Passion Projects, Niches, and the Internet

It's a weird time to create. I still think we should do it.

Me, dreaming up what the world would look like if we all took a chance on our wildest, coolest, super-particular ideas

This conversation with Isaac came right on time for me. Luckily, I had the fortune of sort of knowing Isaac before this interview, an Internet Friend™, if you will, and I’ve always been really interested in and delighted by their pursuit of literally everything. Whether it’s creating podcasts, tote bags, zines, etc. - you name it, Isaac’s probably taken a stab at it.

When they told us more about their vision for the art scene in Detroit and the possibility of facilitating more travel and an international community for artists, not only did I feel the need to pick up some kind of formal art practice to secure my seat on that flight (half a year in Brazil?...yes) but I also felt connected to the ethos behind it.

It feels like a weird time to pursue anything creative. While the sheer number of tools at many of our disposal’s makes it easier than ever to gain visibility and monetize your work, there also comes the nagging feeling that you need to “build your brand” (a phrase I could gladly go the rest of my life without hearing) and make it as marketable and appealing as possible to the largest possible audience.

So quickly, the hyper-specific, personal choices that make your thing uniquely yours dissipate under the umbrella of relatability. Does this make sense to anyone? Regardless, welcome to my inner monologue.

To be clear, I don’t think there’s any revolutionary take here; Today, the measure of success for whatever we pursue seems to be visibility. There’s nothing objectively wrong with that. Subjectively, of course, it has a ton of issues, and it is fundamentally altering our brains and self-perception. But there’s a ton of great think pieces and research on that that smarter people than me have already done. I bring this up to say that knowing this is the culture we live in, I am really intrigued by and invested in the pursuit of deeply personal work. In this case, Isaac’s work is born of their family history and experience. Their vision for what they want to accomplish in the world is a combination of the community they were raised in and the communities they have chosen to become a part of. Obviously, they don’t need my stamp of approval- but I think that’s super fucking cool.

Similarly, I think that’s what led Grace and me to a project like As You Are. It’s a space where we can be deeply personal while also hoping to benefit the communities we both keep online and IRL. I hope this can be a space where I can experiment, share, and get things not quite right. I want to write things that make people think differently and things that make people think “that didn’t resonate” all the same. I just hope to “go for it,” if you will. I hope more of us can muster up the courage to create things we’ve never seen before. I think the world needs it.