Can I call myself an Artist?

So at what point can I call myself an artist?

A few months ago I was at a business improvement seminar and as a means of introduction we all took it in turns explaining what we did for a living. As my turn approached the heart rate increased and I was tossing up what I should say, in the past my job description has always been Photographer/Videographer, but this time I thought stuff it.

So when my turn came I simply said I was an "Artist", and for some reason I couldn't help but think that everyone else in the room thought I was joking, and ridiculously I almost felt the same, so with an elevated heart rate I stumbled on to say ," Yeh but I also do commercial video production and photography"...why did I do that? why couldn't I have just left it as Artist?

For some reason it feels strange to call myself an artist, it's not that I don't believe that I am an artist, I think the word "Artist" has always represented something that I felt was unachievable, so maybe I am lacking the confidence to make that final step of calling myself an artist.

I had to go into hospital just last week for a colonoscopy...now this is not something I would recommend as an enjoyable experience, anyway on the form there was a spot for career....and guess what, yeh, that's right, I wrote ..."Photographer" old habits die hard. 

Why do I keep doing that? anyway....it's not a mater of "can I call myself an artist", as something I love doing and am making a career of  "I must call myself and artist"... so from this day on it's Mark Coombe the Artist.

For those of you new to my art, I live near Rockhampton in central Queensland and paint my interpretation of the things that make life on the land special to me. My studio is fairly basic, a small bedroom that is no longer used on the northern side of the house, the best thing about it is that everything is set up and there is great natural light coming in the big window. 

I made the easel from plans found on the internet and it seems to work pretty well. I use photos loaded on a tablet as reference to paint from, the great thing about this is that I can easily zoom in on details and isolate colours, I have a few anatomy pics of horses on the wall which are essential for getting legs right etc.. Oh and the curtains are a bit of a problem, handy for blocking out direct sun, but they are tending to get a bit splattered with paint, guess that just goes with the territory.

That's all for this week, next week I am going to show what goes into developing the concept of a painting prior to starting.

Please share with anyone you might think will be interested.

Cheers and stay safe

Mark