In Conversation with Bryan Beckon: “The Ideas of Competition”
“In Conversation With” is a brand new conversational interview series where we sit down with contemporary artists and discuss topics that are important to them.
(All conversations are recorded, and transcribed by BrassTuna.)
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BrassTuna: Hello Bryan
Thanks for talking with me today. Would you mind telling our readers a bit about yourself?
Bryan Beckon: “Hello readers, my name is Bryan Beckon and I am a multidisciplinary artist. I enjoy watching TV. I like reading, I like hanging out with friends, I enjoy making art ,,, and yeah that’s me.”
BrassTuna: Thank you.
Prior to us recording this we were having a very good conversation on many topics,, some of which will probably be tied into this, I assume. But today our topic is going to be surrounding the ideas of Competition in the art space.
Would you mind starting us off?
Bryan Beckon: “Competition in the art space…? I think its.. I think its necessary. I think there needs to be a sense of competition to allow people to push past themselves,,, and to attempt to,,,, and be challenged . I think challenges are very important for growth, like even these natural challenges that we have throughout life, or whatever someone may be facing. I think that those challenges, they allow for a moment to overcome something and be made a new.”
BrassTuna: I know we’ve had conversations on the ideas of competition in the art world, and I think when I interpret this topic of competition it’s more like on a personal level.
like whether or not the other person knows that I’m in competition with them, one of us is going to “succeed”,,, or you know “I’m in competition with you to have more shows” but you don’t know that.
Bryan Beckon: “Like we all? Or perhaps are you speaking very personal on your own situation of that?”
BrassTuna: I think it’s however you interpret it. When I interpret it, I think of competition as like, you know “I’m in competition with the people in my community to continue to grow,” you know? it’s a competition to see “who’s growing the fastest” or “who’s growing the most”,, whether or not I personally believe that, that’s a whole other thing. what do you think?
Bryan Beckon: “I think probably to each their own, because I think that type of mindset could perhaps allow someone to really go out of their way to get more shows, or be more productive, or to read more, or to think more. I think that those ideas are strange because, in a sense, I guess it depends on what someones going after..
If there’s someone who’s striving for similar things then,,,,
,,, perhaps gallery representation, or perhaps the recognition from,, from your contemporaries, or positions within certain areas that only allow for a few people to be there. I think that,,,,
,,, I love to lead with cooperation, and friendly competition, of “lets both work hard to get to where we want to go” , but not with animosity, and not with jealousy and envy.
I think back to when I was in football, in which I was able to really outperform the person on the other side, one for my for my teammates, and also because,,,, like that’s what we gotta do right now, we’re at battle. This is this is war so one of us will be defeated. yet I think there’s a type of humility and compassion that can still be involved within that. where we congratulate the winning of others and not belittle the ones who we have “surpassed.”
BrassTuna: Have you ever had a conversation with somebody in the art space about the idea of competition?
Bryan Beckon: “Not really, I feel like in my head I’m like my only competition. I think I’m inspired by people more than anything, in the way that I see someone else doing something well and I’m like, “shit let’s do it.”
Like OK, you just showed me what is possible and now I want to take it to that level. But I don’t really talk to anyone about the ideas of competition.
I’m very much like my own competition.
I feel like I want to see everyone win, I want to see everyone eat.
Well at least everyone in my circle.”
BrassTuna: I feel that.
I as someone involved in the Phoenix art scene, wether or not I want to be, I see competition as growth. It’s like who is growing the fastest and who is showing that they’re growing the fastest.
That to me is my competition. You know I,,, I want to grow and I want to show that I’m growing fast, and… that doesn’t always produce the best art, you know, a lot of that stuff just doesn’t stick… a lot of it is literally just shit. But I feel like, for me at least, that’s the way in which I want to see competition.
Bryan Beckon: “And that’s why in the art world the idea of competition is so ambiguous. in head my competition is like,, not the production of things, but perhaps the quality and emotion. the honesty. it’s like in my head, I want to be the most transparent and honest person When it comes to my work and I want to be as open as possible and be someone who is experimenting,, someone who continues to experiment and to grow.
I think in the art world to me its difficult to be competitive. I think to be competitive… it’s not like we can measure who’s art is better.
It’s so many things that like, it’s out of our control.”
BrassTuna: I’ve never viewed you as somebody who is competitive because,, I know,,, that you know it’s subjective and you know that you’re doing things for your art, and for no other reason but I feel like there’s not many other artists like that.
And now that I’m thinking about it, it’s funny because we are all still struggling to make money, or at least a living off of our art.
Bryan Beckon: “Right, like maybe the competition is acquiring wealth or at least the wealth of money.
And the thing is, there is so much money out there.
there is, there is enough to go around.”
BrassTuna: I think a lot of competition also comes from like the followers that you can gather online or like the amount of likes you can get on a post or,,, I think in today’s age competition is very different from like you know, some other contemporary artist in their 50s or 60s or 70s. Nowadays I feel like a lot of competition is centered around social media.
Bryan Beckon: “I can tell you right now, that shit does not work. You can’t pay your rent in likes.”
BrassTuna: I’d be broke still though.
Bryan Beckon: “No right, my likes are at like 200 right now.”
BrassTuna: Same… If only it could be as simple as creating a post and simply getting paid for it lol.
Though I do think competition is still evolving in these art spaces.
Bryan Beckon: “Yeah I can definitely see it being established on social media.
I think for a lot of that, that is the way to eventually get monetary value with your work,,, because it’s a fight for attention.
It’s a fight to, to whoever can do the, I don’t know, the most attention grabbing thing within 20 seconds,, that’s the one who is going to be “successful.”
Which I think a lot of the perception we have of people on social media is that they live these lives that are not naturally true, or more so just like a facade.”
BrassTuna: Yeah. I completely agree..
Bryan Beckon: “Honestly to me it seems like, for the most part, if you were able to make money off of social media you most likely wouldn’t want to be on there.”
BrassTuna: I agree, like when you start getting a monetary supplement from your art it’s like you don’t like doing it. Well at least for me personally.
I can’t imagine the money coming from social media though, That might add an entire other difficulty.
Bryan Beckon: “The thing is I realize that the representation of artists online, or who were successful, were the ones that were able to produce content, and show that.
That was representation of what an “artist was” to me.
The artists that I see in museums or galleries, I’ll go look at there Following or look at their engagement online and they’re never posting,,, for example there is one person who I’ll see sometimes here and there and they have zero posts but they are displayed in these top galleries and I’m like,,, “what the f*ck?”
You don’t need to go promote yourself constantly? I’m always thinking about that.”
BrassTuna: The people who already have been in their prime in the art world, they’re not in competition with us they are gonna continue to get money.
I don’t understand how to break into that area of commercial success. Where one doesn’t need to promote themselves via social media…
Bryan Beckon: “The chances of breaking into that specific art world is slim to none...
The better option is building a community around yourself that supports you and that loves you and would gladly buy something that you have, or support the shows you’re in, and help you through your career,,,
That’s why I think chasing this world I don’t know exists, or where it exists, or how it exists is something I don’t really wanna spend my time doing.
Time wasted on trying to get somewhere that I know I can’t be accepted into.”
BrassTuna: You mentioned community building a bit ago,,, do you feel like that is something that could happen here in Phoenix?
Bryan Beckon: “Absolutely. I think there are different types of community. you have your community of friends, the ones you care about and love.
And the community of collectors. You need collectors in your life so that they can buy your work.
I feel morally unethical selling my work to the homies.
,,,I’d rather just give it to them so you can have my work…
The collector and the artist are in this symbiotic relationship, where we need to eat and they also need art to fill something,,, and I’m not sure how I feel about that.”
BrassTuna: Oh that could whole can of worms,,,,
You know it’s it’s funny and to circle back to the beginning of our conversation, for me I’ve never had that where collectors or people are wanting to buy my work in the sense of like, “do they care about it?”,,, “does it matter to them?”,,, or are they just filling up a wall in their house?
I’ve haven’t had that yet, so that’s why when I think about this topic of competition, I feel like I’m in competition to become that person in an art space,,, in which my stuff is being wanted you know?
Bryan Beckon: “The people who would die for your art, they are not the people who can afford it. Like I can’t buy my own art,,,
It’s your friends and community who would die for your work and love it the most.”
*BUZZ*
BrassTuna: It’s been about 20 minutes, and I have to say I’ve enjoyed our conversation today Bryan.
Do you have any closing thoughts that you would like to share with our readers?
Bryan Beckon: “I think If I could share any final thoughts.
“I would say, make friends. Just go make friends, and learn to love people,,, and make friends. One of the greatest qualities I think in life are friends.”
BrassTuna: Thank you Bryan for joining me today. It’s been a pleasure.