I am over the moon to have Nicky in our Inspiring Creatives series. Nicky creates the most unique photo art, multi-layered and deeply interesting. You could spend hours looking at her work, discovering and being surprised at the wonderful treasures hidden in the layers. I absolutely love this quote from her interview below on finding your style – “Your style will evolve and change over time and after many hundreds of pieces of art or photos you take and it will find you, you won’t need to look for it. If you are seeking it, it’s usually too early. Simply create, keep creating, improving and be patient.” – I hope you enjoy this interview on what keeps her pushing forward in her creativity as much as I did! xoxo Denise

Tell me a bit about your background and what inspires you to be creative.

My name is Nicky Jameson, photographer, Digital Artist, Memory Keeper. I am from London UK and based in Toronto, Canada where I’ve lived for several years. I create emotive Photo Art cityscapes and digital paintings using my photographs which I blend with grunge textures and artsy layers. I create these from my heart’s truth and my own experiences…Missing the beautiful imperfections and alluring grit of my hometown of London, I take that feeling of a surge of love, sentimentality, and nostalgia and channel it into creating photo-artistic memories steeped in emotion, connection, time and a sense of Place. Fans and owners of my art tend to hold London or Toronto close to their hearts, whether they’re longtime expats, repeat visitors, or fond historians, we share a special connection to these two cities. I am daily inspired to create art by my mission, my clients, and my determination to daily live a creative life.

What started your photographic journey?

A photographer of several years, I always wanted to do something different with my photos. It’s one of the reasons I enjoyed winter photography…. Everything looks so unusual and this is where I was initially drawn. This was also a way to make the best of the very long Toronto winters. I liked my photos to be “arty” so I’d play around with filters, presets, tones, HDR and anything else to create a moody feel and express my feelings and emotions in my photos. I became serious about my photography in 2013 when my dad died. My husband bought me a “proper” DSLR to take my mind off my sadness. During that traumatic time, I walked around my hometown London, UK taking photographs of places I knew and loved. This focus on taking photographs helped me. I decided nothing in life was guaranteed, time waited for no one and it was time to get serious about my art photography. I knew that I had “an eye” for a unique angle and portraying emotion and I enjoyed exploring the stories and history of the places I shot plus I had strong connections to my home. Shortly after that I held my first art show and started selling a few of my photographs and was also a finalist in a local Business Improvement Association photography contest for Waterfront Photography with my photography displayed along the Toronto Waterfront for two years. My husband then got me a mat cutter for Christmas and set about I framing and matting my photography prints often using found frames from goodwill shops.

After a while, I began feeling my photos were becoming a bit predictable…I was feeling limited. How could I bring something different and more artistic to my expression and reach more people with what I felt and wanted to say? Around that time two life-changing things happened. On an artist’s business semester I learned how to become comfortable about my work by sharing my hearts truth, and how my life lessons and experiences shaped my journey and the reason I created my art photography as it was at this time. It was run by artist mentor Ann Rea, who taught artists the importance of creating value over and above my art through serving a mission and a target audience. This revolutionized my entire approach to my photography, which itself was about to change… to better express my message. It was about to become Photo Art.

Just as I was completing my business semester in 2016 the second life-changing thing happened… I discovered the Photo Artistry Course taught by Sebastian Michaels. It was perfect timing. There I learned how to extend my photography beyond a photograph using Photoshop and other powerful tools. I had always been intimidated by Photoshop, using it only for minor edits and yet within weeks I was creating artwork from my photos, blending them grunge textures, distressed papers, and brushes.

I narrowed my focus in line with my mission – and told my stories in my urban cityscape and landscape photo artwork. I was still taking photographs, only using them differently. I became part of an elite international group of talented (and like-minded) artists and my photography became the start of my creations rather than an end in itself. “Messing up” or “distressing” my photos, blending them with textures, creating painterly effects and layering in grunge and artistic embellishments opened up a universe of creativity for me and I still feel I have only scratched the surface of what’s possible and whom I can impact with my art. My fear of Photoshop (other than for editing) disappeared as I created the art I’d always wanted to create. I’ve been published for the 5th time in the stellar digital art magazine: Living the Photo Artistic Life – a testament to the impact photo art has had on my creative journey as a Digital Artist.

What drives you to keep growing creativity?

This gift of creativity, my mission and being able to create art I love and to be able to touch people with my message and artistic vision. Creativity compels me to push past my imagined limitations and prove to myself that with a lot of hard work, persistence, and patience I can make this a creative life every day.

To continue growing creatively as a photographer and photo artist, I am always learning new techniques and approaches to my photo art. In addition to my grunge art, I’m learning digital painting in a range of different mediums and combining that with my grunge layered and textured approach. I’ve learned to use an iPadPro (my first-ever Apple product) as one of my creative tools. I aim to master my craft and as a digital artist enjoy the exploration and journey. Remembering stories, keeping and celebrating memories, creating that sense of place, drawing my audience into my compositions, to dream their own special dreams through our shared experiences and connections is a big motivator for me to keep growing creatively.

I’m also motivated by my fabulous clients. While I love creating art (at least most of the time!) it’s extra special to me when someone makes my work part of their life and mirrors back to you the feelings and emotions I had when creating the work. It never gets old. I love making my clients feel happy and inspired and I am grateful to them for sharing their heart with me. It’s a pleasure and an honor to serve them through my photo artistry. It makes this creative gift real in a very special way. Continuous creative growth is a perfect way to nurture it.

What or who has been the biggest influence on your creativity and why?

I have so many influences that it’s impossible to pick just one. I’ll just say for starters my creative purpose and mission. Then my business and art mentors, my incredibly supportive fellow artists, the amazingly talented designers (including 2LilOwls) who inspire me with the beautiful textures I use in my work, artists who have come centuries before me…my own challenges and life experiences, my favorite music… the beauty and grittiness of my hometown London as well as the specialness of my adopted home in Toronto. I am also influenced by stories of struggle and overcoming against the odds.

What do you do differently to bring authenticity to your art?

I create from my heart’s truth and remain inspired by my creative purpose and mission every single day. I wake up and feel energized that there’s a new opportunity to create something new, to say something, to evoke emotions, create memories or simply be led in an unexplored direction.

For some of us living abroad away from our birth-home, we can become disconnected from home and those special traditions, quirks, and memories. It may be challenging to go home when we want to and when we do perhaps it’s limited to short visits to enjoy family, places and things often taken for granted. Being familiar with these feelings and emotions I’ve made this my mission – encouraging us expats to be kind to ourselves and rather than hiding from the feelings and nostalgia of missing home, we can “go home” and bring back those fond memories instantly whenever we want through my photo artistic art. Celebrating that connection, I dig deep into my own feelings and experiences and offer them through my photo artistry. Memories become stories which become authentic and real conversations; like a city’s emotion and nostalgia expressed through my layered and nuance grunge photo art.

What has been the most challenging part of creating your art?

I’d have to say balancing my creative time with my full-time day job, as I build my creative enterprise. I call it my “5-9 Weekender.” Time is my most precious commodity and managing my weekends and evenings so that I have time to create art regularly is one I wrestle with daily. It’s important to ensure I get the right amount of sleep and relaxation and so putting my health first is paramount.

I also do my own marketing, writing, adding work to my site, posting on social media, and newsletter to keep in touch with clients and fans and introduce my new art. To help me balance and prioritize things I have a plan for my dreams and goals (a plan that changes, but it is a plan), and I bullet journal. In my bullet journal, I document and record pretty much all my life, my ups, downs, accomplishments, thoughts about creative goals I’d like to achieve, tasks, trackers, lessons learned, inspiring quotes, ideas for art compositions and more. It helps keep me accountable to myself and I can look back on a week, a month a year and see my story unfold as well as track my goals. I encourage anyone to bullet journal as it is alarming how quickly forget our accomplishments. When you write down one accomplishment each day, no matter how small, in a week you are feeling encouraged and that helps more than you might imagine. I feel the act of writing (I use a fountain pen with colored inks) is an amazing way to open creative channels to new ideas.

Creating my photo art is also my way of relaxing I feel it’s important to preserve this. While it’s not yet quite time to quit my day job and my art is my “side-hustle,” my creative enterprise is underway little by little and I am very excited about it. For now, my work supports my art even though it’s challenging balancing it all. I didn’t wait to begin my creative journey because there was never going to be a “right time.” I simply started… and I encourage other artists and photographers not to wait for a right time or permission… if you have a dream, begin it today.

What was your biggest fear when you started to follow your passion and how have you overcome that?

Probably my biggest fear, when I started taking my photography seriously and creating art from it, was that, even though I loved it, maybe no one else would. After all, there were so many much better photographers creating amazing photographs. In certain photography groups arguing about technical equipment seemed to be terribly important to photographers (and terribly boring to me). I was interested in how to take and create photos with emotion and feeling, most photographers appeared fixated on who could get the best shot and exposure – and who had the biggest most expensive lenses! It left me cold.

I overcame the fear by taking the photos that I liked. Putting my own feelings into them and later experimenting to see if I could sell them, at first in a local arts market, then online. I still remember making my first sale… it was a much better feeling than fear. I left a lot of photography groups that did not serve me. I started blogging and making more photo art prints, got it framed and sold it. I learned more about marketing, focus and being comfortable having conversations about my mission and why I create my art. Once I started creating photo art my confidence increased because it was something different, like a road less traveled. Instead of being apologetic about enhancing my photos I celebrated it and was bold and deliberate in creating art from my photographs. In doing so I no longer felt limited, I no longer feared the “purists” or the “techno-snobs.” I still went for a well-composed shot, however, it didn’t have to be perfect since I was going to blend it with other photos textures and paint anyway. I joined a group of like-minded supportive photo artists and continued to enjoy creating and expanding my artistic horizons and haven’t looked back.

As artists we will always have some residue of one kind of fear or the other, I believe it’s fine to acknowledge it but not allow it to control us. We must learn to listen to our own heart and calling, and realize we are each on our own journey. Knowing ourselves, believing in ourselves (instead of listening to what others happen to think of us), learning, getting support and taking small steps as actions will conquer fear. And let’s face it, most of our fears never happen anyway.

How has embracing your creativity impacted your life?

Embracing my mission means living a creative and photo artistic life and it has changed how I approach my life, how I see things and indeed how I approach each day. I live a life of creative purpose. I center my life around creating, making time to create something every day, even if it’s only ten minutes. I create from my heart’s truth without being concerned as to whether anyone likes it or not. What’s important is that I like it.

I’ve been able to find my “tribe” – people who get what I am saying in my art and value it. They’ve become clients and fans. I consider the photographs I take and explore what new perspectives I can get to take into my creations. It means I am always looking at how I can expand my creative horizons and serve my clients by continually learning new techniques and taking advantage of technology and tools to create and enhance my work, whether this is learning to create art on my iPadPro, digital painting or looking at different ways to add value and talk to my audience about my work. Embracing myself as a digital artist has also freed me from seeking the impossible quest for perfection; now I make a photograph part of a greater creation rather than an end in and of itself. I am almost always going to mess it up and do something to it, whether it’s adding textures, extracting elements from it or turning it into an impressionist painting or watercolor sketch. My decision to focus frees me from trying to appeal to anyone and everyone which is a good thing because it’s not possible.

What do you do when you find yourself in a rut or you are feeling uninspired?

Most of the time I will try and create something different or I focus on something entirely different. I’ll paint something on my IpadPro, try out a new app, or throw some photos and textures together to see what happens. I’ll put on my favorite Spotify playlists and try and sketch (I am lousy at sketching but trying to improve). I’ll take my mobile phone and go for a walk to see what I find, write in my journal or listen to an inspiring podcast. I’ll sometimes watch YouTube videos… although it’s easy to go down rabbit holes with them so I am careful. YouTube is amazing for learning. I also like to read books or articles about people from all walks of life who have hit dry spots, overcame challenges, failed in some way and achieved their dreams and goals. Most of all I find that actually creating something, anything, often pulls me back out of a rut. And I have to admit I never like to give in to the “rut” feeling in case I never get out. That may be a fear. I am so grateful for this gift of creativity that I don’t want to waste it by not using it even if it’s for something small.

If you could share one truth… from your creative heart to ours… what would you want us to know?

Whether it’s photography, photo artistry or painting create your art from your heart’s truth. Know your heart’s truth and be totally comfortable with it because that’s where we connect with others at our deepest level. What personal lessons has life shown you? What have you overcome in your life and how has that shaped you? Boldly allow your truths to come through in your work. I believe when we express fully this through our art or photography we take it to a different dimension and it is uniquely personal.

Create lots and lots of art. I’m talking thousands of photos or compositions. Aim for mastery of your craft yet let it be play, and if you do want to sell your work look for ways to add value over and above it. Forget about things like style and equipment and technical squabbles, most of the time they are a waste of time. Your style will evolve and change over time and after many hundreds of pieces of art or photos you take and it will find you, you won’t need to look for it. If you are seeking it, it’s usually too early. Simply create, keep creating, improving and be patient.

What’s next? Where do you see your artistic vision leading you?

I see it leading me to a creative and fulfilling life of happiness, where I continue creating meaningful, impactful art I love that contributes to our happiness. I have a book project in the works and of course, traveling home to London for play and stories will remain a big part of my life and art. I’m broadening my photo-artistic memory-making by learning new things which could open up new and fun creative opportunities as I continue showing up.

Do you have any tips, tricks or advice for those just getting started out in photography?

Enjoy the fun of shooting and creating, avoid getting bogged down with what others think of you. Follow your heart and avoid comparing yourself or your work to others. Learn excellent composition and master the rules of photography well enough to break them on occasion. They will serve you well. Take thousands of photos and get used to culling all but the best of them. Start with the best camera you can afford (the cameras in mobile phones are now blazingly good as any camera’s) and learn to feel comfortable with how it works. Avoid getting into polarized argumentative “criticism” photography groups and wasting time arguing about technical stuff…when you are starting out they will sap your confidence and you will become discouraged. Find groups that are genuinely supportive. Support others, offer encouragement and never offer critiques unless requested. If you want critiques, take time to learn how to ask for and receive it. Get used to posting your work on social media (it will boost your confidence) however avoid allowing social media likes, comments, and followers or whatever’s the “flavor of the month” to determine how you feel. Learn, but always trust yourself. Do You. Keep creating.

What is the one piece of photography equipment you absolutely cannot live without?

Has to be full-frame Sony Alpha 7 and 1.8/55mm Zeiss lens.