Meet Dakota Drake

Today we’d like to introduce you to Dakota Drake.

Hi Dakota, so excited to have you on the platform. So before we get into questions about your work-life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today?
I’ve always been interested in art. I was encouraged from a young age by a few members of my family, who took me to museums and galleries whenever I visited and loved when I sent them my crayon drawings. Though my creative side was strong, there just weren’t any examples of living, working, successful artists within a hundred miles of where I grew up so I didn’t have any examples of “real people” making a living out of it.

I did however have a lot of small business owners and entrepreneurs around me that were fascinating and creating what seemed like great lives, so I went to school for entrepreneurship and international business. My first jobs were at chaotic, volatile little start-ups that could be fun, or could be stifling given the day, company, and position. I ended up doing freelance marketing on the side so that I could be a bit more creative and in charge of my own work.

2020 happened. I was laid off from my full-time position and tried freelancing full time, but given the mass layoffs everywhere, it quickly became apparent that the market was saturated with people doing exactly what I was doing, but better, cheaper, and with more skill. Besides that, I realized I wasn’t interested in any job posting I came across.

For fun that year, I’d also started posting the comics I doodled onto Instagram. I then started posting some of my old paintings, which I’d only made one or two of each year since college. When the stimulus checks arrived, I bought an iPad and started playing around with the digital art program Procreate.

In 2021, I designed a friend’s book cover for free. That, and the art I’d been making digitally, got me just enough experience to get another book cover job, this one actually paying. That gave me the confidence to put it out there on Facebook, “Does anyone want cheap art? I’m building a portfolio.” I was amazed at the response. Friends and family, and even a few strangers, asked me for art. It kept me busy for the rest of the year. More importantly, it made me feel like a real artist.

This year, my goals are to keep doing commissions, apply for artist residencies, sell prints online and in person at art fairs, find an agent for illustration work, all with the end goal of becoming a not-starving artist AND continuing to do what I love! Which is telling beautiful, weird, loving, strange stories through art.

I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle-free, but so far would you say the journey has been a fairly smooth road?
No, but it’s been smoother of a transition than I expected. The biggest struggles I have are my own distractibility, which leads me away from the commissions that I really should be working on, to the backyard or the internet. Also, I went to school for business, not art, so the artistic skill isn’t where I want it to be, but I’m working on it!

Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
I have no discernible style, in part because I’m still building my skills, but I joke that most of the work I’ve done in the last year is of video games and cats.

There have been others of course, but it feels sometimes like the majority of my commissions have been of video game characters and maps, and people’s pet cats. I get it. Cats are photogenic and I’m sure their Egyptian cat-god ancestors would be proud of them.

I used mixed media, acrylic paint, and digital tools to design and illustrate.

In terms of your work and the industry, what are some of the changes you are expecting to see over the next five to ten years?
I haven’t been in the industry very long, but I see a huge shift to creators building their skills and finding their audiences and clients in non-traditional ways.

I think artists will shift away from traditional art schools as both a way to learn their craft and get to know “the right people”, and move towards free online tutorials, and using social media platforms to find audiences rather than established galleries and collectors.

Nontraditional artists, like animators, craftspeople, cartoonists, and what have you, can reach much larger audiences than some of the best represented traditional artists nowadays. This isn’t anything profound or new; I think most of the world is moving into new models of creation and self-promotion.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.dakotadrake.com
• Instagram: @artbydakotadrake
• Facebook: @ArtByDakotaDrake
• Twitter: @Deekoter1