A Seed had Sprouted in the Soil

how my calling of becoming an artist started

I was 7years old then, probably I’m at my 2^nd Grade in my primary education. It was year 1998, I can’t remember the date or the day, but all I can glimpse at that memory is my Mother was very disappointed to me. She is very disappointed because what’s inside my 80 leaves notebook and 100 leaves pad paper are not the written lecture of my teacher instead, it was full of drawings of inanimate objects, of faces of people, caricatures or the best way to call them..DOODLES. And what makes my Nanay more disappointed? It is the drawings drawn not in papers but was the drawings drawn at my backpack..I felt sad for what just happened, but what can I do? It felt like, it’s a part of me, that making drawings at that moment makes me complete..it is simply an escape to reality. At age of 7 though it is not very clear..but at that barely moment, I have this feeling of who will I be when I grow up. That is where it all started, from that time I keep on drawing and drawing and drawing..more drawings on my notebook than copying the lectures, more drawings at the back wall of my classroom, more drawings on my armchair, more drawings on the chalkboard, more drawings on the soil..that’s what I am, ruining some properties for the sake of drawing. I still don’t realize who am I at my early age, whenever people ask me who or what will I be when I grow up..I can’t answer a thing. Doctor, Engineer, Lawyer, Teacher, Architect etc..most of my classmates will answer , but me? What will I be?..who knows. The next thing after I crumpled down numerous papers for the sake of drawing, I begin to be very fond of coloring..watercolors, crayons..even leaves and flowers that can be used as coloring materials. Of course I always ended up ruining my art piece thing because of coloring. I keep on mixing the colors, what color will it produce if I’m going to mix this color from this one, it’s a messy work..but luckily I’m enjoying it, because the best thing after ruining a thing is learning new things and applying it the next time you want to ruin another thing again. Year after year at my primary school I keep on upgrading my artwork hobby, like copying faces of people, copying cartoon and anime characters on posters etc. but of course I just keep ruining and learning. Until one day I realized how much my drawing improves, from nasty inanimate caricature to drawings that receive good compliments from people. After my drawing era, another form of escaping reality thing hit my head..it is the art of freehand lettering, it is a form of writing mixing with some drawing techniques..somehow like calligraphy or like font styles on word doc. The difference is that you are free, you are free to design words you like to write..make the word stout or thin, straight or bubbly etc. until you find the design very stunning and cool. I often use freehand lettering when I am designing the cover of my book report and paperworks project. Drawing, Lettering and I are enjoying spending time together until another form of escaping reality thing knock my life..Literature. I remember I was 13 years old when I enjoy reading stories of adventure, love, tragedy and sacrifices. I was also at my 13 when I keep on reading poetries, I don’t actually look at who the author is because what’s important to me is the thought of the story, of how it will end, the logic of its flow, the lesson learned and the kind of feeling the story brought to me. And at that age, I started to write poems, lots of poems. I wrote poems on scratch papers, I wrote poems on arm chairs, and just like the drawings when I’m 7, I wrote poems at my backpack. Age 14, I started to mix things up. I mixed drawing and writing, I made a 200pages Comic book fully drawn in two notebooks. My classmates in high school keep reading and borrowing it until none of them remember to bring that piece of art back to me. Yeah, I lost that comic I made but no regrets, the important thing is those who opened it enjoyed reading it. But that was just the beginning of me falling in love to art. 16years old, I was encouraged by my Professor in Technology and Livelihood Education to join his summer lecture about Sketching, Architecture, Painting and T-shirt designing. I learned a lot about measuring things in Architecture and Sketching to make them look perfect, but I prefer to be a deviant among all his students because I didn’t follow the measuring protocol. You read it right, I didn’t measure my sketches and the blue prints of my house plan, and I just draw and draw and draw, and draw. I have this very simple belief that measuring things especially in sketching will take me a long time to finish an output, and I prefer erasing wrong details and correcting them than measuring. But of course in terms of Architectural design, a perfect measurement should always be implemented when making a blue print, so never follow my belief. My first painting was a seashore setting, it was a sunset view were lots of yacht were voyaging the sea, it was pretty fantastic and it melts my heart that I had made a very good painting in my first try. I left that painting at my professor’s classroom for him to remember me after I graduated from secondary school, that once in his life he met a kid who is so lazy in doing measurements to his artworks. College, 16years old, I took Nursing rather than a career of being an Artist. Reason? Because I don’t have my own money to fight for the career that I am dying to have. People around me keep telling me that I have no future when I take Art related courses. It was a hard punch hit on my face when they let me broke up with the thing I love. A Good Samaritan encourages me to give up my artist dream and take up nursing and will pay my tuition fee. That moment, I gave up my dream not because I want to, but I gave it up because of the love I have for my Mother. Nursing is an in demand profession, and if I will become a Nurse, I will earn big and I can give a good future for my Mother who raised me alone since I was 4years old when my Father left us. I gave up my dreams, but my dreams did not leave me. I keep on joining every art contest in school, Poster Making(I got runner-up position  in all poster making contest that I joined in), Paintings (our finger paintings won as champion and was still used every time there is a school exhibit), Exhibit Designing(our department got runner-up position). I also become a comic artist of the school newspaper. I also learned to use moviemaker, make short stories and put music on it and editing pictures in picture editing applications, in brief explanation, Art is still in me. Just when I thought that I had learned enough in art, I was wrong. It is a continuous process, I was a late bloomer of music, I was 17 when I learn to play guitar and at the Age of 18 I started to join battle of the band contests and played rhythm guitar and vocals with 2 different bands in where one of this band where I played earn a 1^st runner-up position. Now, I am 20years old and will turn 21 at the first month of 2012, I’m a fresh July Nursing Board Passer, a registered Nurse. So what’s next for John Paul Nacion?, not much..right now I’m looking forward to become a good photographer, yeah right, I had opened my eyes to another form of art. I have this passion in creating pictures through my point and shoot camera, I really mean creating picture not just taking it, got it? Well, taking picture is just taking a shot on one simple perspective, but creating pictures in camera is like creating stories in the images that I took, moments to memories, making time stop still and escaping reality. Am I a professional Artist? No Im not..I didn’t have the chance to study fine arts and show to the world my paintings, sketches and interior designs.. I didn’t have the chance to study literature and publish my poems and my written stories.. I didn’t have the chance to take music lesson, sing and play on a concert.. I didn’t have the chance to study multimedia arts and make my own movie, promoting my own lettering fonts, comic strip, edit amazing stunning pictures and have my own digital SLRs..I am a jailed artist, sketching and drawing my own thought inside my room, typing my poems and stories on facebook, blog, and tumblr, making music video out of moviemaker and upload it in facebook and youtube, editing pictures from different picture editor application put my lettering signature on it and taking lots of picture using my point and shoot camera and upload it in facebook and tumblr, and staring at the window strumming my guitar, singing my favorite song. Who am I?..I still can’t say but I’m praying that someday I will be there, to a destination where I really wanted to be in since I was 7years old.

“Every child is born an artist, but it’s up to them whether they will remain an artist or not when they grow up” "John Paul Pagunsan Nacion > December 5, 2011 .06:48pm.