My art brings in no money. But it gives me something to look forward to each week. Every face is just a personal challenge to draw by hand. There is no competition with anyone except my paint brush (画笔), blank canvas (画布) and my hand’s dexterity (画功). And it costs almost nothing to maintain this hobby for mental enrichment.
An artist/creator’s life is very tough. Nobody has been known to becoming rich going down this career path. Now AI makes it worse by stealing all their jobs! So, I’ve never consider turning professional. It sounds better to remain as a freelance hobbyist than be known as a struggling artist!
My art don’t sell. So I need to keep my day-job.
I just keep working and drawing to keep my mind alert and my hands nimble. I believe if I keep doing, I’ll keep improving.
When I come home from work, I am often deflated and flat after dealing with difficult people at office. When I draw and paint, I come away feeling inflated and alive! I think doing something you love or of great interest is a good way to re-fuel for one’s mental health in today’s stressful world.
There is a difference between shyness and shame.
I feel shy to show my poor artwork if it does not meet my own quality standard. I feel shameful to copy others’ artworks to call them my own creation. But AI has neither shame or shyness. AI has no feeling nor soul. That’s why they are free to use.
There is a difference between shyness and fear.
In the past, I often fear buyers would reject
my artworks for being too realistic with too accurate likeness of the subject.
I told them I’m just an art-maker, not a plastic surgeon. What I see is what they
get. Now for commissioned work, I’d add a no-refund policy with payment upfront
before I start my paint brush. It’s take it or leave it. No money back!
I rarely accept public gigs unless the offer is irresistible.
In my old school days, I had failed in many other subjects but scored high marks for my artworks. Sometimes, my teachers showed my artworks around in class and called out my name at the school hall assembly to give me book prizes for my art. I tried to walk hurriedly, avoided eye contacts or just looked elsewhere to avoid stares.
In the past, I was reluctant to show my art. To my quality standard, they were not good enough. Now I just publish them freely for entertainment as many still appreciate this artform and take the time reading my stories even though they don’t always believe them or agree with me.
Art can change nothing. At the most, art can only mock biased policies, raise awareness on key-topics and perhaps arouse some thoughts. To many, art is just visual entertainment. To the creator, art is a display of accumulated years of skill practices. Now AI wants to emulate these skills by stealing them & taking short-cuts. Damn!
Copyright laws offer zero protection to artists unless one has the financial power to fight big tech-companies & stop them from scraping and stealing public data for their own use to make money without paying anything to original creators. I’ve little concern as nobody copies from a nobody. And I have my own ways to make my art less searchable online. But ST insisted on using my real name for my story. Damn!
I gave my caricature story to ST to add some color and vibrancy to its dull content, not expecting it to be published but it did. ST said they are now giving out a small “token” in appreciation of my contribution and to buy over my story’s copyright (indirectly to stop me from re-selling, re-posting it unless I pay for their permit licence). This explains why no artist gives away their work to the press for free!
The recent experiment shows that very few people read the local
newspapers these days. Only 4 fans/friends picked up my story and responded. Lesson
learned: if you want exposure on your stuff, don’t depend on local newspapers
alone. This explains why there are so little contents in newspapers today! I wonder
how they make money.
Journaling through art
Caricature is a specialized form of art that often brings humour and satire by capturing the “essence” of a person by exaggerating or magnifying their most distinct traits or physical features. In my secondary school days, I was often fascinated by these hilarious caricatures published in newspapers and magazines. I kept wondering how these artists were able to use just simple forms, shapes and few strokes of the pen to create “representations” of a person’s face that were easily recognizable by others. In the old days before the internet and social media, I would often cut out these caricature drawings and keep them as drawing references. In my spare time after school work, I would doodle on scrap papers and emulate these artists’ drawing styles.
(Read the entire article @The Sunday Times, dated 28June2026): https://eresources.nlb.gov.sg/main/sphnewspapers
Each caricature is taken as a personal challenge. Completing each challenge is a joy felt within, like getting a dose of dopamine from finishing a marathon race. Such ‘feel-good’ effect re-fills the motivating fuel and drives me to look forward to the next challenge. Creating caricatures keeps my mind busy, my hands nimble and to feel alive. The legendary American country music singer, Willie Nelson once said, “I think I need to keep being creative, not to prove anything but because it makes me happy just to do it…I think trying to be creative, keeping busy, has a lot to do with keeping you alive.” I think he is probably right.
As AI grabs and eats into paid creative and artistic works, more people are taking up the same skills-drawing, writing, crafts-in their own time, for no money, just to be and feel human. In art, artificial means something is fabricated, not created. This explains why nobody puts their names on their ‘artificial’ works.
One AI expert told me: “The risk is not moving fast. It’s standing still while everyone else moves.”
I said, just let them. Always, I let others 冲(rush) first as I
step behind to watch the situation from afar & think about my next move.
I’m not the ‘chiong’ type. This explains why I cannot get any free-stuff
when donors give them out. I can only get ‘left-overs’, if any. Sigh.
I trained my mind to believe that all hand-made stuff has high value vs those low-value stuff fabricated by AI. This is why hand-made craftworks cost more. Unfortunately, DIY-users don’t think this way. Sigh.
I asked AI to interpret this artwork and state what message is it trying to convey. AI’s lengthy narratives just want to impress & make things complex!).
Co-pilot’s output:
This piece conveys that life and art gain meaning through novelty and exploration. By exaggerating Norton’s features and pairing them with his words, the artist suggests that creativity, whether in acting or visual art, is fueled by curiosity and the willingness to embrace new experiences.
My artworks don’t sell. My caricatures have never won any award. It does not matter. I just keep going.
I
still want to keep my mind active using art for storytelling, turning visuals
into narratives to express my thoughts, emotions, meaning and imagination. All
narratives are written by a human, not AI. I don’t want to be a lower-value
human!
Can AI express their own thoughts? I think probably not. They are just hallucinating or giving out answers mined from their data bank that copied from others without their knowledge!
The more we rely on AI, the more we lose our critical thinking
skills, cognitive capability and decision-making ability.
With the advent of AI and cheap tools, anyone can now produce caricatures
easily and fast without learning how to draw. I still prefer the traditional
and old-fashioned way of creating art from nothing. I still find that drawing by
hand is an enjoyable process and it always thrill me to see the final artwork
emerges gradually, stroke by stroke of the paint brush on a blank canvas.
