After great, but restless years spent in New York City, illustrator Leah Goren has moved back to California, where she bought an old tennis court with her boyfriend. Still, the talented illustrator doesn’t sit still, but doesn’t value neither herself nor her work based on where she currently lives. She doesn’t longer needs to be “the illustrator living in Brooklyn” anymore. Let us take you through Goren’s creative mind.
Cover photo: © Leah Goren on Instagram
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Illustrator Leah Goren
Since she was a kid, illustrator Leah Goren knew she wanted to go to art school and become a designer soon after. While taking sewing courses and drawing classes during high school, she started to build a portfolio at young age. While at college and doing several internships, she always looked at how older ‘peers’ developed their work. Not to copy their style, but to learn to develop her own handwriting. Goren constantly shared her work via her blogspot website.
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New York City versus California
Once a student, Leah Goren couldn’t wait to move to The Big Apple. After having spent more than 10 years in New York City and some years in Los Angeles, too, she doesn’t longer deprive the value of her work from her current location. This has led to more confidence and a lot of mental rest. While the big city worked well for her network, friends and artistic inspiration, she is relieved to be back in California, where she recently opened a very stylish tennis court (thecourts.net) in the middle of the desert. It provides the rest she needs to be creative.
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Gaining confidence as an artist
It took illustrator Leah Goren years to develop the “handwriting” she is know for today. She has learned a lot from her mentors (now referred to as friends – despite the age difference), for example how to stay true to her own style and the work she makes.
As the years passed by, she has learned to be confident about the work she creates. Having a unique style does lead to critics, of course, but it does lead to success as well. Staying stuck in the middle simply doesn’t work when you’re an artist. A wise lesson she’s learned from Rachel Cole, her mentor and friend from New York. Despite this, Goren has gained confidence from her commercial jobs. They were ‘the proof’ she was doing her job well. It made her realize she’s a professional artist now. Furthermore, building an online portfolio helped spice up her confidence level as well, because it shows her entire oeuvre.
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In line with this, her favorite jobs are those she does for her own sake, rather than for commercial purposes. She feels like the commercial projects ask for some kind of replication of her earlier work or as a derivative of other artists’ works. The illustrations she loves most? Those are the ones she draws by observing an object, created at one single moment in time. When creating these types of drawings, time seems to stand still. In the end, Goren declares in many interviews that she lives just to be happy. And that’s what life’s about. And as long as illustrating makes her happy, she will follow this path. We have nothing to add.
Check out Leah’s work below.
@leahreenagoren
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Quite impressive, don’t you think? Also check out our sections dedicated to photography and art or our section devoted to impressive women. We bet you’ll like it.
Source: booooooom.com
