flood Gates opened. So it doesn’t matter what you’re making, the more of it that you do, the more ideas you’ll have, it’s a domino effect. And you can’t do that without doing it consistently. I don’t want to say like every single day, because that sounds overwhelming to some people, especially if they’re not in the practice of it, but I mean, and I create every day now, but it took me years to get to that, that point to where I even want it to create every day.  

01:09:23    Now I look forward to it. It’s an essential part of my lifestyle. And it’s something that I it’s almost like meditation for me, it’s a practice. I’m not forcing myself, but for people who are just starting, I mean, even setting aside one day a week to like slowly get into it, the more you create, the more you will want to create. It just, it will grow itself. But yes, it’s definitely a collection. If you’re young, what you make probably won’t be you like through and through, because I really think your art style comes with experiences that you collect little bits and pieces of imagery that you like, that you, you’re not even conscious that you’re hanging on to it until it comes out on the page 10 years later. Like, um, I like to, I like to tell people the origins of my pencil kids, because it really gives a great example of this collection style of inspiration.  

01:10:20    So my pencil kids come from several, several things. When I was a little kid, I saw a Pokemon movie and there was a Pokemon called syllabi. And that I didn’t think about that Pokemon for 15 years until like I started drawing a little limbs and my pencil kids. I was like, yeah, that looks like syllabi. Also Eva from Wall-E same kind of limbs. Love her. Do my pencil kits look like Viva. No, but you can see in her arms, like where the inspiration comes from. Uh, the movie nine is a really creepy movie that has a lot of like burlap rag dolls.

And it’s, it’s actually a really heavy plot, but one of my favorite movies ever inspiration heavily came from there. My pencil kids don’t totally look like those dolls. No, but you can kind of see like where that would have grown from, um, legend of Zelda, wind Waker. There are little spirals that are on like this wand thing that he uses and also on his belt, that little spiral knees and elbows on my pencil kids. That’s where that inspiration came from. Like inspiration is more like a building block. It’s not really you, you’re not going to find it in one place, I guess is what I’m trying to say.  

Adam: 01:11:37    Yeah, absolutely. It is almost sometimes funny to see what comes out and then have that moment of recognize like, wait, I’ve seen, Oh yeah. I did not know that I’d lodge that in my memory bank from 20 years ago or whatever it is. Well, okay. I want to wrap us up here with this. Um, knowing that everything like you’ve just been describing, it’s about practice and learning and we’re always evolving and all this stuff is just growing. And I’m wondering what you feel like maybe you have figured out so far about maybe that’s life about art, about people because you have interaction with so many of followers in the work that you’re doing, but you know, just in a world of chaos, it feels like at times, uh, what do you feel like you really know right now?  

Savannalore: 01:12:30    All I know is that I w I want to be good and I don’t want any event or circumstance to ever convince me that I’m bad. And that’s something I have to battle a lot because imposter syndrome convinces us all. We’re bad at one point or another. And imposter syndrome is like a very real feeling. So I know that my whole goal in life is I’m going to be good and I’m not going to a fear, either other people’s opinions of me or my own false opinion of myself via imposter syndrome. And I am going to encourage others to not compare themselves to other people. And I’m going to try to not compare myself to other people, uh, where it’s like, we’re all plants.

Like we all grow at different paces and we’re all still beautiful plants at the end. So like I was reading a book the other day by Jacob Nordby and he said like an oak tree and a bamboo stick grew up very different rates of speed. If the little Oak tree watched the bamboo sticks shoot up and compared itself to that bamboo stick, it’s going to live its whole life thinking. It’s a failure when really it’s going to be this majestic Oak tree and 150 years. It just doesn’t know it yet. So I that’s for a while. I think that’s going to be my outlook on life for the net for the near future, because I love that so much. And that, that’s what I know right now. I think  

Adam: 01:14:12    That’s a great one. And that’s one of the reasons that I love having these conversations, getting connected with people, getting to get more perspective that honestly, I guess, from a selfish place kind of helps me. So that’s going to be one of the many takeaways from this conversation is, um, how to look at, at that sense of comparison that I probably have too much. Um, you know, if I’m really honest with myself, so Savanna, thank you so much. Uh, this has been great and I’m so glad to be able to share more of your story with people I will in the show notes, be pushing people to your website, to your tick-tock Instagram, all of those places where they can find more of your art, more of your story. So,  

Savannalore: 01:14:52    Yeah. Thank you. Thanks for being here. Thank you so much, Adam, for inviting me. And this is a lot of fun. I enjoyed chatting with you have a really good day. Okay. 

[TRANSITION MUSIC]

OUTRO

Adam: 01:15:12    That was my conversation with artist Savannalore.

You can learn more about Savannalore in the show notes published with relevant links and an episode transcript on the website, at humanitou.com. 

You also can connect with her and see her work at savannalore.com and on the usual social media channels. It’s @savannalore on Instagram, Twitter and TikTok, where you also can join in with her video drawing tutorials.

If you connected with something you’ve heard in this conversation today, it would be helpful if you take a moment to rate and review the Humanitou Podcast on your podcast player, if it’s one that has that functionality. I also appreciate when listeners spread the word on their social media pages, and by word of mouth with their family, friends and everyone else.

Because it’s together that we can shape a more creative, thoughtful and positive world.

I’m Adam Williams, creator and host of the Humanitou Podcast. 

Thanks for being here.

Humanitou