I’ve been traveling around selling my work at festivals and stuff for almost 10 years. My BF and I have known each other for 5 years but started dating about 6 months ago.
I’ve really been busting my ass to get ready for one of my biggest festivals this year in May. So right now I am working on about 5 paintings. Lately he’s been asking me to do things like add his tattoos to people in my paintings, etc.
I am currently doing a painting of the Mad Hatter. A long time acquaintance of mine requested it and wants to buy it when it’s done. And this guy dresses up at the Mad Hatter regularly and he really goes all out with his costume. So, I made the painting look kinda like him. My bf has a face tattoo. It’s small, above his eyebrow and off the side, toward the hairline. I posted a progress pic of the Hatter painting, and BF messages me and asked me to add his tattoo to my painting. He has been doing this stuff a lot lately and it’s actually getting a little irritating.
My BF is a really creative person, also. He was a tattoo artist for years. He paints too. He also does things like painting furniture in artistic ways, etc.
I already plan on talking to him about it next time we see each other. I just want to know from all of you, is this something I have a right to be annoyed about?
TL;DR BF keeps asking me to make the people I paint look like him.
19 comments
> is this something I have a right to be annoyed about?
Yes. Because you are making a commissioned piece for a *paying* customer. Your customer doesn’t want a mad hatter who looks like your boyfriend. If he wants something dedicated to him, he can buy it or he can request it to be his gift for Christmas or his birthday.
Kind of. I think this is something you have a right to ask him to stop. And it’s okay that you are annoyed. But it’s good to not be too annoyed at behavior that you have not yet asked somebody to stop doing. His behavior is a bad idea, but it isn’t clearly awful. It’s not something that might not just be an honest mistake. So, just start by calmly telling him you want him to stop doing that, and then if he stops, there is no relationship problem here and good communication will have worked.
Really imposing and rude that he wants to be inserted into your work that someone else even ordered! It’s really cringe how he doesn’t see how this is inappropriate as an artist himself.
Yes.
Try:
“It makes me happy that my work inspires you to be creative but I need to do what I need to do for my customers. I’m on a tight deadline.
Why don’t you use that inspiration for a peice of your own?”
I think that really he gets inspired and then gets lazy and wants you to do his ideas for him
There’s a simple answer to this – work it into the conversation that you’re thinking about making the Mad Hatter painting relatively sexy (or perhaps simply “handsome”).
He’ll ask you if you’re going to add the tattoo. Tell him “no”.
If he then objects to the fact the tattoo isn’t in the picture but nothing else, you know he’s merely vain and wants himself depicted in paintings.
If he becomes jealous and outraged and accuses you of being attracted to your Mad Hatter friend, you’ll know that the real reason he’s asking for these changes is jealousy – he’s believes it’s appropriate to “manage” his jealousy by restricting your freedom to interact with people.
Precisely what you do with the resulting knowledge is up to you.
To make it apart of a piece for work he should know not to impose that however of it’s a just for fun piece I think he just wants to be a part of your loved activity maybe it’s him just saying “hey I would like that same attention to detail
Has your boyfriend always been self-centered, or is this new?
Your art is yours. Tell him to fuck off or draw a stick figure and write his name under it
Honestly he sounds really insecure. In this case it’s inappropriate because the painting is a commission and your friend likely doesn’t want it to look like your boyfriend. More generally, there’s nothing weird about it if YOU want to do it. But I think it’s weird to ask you to do it, unless you’re painting something specifically as a gift for him. Definitely talk to him about it.
Tell him to commission a work from you. Then you can go to town on his likeness. If he wants to be an insert in anyone else’s PAID piece, tell him to fuck off.
I feel like it’s acceptable to ask once or twice for a personal Easter egg in your paintings, wanting to add a facial tattoo, the stupidest kind of tattoo, is taking the piss. Him wanting to be your muse isn’t wrong it’s just extremely egotistical of him so early in the relationship.
You have your own inspiration towards your art , that no body should put their nose in to make it about themselves.
Just as you wouldn’t ask him to add one of your features to a tattoo that he would do for a paying customer his, he shouldn’t ask that of you.
Yes, that’s weird and annoying! You’re an artist, you don’t need pressure about what and how to create. You need your creative process that is unique to you to come through. No one gets to force themselves into being your muse.
I mean to me the question here is not the *content* but the *tone.* Like I understand him feeling like it would be a really cute and sweet gesture and would make him feel loved and appreciated, maybe even saw somebody else putting their partner into art and was like “aw I want that” and was more forward than most of us would be about asking for what we want. Or he could be pushy and whiny and needling. Hard to say from just the content.
And I mean, you’re gonna talk to him. To be clear I don’t believe that there’s such a thing as a “right” to hold a feeling. Feelings are feelings, the question isn’t whether or not you have them but what you do with them. Do you let your feelings control you or do you experience them and decide how to act with their input. To me the issue is as another poster put it, these are *commissions,* so the interest of the commissioner has to come first.
Quote him your rates for commissioned work.
I would see if you can defuse it with a quip/compliment as part of the refusal. Like “nah, this subject isn’t handsome enough to wear your things” – you have full authority over your work, but don’t assume the ask is even meant to be serious – it might just be a conversation starter. You might also sketch up something that satirizes him in a ridiculous way and keep a running set of add-ons to his satire image?
If the ask was needy and pushy, and you feared a fight from flatly turning it down, then it would be a problem. But if he’s not ordinarily controlling and selfish I would find a way to poke fun at the whole thing.
“This is my art, that I create for the people that have asked for it. I will create it in the way that I interpret their request. If you want me to create something for you…. I can do that. But I need you to stop asking me to incorporate things about yourself into my art.”
Boom, done.
Be up front, be assertive, it shouldn’t even be a problem for him. This a boundary, enforce it.
Yes, it’s weird, be annoyed.
But… about malicious compliance.
Paint him in every picture – always. Hundreds of versions of him. Make it characteristic of your art. Always recognizable by him being in it, surreal versions, zombie versions, silly versions, always him. If it’s meant to be a portrait of someone else, paint him ‘photo bombing’ it in the background.