My (Drug-Fueled, Depressive, Neurodivergent) Artist Origin Story
Picking up a paintbrush for the first time at age 41 and how that became a thriving side hustle.
A few years ago I was doing a ketamine treatment for depression, and in one of my reveries I imagined I was a paintbrush with paint coming out of me onto a piece of a paper.
That experience led to me buy a beginner watercolor set from Amazon and put brush to paper for the very first time in my life.
(Relatable? Anyone else?)
I was 42 years old, a semi-employed actor and tour guide, and had never really done any visual arts before.
But I started watching YouTube and TikTok videos about watercolor painting, and, with quite a bit of free time on my hands, I was able to practice pretty consistently.
Humble beginnings
I don’t know what drew me to painting houses and buildings to be honest. My first painting (below) was of a cabin in the woods, and I suppose I just got fixated.
I shared some of my early works with my family and, even based on these EXTREMELY amateur attempts, my sister encouraged me to start an Etsy store and start taking commissions! (She’s a wonderful cheerleader, I’m very lucky.)
I had the good sense to practice a bit more before I started charging people actual money. But when I felt ok about a few little sketches I’d done, I posted them on social media just to let people know what I was up to.
Almost immediately, I had two people ask if I would paint their house - for money!
Then over the next few days I had two more people message me about doing portraits of THEIR houses.
It was truly a “What the heck?” moment. It felt way too easy!
The hobby vs. side hustle dilemma
To be honest, I had wanted painting to be just a hobby, not another side hustle. Something that was just for me.
But as someone who was struggling to string enough money together to cover my bills each month, who was I to say no to some extra pocket money?
Within a few weeks I had launched Daniel Paints Your House on Instagram and was working pretty consistently for a few extremely kind and generous early patrons.
I’m not going to pretend this was ever a full-time income for me; that I now live a prosperous, abundant life with art commissions as my only income. Far from it.
But at this point I’ve made about $11,000 over the last four years or so through my painting. That’s a fairly significant amount of money for a side hustle, and I’m proud of that!
Attempting to live a creative life
My life today looks very different than it did when I started this endeavor.
For one thing, I was diagnosed as neurodivergent, a topic I’ll get into in another post.
For another, I (sadly) left acting behind in 2024 and am now a full-time corporate employee doing the Monday-Friday 9-5 bit in an anonymous skyscraper in midtown Manhattan.
It’s the farthest thing from a glamorous artistic life you can imagine.
So it’s become even more important for me to have creative outlets in my free time. And that’s what my painting gives me.
I’m a born creative - it’s a MUST for me. I was never able to make a full-time living doing it, but that doesn’t mean much in the grand scheme of things. It’s the “creating” part that’s important.
I hope you’ll stick around to read a few more posts about how I work, the tools I like to use, the strengths and struggles I deal with as a neurodivergent artist, and all the other topics that pop into my head as I grow this publication.
In the meantime, if you’ve got any questions about how to get a custom house portrait commission from me, I’ve put together a quick guide here.
Or fill out the form on this page and I’ll get back to you ASAP:
