 So let's see Leah Alex Jules Cocoa cool so quiet so we're going to wait a couple more minutes just to for a couple more people to show up so feel free to talk about yourselves. You don't need to be going I think they did we have to get on that so we're actually on their website. Long but it's like very finicky. But it's the. Good stuff. And rich. can just. But thank you. Everything United is great. I mean, it's not up there. Come on, let me grab it. Yeah. I don't have to get there. Yeah, so is it the navigation? That's great. That's the very end. I'm sorry. This one. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Just so sorry to update. I was on the show. Sorry to update you on the questions I'm going to ask. I'm going to ask. What's it actually like to do what you do? It was slightly different than I said before. Like the realities of the job. And then. What pass was that you took? So life events were. So slightly different. Sorry. That's what you put in the email, right? Yeah. That's what it was in the email. That's what I just said. Right. So. So remember, you're scrolling that way. What is it? Well, to get over it. Can you tell you something? What is it? Okay. And then is it already started? You don't have to do that. They're doing it on that end. You guys are going to share mics. They're on now. You actually have to share it with me too. But I won't be talking that much. So I will start us off. Okay. Okay. I think we'll just go ahead and get started. And then if others show up. Then we're good. All right. So I'm going to start. Is the mic picking up? I'm going to. So over here then. So I'm going to start with a land acknowledgement. And then I'll come in and introduce everybody. And we'll go through some questions with them. All right. So as an organization. Within MSU Denver. CBA acknowledges the indigenous people. And the land of a raria. And the broader Denver area. We honor and acknowledge that we are in the traditional territories. An ancestral homelands of the Cheyenne. And the Erapahoe nations. This area was also the site of trade hunting. Gathering and healing. For many other native nations. We recognize the indigenous peoples. As the original stewards of the land. And recognize indigenous people still. Connected to this land on which we gather. We also acknowledge the labor of enslaved Africans. And their descendants who worked with stolen land. For the colonists. And who's who continue to disproportionately face economic oppression. Racism. Violence and exploitation. Lastly we want to recognize the communities. And families of raria. Displaced by the creation of this campus. For MSU Denver. To have a place that we now call home. We share this acknowledgement to encourage. All of us here to consider. How our work in this space. And in our daily lives can address these historic. And contemporary atrocities. Right. So welcome to. The art and work panel discussion. About murals. So this was supposed to take place two months ago. And we got snow. Thankfully we've been able to. Reschedule it and do it today. So I have four. Delightful people with me here today. And they're each going to introduce. Themselves as we show some images on the screen. So I'm going to let them do that. After that I have just two questions for them. One is. What is it actually like to do the job that they do. And the other is how did they get there. What were the life experiences. Education. Opportunities that they found. To. To get them where they are today. And then I think hopefully we'll have time for some questions. It goes pretty fast. So make sure that. You're really actively listening. So you have questions to ask at the end. All right. So I'll start with. Leigha Brenner clack. All right. Hi. I'm Leigha Brenner clack. And I am the founder. And the executive director for street wise arts. And street wise arts is a nonprofit. Based in Boulder. And we focus our programs around mural art. And public art. One of our main programs is a mural festival. We've done that for four years. And then we also do a lot of community projects. Where we partner with. Other nonprofits. Other businesses to do mural projects with them. And then we also have an education program. Where we do. Arts education that is. Inspired by street art. And the culture around street art with. K through 12 students all around. Denver and Boulder areas. Fantastic. All right. Next up. And let me say let me quickly. Shift gears here and pull up our slide show. Technology is. Always. Okay. So how do I. Over here. Quick. Someone tell a joke. How. How do I get my arrow back. Thank you. Melody. Oh, there we are. All right. All right. Fantastic. Okay. All right. My name is Alexandria. I just went full time art in November. But I've been doing it for about four years. In conjunction with another full time job. And then I'm also one of the founders. And executive director of Bay Walls. Which is an all women. And non-binary mural festival that we've been doing. We're going on our fourth year. This year. So. Yeah. And I hope that you'll talk about both of those things. I will. Great. Also the next up Jules Mendoza. Hello. My name is Julio Mendoza. I go by Jules. I'm a muralist from Denver, Colorado. I was born in the past of Texas. And I lived in Mexico. And I've been a. Full time artist for two years. Barely. But I've been doing murals for. Four years. All right. Sorry. Sorry. I know. I was going to. Thank you. All right. Thank you. All right. Hey, I'm Coco Bear. Nice to meet you all. I'm a muralist and. Filmmaking and some other things based here in Denver. Download street art over the years. And. I've been doing murals now since. It's almost almost 10 years. Coming up and I've been doing street art around town. Much longer than that. And. Is there. Oh yeah. I'm also one of the. Leadership group that puts on Bay Walls. Mural festival. And other things that we do throughout the year. And. That's about it. Awesome. Great. Thank you. All right. So I think what we'll do. And I'd love for you to all talk. Sort of together, right? So each of you can kind of answer the question. And then we can discuss, right? And you can sort of chime in as we go. But yeah, the next question is, you know, what is. What does it really like doing your job? It's not all labor, is it? No. It'd be super frustrating, but also can be really fun. And. It's like a carnival. It's like you walk in and there are all these different booths. And depending on the time of day or like. Year time of year. Everything is totally different. So I know like as muralists. Like time of year is. Very important in what we do. And so yeah, we're trying to like balance the whole like. Studio side with also the mural side, which can be. Challenging sometimes. And when you say studio side, what do you mean? Like so. Not only do I do murals, but also studio works. I'm doing paintings. My main medium is acrylic on wood panel. So. Trying to do that and really utilize my time in the winter. When I'm not having as many murals. So that shows throughout the year. I have pieces that I can put in them. I have two solo shows this year. So I'm constantly trying to produce work. So. Yeah. And what about the business part of it? Where does that off? I think that's really the hardest part. You know, and when you go to art school, you don't. There's really not a lot of emphasis on. That you're all of a sudden going to be in this art. Business. And I think that is the most difficult part. Because you just want to make art. And it's like that part. You know how to do. And. There's an element of enjoying it and also an element of work to it. It's like. It's you want to be enjoyable all the time, but sometimes that's work. But. Part of getting new jobs and. Just. Communicating with galleries and organizations. And. Curators is. Is a whole other. Skill set. It tends to be a lot of us who are drawn to being artists. Like. We're fine being by ourselves and working by ourselves. But this like. Our communication thing is a little bit more of a. Challenge. At least. For me, it definitely is. And just. All the email and all these other things and just, you know, you have to be. If you're doing something as a business, you have to be. Professional. And. That means answering things in a timely way and being able to. Have the information that people need. And then when you're doing. Scheduling things, I think is one of the more difficult things that we all do. Especially when you're dealing with murals that are. Out in the world, it's like. If it's snowing, you're not going to put up your piece and. Or do your work and so. You're also have to be aware of like the environment. And coordinating to have access. And then a lot of times. On larger murals, we need specialty tools. Lifts are the most. Commonly rented thing that. You know, so that's a whole other thing where you have to have. Lift there and it has to be the right kind. And you have to have insurance. And. You need to know how to run the thing. You know, so it's all this stuff that. There was definitely no class about an art school. In any way and. And when you're starting out and for a long time. All you've really got is you, you know, I think that's the hardest thing. About. Being an artist is you don't have this organization that you're part of. That kind of. Takes care of parts of what you're doing. It's like you're. Your account. You're your PR person. You have all these different roles and. I think that's the part that I would classify as being really hard. Is being like that responsible business. Mark is if I. Wanted to do like if that was my nature to be doing that. Maybe I would have been doing something completely different. You know, it's like. The two skill sets aren't necessarily like. Come as a single. And I think everything is part of it. But. Just like says always like a learning experience with everything that you do. And I was just talking to a friend. He was. He's a. Illustrator, but he graduated with a business degree. So he says the business part comes really easy for him. So he's really glad that he. He has a degree in business and now he's doing art. So. I know he's I think that's a great combination. Not saying that you should take business to do art. But I think it's really helpful to learn those tools. And because they really come in handy when when it comes to. Doing contracts and. Just doing all your. Accounting stuff and all that stuff that things that. You don't think about when you think about doing murals and. Paintings and all that stuff. Yeah, for sure. No, we're not going to say all the bad things about it. We'll tell you good things too. I know like for me, this is my first part where. I'm actually applying to things and I've been getting. Rejection letters over and over and like you can only take. So much as a human being to be like. So I really had to lean hard on my. Network group and my community. And just the people that I've met over. The whole years that I've been alive to really. Bring together projects so. Thankfully that's like kind of getting me through the spring. And like into summer for projects, which has been really nice. But yeah, so. You gotta have some thick skin for sure. Yeah. Every year is going to be different. Same for me. I mean. There's been years that everything that you. Apply or whatever you. You got accepted, but then there's times where. You get a lot of. Like. Nose and a lot of doors close for you and then. But I think you have to. I know it's part of it and I just have to. You. Applying to stuff, you know, like. Don't just apply to like five mural. It's just applied to. Everything that. You feel like connects with what you do, you know. And eventually something's gonna say yes, but someone's going to say yes, but. It's like this every year is different every year. It's sometimes you have to focus a lot of murals. Sometimes it's indoors. Sometimes it's. Shows galleries or sometimes it's a lot of studio time. But everything's part of it. So I think it's that's the fun of it. That's not always the same, you know. Every every month, every year is different and. It's just what makes it fun and what. I don't like what keeps me going every time that. Every time like a door closes, you know, I just. I just feel like if something doesn't happen, it just. It's not meant to happen at that time. And it's. I better utilize my time for using to do something different, you know. Something it'll come up. Yeah, it's really a good skill to try and develop to not take stuff personally. Because most things aren't personal, you know, even if it feels that way. And when it's your art, which is something of your making, it's obviously. A personal thing, but. Their decision isn't necessarily judging you as a person, you know, it's like. They just don't like something about it or. And that's a really hard, it's easy to say. But it's really hard to do, you know, and. Because it really is. A lot of fun, like there's a lot of fun and what we do and like. It's kind of all these parts, but then when you're actually doing the mural, even when it's like. There's things that are crazy going on, whether it's like. That part's fine. You know, but it's like all the other stuff is the work part. And so they just go together, you know, and in order to have fun, you have to. To work. For me, what I say is the most important thing. Like if you want to do this as a. As a professional as a career, so to make a living out of it, I think it's really important to. Make sure you have a balance between. Work and. The business side and your, your personal life, you know, so. Just because you're a full time artist or whatever. You can't forget about your own life, you know, about your hobbies and love stuff, you know, because. If you just. You know, bury yourself with a lot of work of. You know, it's eventually it's going to be overwhelming and it's going to. I know you're going to start feeling. Different than how you first started. Which it was you started doing it because you this is what you love. So. When you start. Not having that balance, you know, and just forgetting about everything else and just doing. Like getting busy doing. Are. And I can, you can get to that point, but. Just work all the time and like. I think that's a really good point is to find. You mentioned like hobbies, like somebody that's like totally. In a different head space, you know, and when your studio is in your house, it's really easy to like. Really work all the damn time, you know, and actually. Would breaks because that's what actually feeds. Your art is going and having other experiences. Interactive with people. Well, you don't want to turn your passion into your job, right? Because then it's just work, right? You want to keep that passion. Going. Yeah, sure. You know, it's tricky. It's tricky when you start looking at. And as jobs because there's like something kind of implied. In that that you are. Pleasing the client and it's really. Easy, especially when you're starting out to really want to. Please the client. You're like, you're always kind of like, oh, they gave me this job. I don't want to look, you know, it's like. And the hardest thing to develop is to be able to say no to. Things that aren't true to what you want to do and. I've been doing this project with the health parts and stuff and. Multiple people to be like, oh, you know, can you put like our business name on them and things like that? And you're like, you have to have these lines where. You say no, and sometimes it means saying no to money, which is. Hard when you need to say yes to rap that month, you know, and it's like. But. You have to it's really easy to like kill your joy in it. I worked as a professional photographer for a long time and photography has always been part of my art practice and. It literally like. Killed that part of my art for a while, you know, it's like it resurrected back up, but it's like. If you're always worried about pleasing clients and. It's just it's a really slippery slope that's not it's not really being an artist at that point you're just. Illustration for hire, which is fine, but it's not the same thing. Right. I wonder if those of you who have run your own festivals can talk a little bit about the other side of the rejection, right? Because you guys have so hard. It's so hard to be on the other side of it. Because you have so much stuff to look through and then you're trying to. See the whole. So like. If you have people who have similar styles, it's like that. You want variety, you know, and. It's really hard and it's even harder when there's people in the mix who you know. Yeah. And know that you're judging it. Like I think like running your festivals to like it's really important to have. Specifics on what your mission and your goal is because that really helps. You know, pull down who you're going to accept. And then it's easier for you to tell them like I'm really sorry, but this is why. Like, but you should try this other festival, which I think you'd be a great fit for. Yeah, for sure. I think that's really important because otherwise there's just so many amazing artists that apply. You know. I think if you go into a project and think about what is it that you want to do besides create. Neurals and have, you know, this beautiful art, like what are what are your goals and what. You know, how do you want to support artists and how do you want to impact the community that you're in and so having those. Outline and gives you a nice. Framework to reference and say, okay, this checks this box, this checks this box and it's a whole package and. But yeah, it's super hard. I mean, people love mural opportunities and it's such a fun experience. But yeah, so it's super competitive. Usually. Also just the fundraising aspect is really difficult. Yeah, I'd say that's probably the most difficult. Yeah, very hard. It's really expensive to actually with babe walls, we pay everybody. Yeah, we pay everybody the same amount. And I've been part of festivals where there were people making huge amounts and you were making nothing. You know, it's like, so when you're trying to also run a festival in an ethical way, the way we do with babe walls or street wise, it's like. You got to raise more money too, you know, and it is really hard and the one piece of advice that would give people when you're submitting your stuff is like. Look at your submission and try and like remove yourself from it and be like, does this really express like what I do. And it's like, if I'm applying to a mural festival, it's like, there needs to be a picture of a mural there and like we specifically. Try and team up people who've never done a mural before with someone who has that sort of the babe walls mentoring model, but it's like. You can still paint a wall, like even if you haven't had a mural commission, you can be like, mom and dad going to your garage door, you know, it's like something that shows that. Oh, I want to let me don't you agree that it's like when there's no kind of connection to that in there. But something that really shows who you are like take the time to have photos, because that's what it's the words. The photos are really what it's about, you know, it's like saying it's like, that's what we're really going to look at and. Yeah, and you don't have to have a wall like you can get plywood boards, put them in your backyard and make sure some initial demos or an over and over. Just practice, you know, it's practice getting bigger and that's that's your example, you know, and then that's really kind of all you need people to see that you. You know, the driver that you can scale your work and, you know, that that goes a long way. So there's creative ways to do it, even if you don't have an actual wall opportunity to paint. Yeah, for sure. But yeah, I think organizing a mural festival is a ton of work. It's super fun, but it is like a year round thing. It's it ends and then it's like right away. Yeah, like we got like, okay. Yeah, there's like grants that you have to kind of apply for months and months in advance. And then you're planning the festival and still don't know if you have that money and then you're reaching out to sponsors and making a sponsor deck. And, you know, it's just constant things to do. Like there's just so much to do. It's like, and you're doing it kind of at the same time. You're like planning the festival and trying to raise money. So that's kind of stressful. Like, at least for us. It's like, yeah, I don't know if we're going to get the money, but we're just going to like cross our fingers and hope that we do and like make adjustments where we need to. But I think asking people for money with sponsorships was a big learning curve for me because I don't like asking people for money and talking. Yeah, just like pitching yourself and like why this project is important and why you should support it. It takes practice. And so it's definitely going to be hard to do that at first. But the more you do it and the more you get comfortable talking about your project and why it's important. Like just if you're passionate about it, you can talk about it. I mean, I hate public speaking and I hate talking to strangers. So, but it's so much easier if you believe in like what you're doing and the artists that you're working with. Like that excitement comes through and people want to support you. So it is super intimidating. But I think just put yourself out there. Like do the things that are scary and hard for yourself because then it makes you grow and it makes you learn. And then you just get better at it and you figure it out. I didn't know how to do any of this stuff before I started doing it. So it was like, I'm just going to try to figure this out because I want to make it happen. So it's kind of the way that it works. And also know you don't have to do it by yourself. Like you do have a whole team behind you. Like I have a whole team behind us and you don't have to do it by yourself. And that makes it really stressful if you try. Definitely a team to do. Well, and I think that's one of those dangerousness in the arts at all is that there's some like sort of lone genius that makes it all happen. And that's never true. Right. Yeah, no, and that's a great artist. It's like, once you made the paint, the canvas and let the room, all these other things, it's like other people, you've got a team. Well, that's what's so great, too, is like when you're building this team, you're like building a whole community. So, you know, lean on that community as an artist, too, to be able to help you find opportunities or if you have questions about what you're doing to be able to reach out to those people. Like Streetwise and Babe Walls are all about building community and like making sure that we all have resources and like people to go to for questions. So Denver has a really great art community here and should definitely be utilized. Well, I think we'll move on to the next question then if you would sort of talk about your actual path, like the things that you actually did that led you to where you are. And maybe do you want to start? Sure. I grew up in a family of artists. So I always saw that that could be a job, which I think was an advantage. But at the same time, it was also incredibly intimidating to sort of be like, oh, I'm an artist, too, when you have people who are like making their living in the arts. I would just start out just taking photos and Polaroids with my parents' cameras and just was obsessed with image making. Finally in college, discovered like mechanical duplication and start doing print making and making murals with Xerox machines and things like that. And kind of got sucked into working as a professional photographer for many years, which was fun. But again, it's like you have this like tank of art. You got 10 gallons of art making in you and it's like, if you're using 10 gallons for your work, it's like you don't have anything left or I think personal. So I kind of got burned out on doing that. And at that time, just kind of reconnected with doing street art, which I had been doing in college and that led me to connect to our street art and graffiti culture here in Denver, which is really an amazing group of people. And this is a great town to do street art. And there's fewer spots now as things get more developed and then migrated to doing murals. Basically got my first mural project before I really even knew how to do what I was doing, you know, which is a lot of times how that happens. It's like you get those opportunities just open up and pretty much I've been doing it ever ever since then. And I really love being part of Bay Walls the last few years and just kind of work on a different part of it all. And the mentoring part has been really cool to we've literally like raised up this group of mural artists who've never done murals before. And we have a bunch of them who like work regularly now. And we know they did their first mural of Bay Walls. It was really amazing. We did our first Bay Walls out of town this year. The Standing Rock Sioux Reservation, which was a really amazing experience and just kind of seeing our baby grow. But it was also really crazy like doing an event and like, not just in another city, but like in the middle of nowhere, you know, it's like a thousand mile. I was 800 miles from here, you know, in like a middle of North Dakota. So that's been really great. And I want to see where we go with that as we continue to grow it. Can you talk a little bit because you mostly weed paste, right? Yeah, I do mostly weed pasting, which is basically, if you don't know, it's taking a print that you made and putting it up on a wall using other. Most of my installations that you see in the streets are done with a biodegradable glue. I just want my pieces to kind of rot and fade away. And then during the pandemic, I did this project, spread hope with the hope hearts. And then the rainbow hope and love hearts. I have stickers for you guys. And that was a really amazing experience to kind of get to do something during COVID, like we were all sort of locked down. I usually go and, you know, I do a fair amount of commissions now, like to just go and put up stuff on Sundays, usually it's kind of my day and the pandemic started up and we're all locked out. I was like, well, I can still go pasting. It was like, I'm not interacting with anybody, you know, and the pieces I was putting out felt really appropriate. They're really mysterious. I was like, we don't need mystery right now. And so that's where the whole part kind of came out of that and switch my whole paradigm of how I put things up. I'd always looked for spots and, you know, I don't do anything really illegal. It's always kind of vandalism life. But literally just ask people on my insta say, if you have a high visibility spot for one of these prints, let me know and I'll come put one up. And I'm still getting requests to this day, printed up thousands of them and put them up all over Denver and Colorado. Leah was all the first people who got me spots for them up in Boulder. It's spread out around the country. I just did one in Miami along with the Bay Walls crew back in December during our basil. And we've talked a little bit about funding, but how do you fund that? You know, that was another thing that kind of flipped my paradigm. Like one, the whole asking, it's like, oh, I just had to ask for spots and people would give them to me. But I did it right off the bat as a pay it forward thing. And so you had a spot that fit the criteria. I came and I put one up and people who were businesses and stuff, like some of them gave donations. And so I just had a print fund and I do a bunch of free ones and I do one and someone would give me a couple grand. It ended up always funding itself, which was like the first time where I hadn't had like some sort of financial model kind of with public art projects. And so it was really interesting to see how something could be completely different and still function. It's kind of it's slowed down now. Like I need to be more in that fundraising mode. And that's not my forte there. But it's pretty much always paid for itself. And there were times like in the first year it started like April of 2020 is my first for the first ones up where the first like six months of it. There were weeks where I printed like $2,000 worth of color printing and means serious like expenditure was very counterintuitive to be like, let's spend money. But it always like filled in, which was really, it's really interesting and cool experience. And it I run into people on a somewhat regular basis who you have this completely their own personal experience with those pieces that it's nothing to do with me. The fact that I put them up and it's like a really special thing. Like I don't, I don't take it lightly. Like I don't know that I could recreate any of that magic like ever again. But, you know, when you have people coming up to you and telling you that wow, an image that you made like help them feel better. That's, that's like amazing. That is an amazing thing. And so I really think I was able to do something that is positive and also kept me sane. Is it allowed me to like be art making and it ended up being kind of a good time for artists as far as having a lot of places to do art. You know, just kind of interesting. Like one model thing. So what was your path. Well, for me, I think it's a. It's different. I guess my family wasn't. I don't know. I think like that is to like to. Drop. And my brother used to do like graffiti back in Mexico. I think that's kind of like my inspiration where it begins. Where I got like the inspiration for our self and. Just kind of like the. The need to be expressing myself and putting it out there on the walls. But I think it's like my career as a. It's an artist. I started four years ago. When I went to college, I wanted to start. I wanted to do art and graphic design, but. I ended up with a criminal justice degree because. I think it was a lot of the pressure of. I mean, people saying telling me that art is not a. Degree work that we're going to make a living out of it or get a job. And I think that also puts a lot of pressure as. Like. When you're trying to make your parents back, if you're a first generation student. So I feel like that's a lot of pressure on just getting a. Picking up careers that's going to make you money, you know. So I took business and I'm bad with numbers. So I took criminal justice and that was fun. So I finished with a degree of criminal justice. And I did work my degree for three years. And I had like an office job. I was kind of like a probation officer, like a supervision. And a supervision program. And that job really made me realize what I was missing in me. And after working on that job for. Two and a half years. I just, I mean, I decided to save up some money and. Left the job, I quit. And I just got like a small jobs, you know, I just. I was working on construction. I was doing. Restaurants and Comcast left just any other little jobs. And to. I started working on a restaurant and. That was on the weekends and that gave me the chance to. For from Monday to Thursday, I was working on any like in my mind. I was like. I want to do this art thing I gotta. I know I gotta. Do what I didn't do in school, you know, so I was. Just do doing like watching a lot of YouTube videos. Painting like on my sketchbook and. Just practicing, you know, she's doing a lot of. Things watching a lot of videos on YouTube phone. Learning on. On your list that I admire. So I just like seeing their journey and. She's getting inspired, you know. And I was utilizing this time to. To just grow artistically and. And gain everything that I didn't do during college. Which was what I wanted to do is art. And. During the pandemic, that's actually when I was. I mean, by that time I was already doing murals. But after the pandemic hit, I was laid off of my work in a restaurant. And that kind of pushed me to. Do our more. Like constantly. And I just started getting busier and busier. And. Well, but. That's what pushed me to do full time. Like as an artist. But I would say like my first mirror was wasn't that that easy to get. It was a. I didn't know how to. Ask someone for wall for permission to paint. Wall mirror, but. It was a one of those things that. I wouldn't. Feel like I wouldn't. I didn't have anyone to ask. Cause I didn't know like the. Like the artist community here. The network. Yeah. So I think that's very important too. And now I. Like I. Known a lot of people that do murals. Like. Like Leah. Was. A mural festival. And. It just. But before I didn't know anyone. So it's just trying to figure out how to. Do my first mirror and it was. Just asking businesses. And into someone said yes. And. That was like my first. Mirror that I had for him for my profile. And I did a lot of networking in my. In my neighborhood on westwood. It's not far from down. But that's where I grew up. When I came to Denver. And. I did a lot of networking there with. Because it's a it's a small art district. But it's an artist. So. I was just asking a lot of people there. And. They're the one that gave me the first opportunity to. Do. A gallery to be part of it. And then to do my first commission. So my first commission was. Like a electrical box. And. That was just like a dream come true. Like. It was like something that I never thought I was going to do. And just to see my art industry. You know. And getting paid. That's the best thing is awesome. And also. It's like. I mean it's like well. Like. So then after that just on I started to. I guess just build my. My portfolio with. More art and. But I feel like the networking with the right people. It's. It helps you a lot because if you don't have like a. Like a. Committee of artists or someone to ask just. Have to do a lot of networking and that's what helped me. Getting a lot of commissions. And. And from there I just like I said after that. The pandemic hit and. I was pushed to do art like full time and. I just. Being busy. Ever since and. And I think I. I feel like I gained that confidence. I feel more confident about. Being a full time artist and. Knowing if. If I'm not constantly working you know I just. It's also. Something that you have to know like how to manage your. Your money you know because. Sometimes it's like it's not like you do a mural every week. Or every month and others. It's different than just having a regular job. So. I don't know for me it's that's kind of how. Like my. Journey of growing as an artist and. I recently got my studio. And. That's like a big something big for me so. And it's there on my. In the neighborhood where I grew up with. Even so. Yeah. Yeah that's a great district that some people don't know about in town. It's very different than. It's. Very unique then. You know each one has like Santa Fe district houses. Unique look and then. Right now and. Westwood it's a. I think it reflects a lot of the community there which is very. Bursa and predominantly Hispanic. So it's. That's what. Like the nearest kind of represent a lot like the community. Yeah. Cool thanks. Alex what's your story. Yeah so I grew up in Lexington Kentucky. And kind of the same thing as jewels. People always told me that doing art was never something you. Can make money from. My mom was very artistic and so. Myself and my three younger brothers were always doing. Crafts and she would always take us out to like playing. Air paint and. So art was like always something that I did a lot and I. Enjoyed to so I took a lot of art classes in high school. And then you know at that point it just wasn't an option. As a career so. I decided to go down the pet the path of pre vet. So I wanted to be a veterinarian so I did that. And then very quickly realized that. I did not. Not that it math at all so I did not do well. And it's just a very competitive. Thing and I just didn't have the grades for it so. Finished my degree out so I have a degree in animal science. With a minor and equine management. So then my new path was that I wanted to. Be like a manager of a horse farm and so. I went and managed an equine rescue and. Northern Ohio for a year and a half. And that was really interesting. I wouldn't change it for the world I had a lot of fun. And this is like exactly what I wanted to do in that. Moment in my life but I still was like always doing art. And finding ways to do art like I did the logo for the rescue. That I was working for. And then I moved to Columbus Ohio. And that's kind of where my art started to pick up a little bit more. I was working for a vet clinic at the time. And decided that. You know doing these pet portraits of. Clients animals would probably be a good second income. Because you don't make any money being a vet tech at all. So I needed a supplemental income. So I started doing that. And then it just got to the point where it just took off. And. So I had to close my books because I was close. I was booked out for an entire year. I got really burnt out doing that. But I ended up doing my very first gallery show. And I did my pieces on cardboard. So I was like really into this. This. Like sustainable portion of art where I felt. Art was very unobtainable and expensive. And I wanted it to be something that everybody that could afford. So I started doing my pieces on cardboard. And did that for a few years. And then decided to start doing it on wood. And so I was building my own panels at the time. And I wanted to expand outside of dogs and cats. And so I did birds of prey. And deer just a lot of the local wildlife. That was there in the state. And that really wasn't until I moved out here into Denver. I started working with the Rhino Art District. And I was running the Rhino maid store, which was a. A retail gallery that they had in the source. And did that I met a lot of local artists that way. And. That's kind of how babe walls came to fruition. I had a lot of conversations with a lot of female. And non-binary artists. And there was this. Overreaching frustration that there really wasn't space for. Them in these mural festivals. That they were getting denied. And on top of that, if they were getting accepted, they weren't getting paid. So it was something that. You know, they just felt like they weren't being. Respected in the space. And so the whole thought was that we would just do this one. Mural festival and we would just kind of like as a. We show them kind of things. And so we did it. And we ended up raising $50,000 in the middle of a pandemic. Right. The pandemic started. Yeah. And it just like took off. And we got. People from all over the world that were reaching out to us, which. You know, in our first year that. Was really intense and. We just realized that this was something that we really needed to. Keep going. So on top of all that I was still doing my own art. And I did my first my first large scale. Mural during a festival in 2018. And from there, just kind of snowballed. So it was kind of like working for the art district. And then also trying to run baples and then also doing my own art. But which is what was really great is I just built this whole. Network that I was able to use for. Just like community and any questions I had, I could reach out to. People and be like, Hey, have you done this before like. I don't know an Instagram like makes people very. Reachable nowadays, which is really great. So that's definitely a resource that if you're an artist and you have. Questions and there's an artist out there that you look up to. Just like reach out to them on Instagram. Most of the time they write back, but if they don't. Don't worry about it. Move on to the next one. Yeah, totally. But yeah, so worked for Rhino up until last November. And I kind of got this point where. I felt like I was being pushed and pulled. And all these different directions and then I was starting to get. Burn out and I really just needed to take a moment and decide which. Path I wanted to go on and where my priorities stood. And I just really wanted to like fully put myself into my art. And see where that could go. So then last November I went full time artist. And so I've been doing that, but I've been into the whole. The cafe, which is an online opportunities. If you guys don't know about it. I would check it out. Supplying getting rejected. Not to be sad, but then there's like all these other opportunities. That have come up outside of that. So just like Jill said, like a door closes, but then others open. So really just relying on your network and your community of people. That you have made and that you know. And stuff just won't stop coming around. So, but yeah, I work mostly with aerosol. For large scale and then for my studio work. I do acrylic paint on wood panels. So it's just been a really interesting journey and. I don't know anything by any means. Like I'm learning every day. So it's also just one of those. Professions that you have to be fully open to change. And it's something that I'm learning to do. So. Yeah, always something to cool. And what was your path? I had kind of a. Strange path to where we are today, but. I grew up in California and. High school in Colorado Springs and. Single parent spent a lot of time with my grandmother and my grandparents. And she was very creative. And so we were always making things and doing creative things. But like through school. I think, you know, art was always in the culture of. Like my community of people that I hung out with like. Skateboarders and going to see shows and. Posters and things like that. But I never really thought about it as like a career path. I was always kind of in this mindset of like. I got to make money. I got to get a job. What am I going to do? And that was like really difficult for me to figure out. As a young person and. Didn't really figure anything out. Went to college at CU and. Switched majors a whole bunch like trying to figure out. What I was going to do. What kind of job I was going to get what I liked. Couldn't figure it out. Ended up. Ended up studying anthropology, which I really liked. Because I loved learning about people and culture and. It was just endless and it was just so beautiful. And I was just really inspired by that. So obviously that's not very good career path. It doesn't really go anywhere unless you want to be a professor. And get your doctorate and. All of these things, which I didn't. So after college, I sort of. Was not sure what I was going to do. I love snowboarding at the time. So I moved to Washington state. Snowboard up in Mount Baker and. Kind of just got whatever job I could and. Which ended up being like in property management. In real estate, so I kind of had that path. For the first years out of college. Which wasn't my passion, but I was able to make some money. And pay the bills and then do the things that I liked. And. And then switched gears again and ended up working for a. Snowboarding company and customer service for a little while. And office management work and. That was fun, but I think all that time too. I was still like involved in the arts community. We go to art openings, collected art and posters and just. Was that was like a hobby, right? That was like what I was into. And then through that network of community. Eventually, like 10 years later. I was like getting more and more into it and. I was like, I think maybe this is where I want to go. Like this is what I want to do for my work and. Sort of just started doing projects with. Creative and artist friends of mine. And then doors opened in that field. My friend opened an art gallery in Rhino, which was. Super tiny at the time was like 2010. He was like, I want to show my art like he got laid off. From his job, he's like, I'm going to open a gallery. I want to show my art and other people's art and come and. Help me run it. I was like, hell yeah, I'll do that for free. You know, I had my regular job and I did that with him. And basically didn't know what I was doing at all. Just tried to figure it out. I knew. I loved artists and knew a bunch of artists, so I just started. Curating art shows in that space and then the. Office job that I had at the time that was my real job. Decided they were going to open a creative space in Boulder. They're like, do you want to help? Yes. And so that sort of transitioned into that and ran this. Space called made by which is a creative hub. Was a retail gallery, all local artists and shop. And then they had a creative learning space where they did. Workshops and go black box theater and. All kinds of different creative paths. So I did that for about five years and I really loved. Working with all the artists and the community aspect. But definitely got burnt out on the retail part of it. Like selling artwork is super. Hard, especially in Boulder. Like Boulder people want to buy landscape artwork. And that's kind of it or nothing at all. Like there just wasn't like a really supportive. Community of people that were buying artwork, especially the kind of artwork we were showing, which is sort of more edgy contemporary. It was so much work for the artist and I just got kind of. Bummed out. And at the same time was seeing murals and mural festivals. Start popping up and it's like this seems like a really. Really awesome pathway and we also were doing murals that made. Life too and in connection with the shows we had a wall. And there were murals in Boulder were like not. In existence there was like a couple of them. So that was like really weird to me. Why don't we have public art here? It wasn't like Denver at all where it was just kind of. Work in it and street art happened. Boulder didn't really have that. So it's like this sucks. We need to change this. So I just saw an opportunity like a. A hole to fill in Boulder in the creative culture of Boulder. And I thought I could do it. I was like, I think I can. Find walls and opportunities for artists. I love supporting artists and working with them. So I wanted to keep that going and get artists paid. And like, you know, once you get a mural at people see your work. And they're like, oh, who is that? And then they follow them and they get another opportunity. And so I just saw it as a really sustainable thing for artists. And like a really fun thing for me to help make happen. And so. Yeah, I just sort of started out trying to find individual walls. And put projects together one by one. Try to ask the city for some money. And I found a wall and then I could find an artist. And at that time too, I was super interested in supporting. Female identifying artists because. In the culture at that time it was very male dominated. Wanted to give more opportunities. So yeah, I just. Kind of just put it out there and had built a network through. That creative work of. People that maybe would be interested in buying or. Mentioning murals. And it just sort of just built, but it was just one project at a time. For a long time for the first few years. And then I mean. In the beginning, I totally wanted to do a mural festival was like. That's what I want to do, but it wasn't going to happen that easy. So I started just built up to it. And as people in Boulder started seeing more murals, more people were open to it because a lot, nobody wanted to let me paint their wall. They're like, what? You want to do graffiti on our wall? No, you don't get it. But finally people started getting it and seeing the work. And now it's like so much easier to find people that want to do murals. So it took a while. And then we did the first mural festival in 2019. You know, it's 10 walls and a gallery exhibition at the library. And. Yeah, I just kind of started getting bigger and bigger. And more people were excited about it in Boulder and wanted to support. And now we have the mural festival, but also still do our community programs, one off murals and education programs and. Yeah. And I didn't really know how to do any of it. I really just wanted to do it and tried to figure out how to do it by. Reaching out to people like Jasper from pow wow walls. I just like shoot an email like, hey, can you tell me like how did. How to start this? And he was super friendly and got back to me and. You know, surprising people want to help you figure things out. So. You can do it if you're passionate and you want to do it, you can do it. Okay. Well, that's a great way to sort of end this portion. Yeah, I think we have a couple. Does anybody have any questions? I have a question. How much do people pay for a mural? There's no one intro. It depends on the client. The client that comes like city of the wall. You know, and a lot of needs to be up there. Well, there's a lot of factors and then also sort of. There's all these factors that are purely like, okay, it costs as much to rent that. We're going to use as many supplies. And there's this X factor, which is. How famous you are not famous or, you know, it's like. That kind of when you're starting out. You tend to do stuff without even realizing it. Not making any money, you know, because you're really doing stuff for cost, but. It's kind of, you have to keep on. It's like kind of what the market will bear. And do you typically like make a proposal with a budget attached and ask for that? Or do you. I know sometimes when you're applying for public work, there's a budget that they have. And sort of build towards. I usually price out the square footage. It's kind of the only. Simple metric and it's kind of that way you can encompass a lot of other costs. Into one cost, which is easier to. To comprehend instead of trying to, and that should encompass like what all your materials and all those other costs are into that one cost. It's just clear. And then that's also something you can. Pad or discount depending on. So obviously if it's for a huge corporation, it's like they're used to paying a lot more for things than small business. And you kind of have to, it's up to you to decide that it's actually really the hardest part of. Yeah. That's why it is something like dropping a price on someone and then like, oh, is that all. Yeah. Right. I just got a question. There are no flat rates for new ones. It's definitely a huge range and also depends on where you are at in your career. Like if you don't have that much experience, like there is like a lower. Dollar per square foot that you should be charging. Whereas if you have like all these years behind you. You know, you obviously are charging for a higher rate, but average what I'm seeing is like anywhere between $20 a square foot to $50 a square foot plus. Yeah. So it's a giant. You know, like screwing themselves doing once for $5 a square foot and stuff. Yeah. And sometimes you do a lot of times when you're doing festivals and stuff, you'll make quite a bit less than you would. Off of your regular rate, but it's kind of it's worth it because you want to be part of that that festival, but also it's like. If I hadn't been in crush walls when I was originally in crush walls, like I got so many jobs off of that to be able to be like, oh. There's a piece that I did, you know, and it shows them that not only have other people got. Okay. And you can do this, but then you can also complete a project, which is kind of important. Well, there is that status thing. I mean, you talked about the X sector too. So maybe for someone, the fact that you're in crush walls makes you more attractive because you're with that crowd. Right. Totally. And you have to milk that stuff. You're like, you know, like before I mentioned, I dropped our basil and do our thing. There's like when you do like stuff that you have to be promoting yourself, even if it's not your nature to be self promotional. It's like, pretty much no one else is going to do it. So you need to do it, you know, and even if it goes against your very beings who like be that it's like you need to like help people understand why. They're paying what they're paying and the value and what they're getting. Okay. You guys said you have a youth program. Yeah, both street wise and vape walls. So like we usually do it's called the future babes well, but it's a youth wall that we do and then grow love who's also one of our leadership crew. She runs a lot of youth programming. So we're working on a grant right now so that we can hopefully have an entire year of youth programming put out. And is there like a certain age up to be or Nope, we take little babies. Okay, cool. Very cool. How we go about it. Yeah, for sure. So we like we list everything on our website or our on our Instagram will like push it out and if girl loves offering anything we'll push it out as well. I know you guys probably have a yeah we work with school sometimes doing like a series of workshops. After school, but we also do like a mural workshop that's just open to anybody that wants to do it. And again, we'll put that on our website of opportunities and basically it's just a learning experience of freedom you're all with another small group of youth and. Yeah, or you know you could just apply to the main event. It's like if you have the experience and have work out there it doesn't matter. What age you are like we had a 40 year old and they ball standing rock. You know, working with their mom, but they did an amazing piece. Yeah, it's like this. It's more just like when you say, oh, she's done a few walls like what you're saying before it's like there's a picture of something on a wall that someone's done that when I see that in that application process. I'm like, wow, here's somebody who's like, they're not just saying, I wish I had a wall, the main on, you know, it's like it's like, I found a way to do this. That's like that goes a long way. But also like kind of what I was saying earlier if there are artists out there that you like and you love their work and you think it matches with the path that you want to do just reach out to them and see if they have any opportunities for like assistance because I know when I'm on bigger jobs, I'll pull in assistance to come in. It's never the same person. Just it helps to like just put yourself out there and then you're on their mind so. Yeah and apply to our next festival. Yeah, yeah, streetwise, which tries to give an opportunity to a young artist who maybe hasn't had a mural yet. So there's we're always open to supporting young people. Yeah, no way you guys to start doing what you want to do. Yeah, totally. Yeah. All right. Oh good. Yeah, David. Where it comes to the project that you treat by and second by the conditions that don't make it to you like a day or just like in this. And why have you ever got to be able to see it and so the skills. Well, then you have to be able to see it yourself. It's like the whole. Not on your kind of values. It's really hard to do. It's like, especially when you have these other constraints like you need to pay your bills and things like that. It's really hard to say no to stuff. But it's something that you have to just keep working on yourself confidence and know that it's like when your instincts are telling you like. This isn't a good fit or me or somebody's like has too tight of a deadline. You know, you're not going to be able to it's like you have to be able to be like. This isn't going to work this way and you know that you can work with them to. To make it so that it's actually feasible but most people who are. Contracting to get a mural done like they don't know anything about murals. But they also know like kind of how much money they want to spend and. That's really the hardest part. I think all for the buildings is getting walls and then you have property owners. Who it's part of their business analysis wall. And so if you're going to put something that they think is offensive or, you know, they want to try and control. What goes on that wall? And that's one of the trickiest parts I think of kind of organizing, but you just have to kind of stand up for yourself. Yeah, that's where like knowing your square foot, like sticking to that and then having a little bit of a wiggle room range and being like, okay, I'm not going to go below this for anything. But also just like reaching out to other artists to and just being like, hey, like what's the lowest you would go and. Yeah, it will tell you all that. Yeah, your tools are all around you. Yeah, and I think from like an organizer perspective, there's usually flexibility or like just ask because, you know, they'll probably put this. Proposal together like this is how much you want to spend. This is our timeline, but there's usually always flexibility in there. And if you're nice and like you want to do it, but these things are important for you. And you just ask like, hey, I really want to do this project. But this timeline doesn't work for me. Can we push it back? Or, you know, this really isn't quite as much as I need to make this project work for me financially. And can you bump it up to this? If you're just genuine and respectful and how you ask and you want to do the project. A lot of times they'll say yes, like, yeah, we can make that work or maybe we can't do that, but we can do this. And, you know, I think it's just, you know, having that confidence to speak up and ask for what you need. Yeah, because most of the time they don't know what it is. Like I'm curating a project right now for a building in Sunnyside and their budget started at 20 and now it's at 50. So, again, they just didn't know. And so when an artist came in and was like, well, I charged this, they were like, oh, we had no idea. So, yeah, just ask. There's an education element to it, too, I think. Yeah. I remember for me, like I had a breakthrough on how much I charged when I was really like fretting about a job. And I was like, oh, I wonder how much like a commercial contractor would charge to paint this wall white. It was like, just like a little less than I was like stressing out about charging, you know, and I was like, I actually quoted them more and they said, yes, you know, it's like, you know, let's go down. And obviously, if you're so high up there and it's like when you're in a restaurant, you look at a painting on a wall that's like $7,000 and you're like, yeah, don't forget, you know, it's like, you have to be realistic. And that's based on your experience. You know, ultimately, it's like, but you can always go down from whatever your set rate is. And then you're doing somebody a favor, it's like, that's a position of power. But the worst thing is taking a job that then, like, I'm sure we've had the experience where we've done things where, you know, you end up doing a ton of work and breaking even. And that sucks. That's just not even worth it. You're gonna just stay at home. Cool. All right. Well, I know you all are gonna have rides coming. So I'm gonna let you go. If you have more questions, though, stick around. Is that all right? Yeah. But yeah. Fantastic. Thank you so much. Stickers, stickers. Awesome. I think I have had some notes in the brain. It's the best opportunity. Oh, more stickers. Yeah.