Meet Darcie Blake | Artist, Educator & Community Organizer

We had the good fortune of connecting with Darcie Blake and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Darcie, is there something that you feel is most responsible for your success?
I think the most important factor that helped get my art into the hands of people who appreciate it is my ability to be authentic. I don’t bullshit my art process or my personality, I am who I am, and who I am is a weirdo smelly cat lady. Well, hopefully not smelly, but I’m open about my emotional and mental process behind my art, and I’m honest about being a person with anxiety. These traits have played key factors in why people are drawn to my work– my art style is scribbly and frantic, but vibrant and relatable. I used to apply huge pressure on myself to make something really big and complex, that shouts a huge message, but really what I’ve found to be most enjoyable for me to make, and what draws people in the most, is keeping my work simple and to the point, i.e. a cat, some flowers, a lot of color and a mantra. For a long time I struggled to believe in myself, but through practicing non-judgement in my creative process, I found my voice. I use my art to remind myself of the power I have, and I share it because I know it can inspire or bring a smile to someone else out there.

Another reason my work has been successful is just that… it’s cute! I really value cuteness– there is an awkwardness and honesty to it. When I think of something that’s cute, it implies a strong sense of wonder and imagination, an appreciation for my inner child. For a long time, I really tried to push my inclination towards cuteness away, but my authentic self wants to lean into it. I want people to see my artwork as a really fun result of a deeply personal, therapeutic process. I love when people look at my art and laugh out loud, or they say, “I’m the same way”, or especially, “Oh that’s so cute!”. I’ve had a lot of conversations with people about my art, and the thing that I hear the most is that my work inspires people to want to get to know their inner kid, and allow that sense of self to guide their own art practice the way it has for mine.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
My art is unique because right now, I’m not worrying about perfect line work or perfect perspective. If I spend too long worrying about that stuff, I end up stopping myself from making anything. I pride myself on my sense of humor and ability to self reflect– I take myself as seriously as I need to, and I think that shows up in my artwork. I really enjoy loose lines and quick stream of consciousness dialogue within art, like David Shrigley’s or Nathaniel Russell’s work. I think there is a certain loosey goosey flow to my work that people are drawn to. And I know that I’m not the first person to draw cats and chickens and strawberries, but I REALLY like drawing simple cute stuff and I come at it with this sort of frantic silly style that’s my own.

But in order to get to where I am today, I gotta acknowledge that I had to go through a period of making very dark art. A lot of blood and tears (literally!) went into the art I was making ten years ago. Much of that art revolved around trying to understand death, mental illness, and my early understanding of feminism. I was really experimental in my mediums– I’d glue used tissues from panic attacks onto collages… or paint with blood. It was all kind of whack, looking back on it now, but I cringe less at that than I used to because I had to make that art in order to get to where I’m at currently. I will say that big, poppy flowers have always made an appearance, so I guess that creative little girl inside of me never really left, she just had to work through a bunch of stuff first.

I’ve always wanted to be an artist since I was a kid– I have a big “All About Me” poster from when I was in kindergarten or something and my tagline underneath my name says “I Am an Artist”. I believe that many people are naturally creative and in my work with preschool children and toddler, there’s a real natural confidence when they produce art. But as kids get older, probably around middle school age, they become aware of how peers and adults tend to make more note of technical skill rather than positively reinforcing creativity. I don’t have anything against technical skill, but in my own life experience and what I’ve noticed in working with children and teens, kids who want to become artists and enjoy making art feel this sense of insurmountable comparison against their peers which can drive them away from making art. It breaks my heart how often I hear kids and adults say, “I’m not an artist,” or “I wish I could be creative”. Anyone can and should make art if they want. I’m so glad I stopped listening to that voice that told me that I couldn’t make art because I wasn’t good enough and just went for it because I knew I had something creative I wanted to get out. I’m glad that I’ve always, at the very least, doodled, because that helped me to get to where I am now, just bringing doodles into bigger form.

I’m proud of how my understanding of color has come along the past few years. I was at Montserrat College of Art for a year and took this really incredible color course that had a great impact on how I understand and use color. I’ve gotten a lot better at choosing a palette for a piece of art. I love purple, turquoise, green, yellow… Colors that you’d see in “The Last Unicorn” or “The Powerpuff Girls”– palettes that remind me of being a little girl in the 2000s. And I’m also proud that I’ve been able to put myself out there to sell my work– I do relatively well as a small Instagrammer, but the like notification is a lto different than selling someone my art in real time. That scared the shit out of me! Thinking of sitting at a table then watching people give me the old look over and pass my work by… I’m an artist, I have an ego after all! So something that helped me move past that was my work with Wrong Brain– I volunteered with them for about ten years. A lot of that volunteer work meant doing booths at events, which I got really good at, like talking to the public about the org’s mission and events, setting up and breaking down, what sells the best, etc. As a resident artist at the space, I started bringing my art and other resident’s work to Wrong Brain booths to see how people would react to my work in real life, and that helped me get over getting passed by, and I figured out that I could successfully sell my work. Yay!

What I really want the world to know about me is that my brain is run by a little cat who always has the zoomies!

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
I was born and raised in Dover, NH, and if I’m lucky, I’ll be able to afford to die here someday… but this brand new upscale boutique just opened up downtown that sells flimsy t-shirts with the word “DOVAH” on them for like $78 a piece so realistically I might need to think about cheaper gravesite property. But that’s a bridge I hopefully won’t need to cross for quite some time. We’ll skip that place on the IT because Dover is a largely working-class city and I don’t know a single person who could afford their $200 embroidered sweatshirts. Anyway here’s a list of local businesses that I like who have more awareness of their local demographic. But in all seriousness, I am really proud to see how much Dover has grown in the past ten years– when I was growing up, alternative music or arts venues didn’t really exist, and now there’s a great selection of them. People move from Boston or Portsmouth to Dover– one, because it’s still kind of affordable, but two, because there’s been such a wonderful influx of art and culture. The Arts Commission and Dover Main Street work really hard, as have alternative art orgs like Wrong Brain, Sue’s Space, Avalon North, and DRIFT Art House.

Dover just had the annual Apple Harvest Day, which draws in something crazy like 20k people every year. The past years post-pandemic have gotten really good with the vendor selection– way more artists who are doing cool alternative stuff have started to show up. I feel really connected to New England at Apple Harvest Day! You find pretty much everything you’d expect to see at a town festival– apple cider, local businesses, organizations from around the area, all that jazz. I always end up running into every single person I have ever met in my life at Apple Harvest Day (the perks of being a lifelong townie!). I would love to vend someday. That happens the first weekend of October. It’s definitely worth checking out.

I love Flight Coffee, Chapel + Main and Auspicious Brew, all in downtown Dover. Flight is a great cafe that has a test kitchen and hosts a variety of music shows. They have huge murals around the place that are all giant chalk drawing portraits– they are also a big supporter of local artists and my partner Alex and I painted their windows this past spring, and they’ve started hosting this great vending event called Mish Mash Market.

Chapel + Main, which I very affectionally call Chappy, also plays host to music shows and they make fantastic mocktails and have a revolving menu that changes from season to season. Ben Lord, who owns Chapel, is a huge support of the local arts and I had the great honor to be one of the five local artists to create a painting on a huge slab on concrete that’s displayed on the outside of the building. Chapel also hosts an arts and crafts bazaar called Arts and Drafts (I LOVE PUNS).

Finally, Auspicious Brew makes kombucha in-house as well as an incredible lemonade, and… they also host music every Saturday night. It’s almost as if all three establishments have something in common but I just can’t place my finger on it….

I love heading to Lost Coast in Kittery, Maine. They have a really cool selection of vintage toys, books, clothes, furniture, doodads and trinkets… and Jon and Tiffany Lessard, the owners, are extremely cool and fun to talk to. They’ve hosted comedy nights in Portsmouth in the past. I always win at Christmas when I buy my gifts from them.

Oh man I could also spend hours in Wentworth Greenhouse in Rollinsford, NH. It’s a huge beautiful greenhouse and I kind of suck at keeping plants alive but I feel motivated to try when I’m in there. They have incredible displays and they take really good care of their plants. The staff are super passionate and knowledgeable about everything and they don’t make me feel like a notorious plant serial killer.

Ummmm I also love the Hampton Beach strip, Hampton NH. Especially in the summer, when it’s super crowded. They do a talent show every year in their pavilion which I’ve never participated in but is a lot of fun to watch, which they allow the public to do for free. One time I saw someone get carried off in a stretcher and I think maybe they almost drowned or something. I don’t think they died because there wasn’t anything in the news later. Sometimes my boyfriend does little kick flips and skate tricks off of it in the off season. The off season is a lot of fun too because you’re less likely to see a possible drown victim get wheeled out, but also because the strip gets a lot quieter and there’s this group of girls and women who ride their horsies down the beach. I’ve always wanted a pony.

And because I love supporting small businesses on the Seacoast, I have to talk about the Somersworth Target. You know what a Target is like, I don’t have to explain it, I just like it. My favorite local major corporation! I go there when I feel sad.

Website: www.darcieblake.com

Instagram: @darcie.blake

Youtube: www.youtube.com/@darcieblake

Other: https://linktr.ee/darcieblake

Image Credits
Audrey Cannon took the portrait photo of me in my studio