Painting shop shop-window mannequins in Chelsea is not a traditional way to learn the art of blending oil paints, but it's just one of the steps on Sally Hirst's journey to becoming both an artist and a hugely popular tutor.
Sally was in Spain in the spring of 2020 when it became clear that the workshops she'd planned for the summer back in Norfolk were unlikely to happen. She got the last flight out of Malaga, announced on social media that she'd find a way to teach online, wrote a blog about it for Jackson's Art Supplies and woke the next morning to around four hundred emails - because Jackson's had listed her online courses, which did not yet exist, among their ten things to do during lockdown.
What followed is one of the more decisive pivots I've heard about. She went from a newbie on YouTube to thousands of followers and the beginning of a thriving business.
Six years on she has twenty-four courses, around a hundred hours of video, two Instagram accounts, and a book out this autumn. She's also refreshingly candid about the parts that haven't worked: the second Instagram account that never took off, the gallery representation that's been "somewhat elusive," and the awkward suspicion that not needing gallery sales might mean she doesn't chase them hard enough.
We also talk about her teaching career which she gave up at time she still had the energy to pursue other things, and how it - and her MA - have helped her develop her teaching style for the artists she works with.
In this episode:
- Why Sally took a whole year off her own practice - and how she avoids resentment when doing two jobs
- The GP who tore up her job application and told her to sort herself out
- ADHD as a superpower, and what a late diagnosis actually changed
- Why a teaching qualification matters more for developing artists than for teaching skills
- "Leave your audience at the door" and why she advises students not to post new explorations
- Selling her work well in Spain yet finding UK galleries elusive
- Writing a book: 50,000 words, hundreds of captions, and no exclamation marks
You can find Sally's work and courses here:
https://sallyhirstcourses.com/
https://www.sallyhirst.co.uk/
@sallyhirst_courses @sallyhirstartist
Her Book, Printmaking for Collage is out this Autumn
https://www.crowood.com/book/printmaking-for-collage/
