Shots of Andre’s garage studio and his right arm.

I took a few hours out of a Saturday to sit down with local painter Andre Martin to get a better idea of where he came from and how he got to be sitting across from me. We met up at his spacious apartment in the Seattle suburb of Issaquah and I quickly noticed how he contrasted with his surroundings. Tattooed and dressed for the city Andre looked very different than the sparkling new developments and the corporately-minded young married couples both with and without children. He was not out of place, but one could determine that his place was in the city conversing with the urban energy that engulfs it. On September 5th, Martin will begin classes at Cornish College of the Arts pursuing a career in Visual Communications. Some may say that going to school was a long delayed action for him, but often we traverse a few paths before discovering the narrow road of our vocation. Mostly, I just listened to Andre’s story and took a lot of notes, which I tried to organize neatly for you to read.

DISTRACTED
1979-1997
Perhaps only while looking back on life we can only judge what we were destined to do and say confidently, “I knew this all along.” Sometimes talent is glaringly present, but often the realizing the right time to act on it is absent. Andre told me he was “artistic ever since he could pick up a crayon” and glancing at his colorful work one can make the connection. As a child he would draw graffiti in the space around the cartoon shapes in coloring books. He felt the compulsion to be creative but did not really pursue it even though he took a few art classes in high school. Andre admits, “I didn’t give it a fair chance.”

None of the art he enjoyed—hip hop influenced street art—was found in the classrooms. He constantly found himself working on projects he did not relate to like drawing houses, three-point perspectives, cheap water color vistas and ceramics. “Doing it was a drag,” he said with a grin. The art that most captivated his attention never really felt accepted by peers and the art community at the time, which made the idea of turning his artistic talents into a career rather ridiculous. Instead, he put art on the back burner and focused on sports (he was a stellar athlete), parties, and girls revealing that he “didn’t take high school seriously” and shortly afterwards joined the Army.

ENLISTED
1997-2001
Andre spent most of his active duty in North Carolina learning how to jump from airplanes as a paratrooper. Every now and then he would take out a notebook and sketch his ideas during slower times. Finishing his obligation to the Army he returned home to the Seattle area and maintained his ties with the military serving in the National Guard and chose to go to school, which was his main reason for quitting active duty. He wanted to go school full-time and took advantage of the money the military gave him for an education. He thought about pursuing a career in Sports Medicine because he was athletic and enjoyed sports.

After the first few classes he found he was not as passionate about Sports Medicine due to the the extensive math and science that went into that field. He had never been into those subjects. He told me he could have finished that degree, but it “probably would have come crashing down later in life.” While figuring out what his next move was he decided to take a drawing class in the summer of 2002. He had not taken an art class since 1996, but he knew he was artistic and wanted to see if taking an art class would help him rediscover the talent that people always told him he had when he was younger. A few days after the class began he grew more and more excited and felt that art was “it.”

ENROLLED
2001-2003
Seeing the work displayed in the student gallery at Green River Community College he got the overwhelming sensation to begin his artwork immediately while reflecting that he could have work just as good, or better, on display. The classes started off with the fundamentals that had initially turned off Andre to art in high school. Plus, the classes were only half filled with people who were serious about pursuing a career or developing their talents. The other half were there just to fulfill an elective.

In the beginning it was slow going, but towards the end of the class the final project aroused some creative energy out of him. Although he told me he was “older, more disciplined, and more willing” to put the fundamentals he was learning to practice he still waited until the night before to begin work on that quarter’s final project. It was a rendering of the ‘Knight’ chess piece in all different types of line drawings styles. His grade for the quarter was a 4.0 and the teacher told Andre, “you have to pursue this[art].” This fueled a keen interest in other disciplines and spurred him on to register for computer design, oil painting and other fine art classes.

Continuing to get encouragement from his instructors and peers he pressed on with an ambition that made him more competitive to be the best he could be. He kept telling himself “If I’m not at least the best I tried my hardest.” His motivation for discovering art in various forms led one of his professors to ask him, “When are you going to transfer to an art school?” It seemed his frustration with high school art classes and dry spells during his active duty periods were going to be redeemed through a rewarding career pursuit, but then he learned he was to be deployed to the explosive war in Iraq, activated from the National Guard, and banished from scholarly art pursuits for a period of 18 months.

DEPLOYED
2003-2005
The most anguishing part of being deployed that fall to Iraq was not being able to show his work during National Portfolio Day which was held at Cornish College of the Arts. The day consisted of students, eager to attract a good school, showing their work to art school admissions officers. It is very informal and the kind of setting that would have put Andre at ease. He was already interested in Cornish because its reputation was outstanding as the leading art school in the Northwest. The more practical benefits of going to Cornish where that it was local and for him it was,”impractical to move out of state because of the expense.” However, if there was a scholarship that allowed him to attend an art school out of state he would have no problems moving and living in another city considering it “stupid” not to take advantage of studying away from home.

He would not have the opportunity to how his work at National Portfolio Day because he had to focus on getting to Iraq by training and “getting into that mindset.” Although having been a soldier for a number of years Andre confessed he was “anxious, worried, and a little stressed” and thus, his mind was not in the art space and he would have to put his artistic explorations, that he so adamantly pursued, in the back of his mind not knowing if he would get the chance to follow through with his increasingly unavoidable creativity.

Thankfully, Andre was kept safe during his tour in the Middle East. He primarily “focused on doing a good job over there” and after arriving in Iraq he turned his attention to adjusting to his new climate, understanding his mission, and settling into a routine. Eventually, he “kind of felt like drawing,” but the Army only had Sharpies or he would purchase paint markers and highlighters at the PX. The monotony of life in the heat made it so he “could only go so long without drawing,” where he drew everything from words, tattoos, graffiti, Koi fish and sany derivative of street art because it has “no rules to it,” he explained. Andre continued sketching throughout his deployment in Iraq confiding that as a soldier, “you have to do other things besides carrying a rifle around and doing your job to stay sane over there.”

SIDETRACKED
2005-2006
On March 31, 2005 Sargeant Andre Martin arrived at McChord Air Force Base. There he spent one week re-situating and in early May 2005 his second detour from pursuing art was officially over. He was placed back on National Guard status with the rest of that summer off. His unit was not expected to report back until August. With plenty of money saved up he was not looking for a job at first. Instead, he had plans to travel to places like Mexico, Las Vegas and Hawaii, but these trips were never experienced. Looking around the city he realized that Seattle had not changed much since he was away and apprehension about what he was going to do next clouded his mind.

Having been fascinated with tattoo art for years he started work on his own tattoos that now adorn both of his arms, one of which has a full sleeve. It was not until his brother Tony asked if he wanted to share an apartment in Issaquah that Andre considered the path he left before deployment in Iraq. He was hired at Aaron Brothers right after deciding to return to Green River Community College in the fall of 2005. Eighteen months after he planned to show his portfolio at National Portfolio Day he was back on track to show his work in January of 2006. Then Hurricane Katrina demolished the Gulf Coast.

Washington State National Guard planned to send a task force down there on a security mission for at least thirty days, which was right at the beginning of the fall academic quarter. Andre was asked if he wanted to be a part of the relief efforts. At first he was thinking about school and the goals he had set for himself so his initial response to the commanding officer was negative, which was okay because his attendance was not mandatory. However, after a phone call home he realized he “had to get down there.” He had just spent over a year in a foreign place helping foreign people and he was not comfortable turning his back on people in peril on American soil. Andre called back his superior and said he was on the team.

Weeks went by after that initial phone call, which he spent doing drills with his unit. Finally, at the end of September, he received a call notifying him he was headed to New Orleans and that following Monday he reported to his unit with all of his gear ready to keep the peace. School was not going to be an option that quarter, but according to Andre it was “not a big deal to go” because he had not “fully settled in yet” to life after deployment to Iraq. The end of October he arrived back from New Orleans. Andre knew that he could not start school until winter quarter and he did not go back to work for Aaron Brothers Art & Framing. Suddenly, he was out-of-work with some time to kill in Issaquah after participating in two of the most controversial events in American history.

DIVERTED
2005-2006
The month he spent in New Orleans he produced hardly any new artwork. All through the fall and into winter quarter at Green River he had the motivation to be creative and his mind was full ideas, but nothing was coming out on paper. October, November and December raced by and his drought continued. A week before National Portfolio Day Andre was afraid that his portfolio was not going to be strong enough because it only contained artwork that was almost two years old. Nevertheless he still brought his portfolio in and showed it to the Cornish Design Department Chair who was incredibly supportive and provided plenty of positive feedback, which reinforced his decision to pursue Cornish, which eventually led to his admission into the school.

Classes at Cornish were still months away so Andre registered for more art classes at Green River and started filling out financial aid paperwork. In his advanced drawing class the instructor decided to adjust the curriculum so that it contained a lot of experimentation and independent study which was perfect for Andre’s creative disposition. This led to his discovery of fine art painting. Art “started getting serious” for him and he began work on his own side projects in addition to class projects. His large self-portrait, Struggle, filtered out of this exploratory period.

Andre respects painting because there always was a powerful affect on him when he saw a huge piece hanging on a wall. When he investigated further, after getting back from New Orleans, he discovered that international and local artists were innovating street/urban influenced art by mixing it with fine art. Andre explains that classic masters such as Monet and others do not hold much significant interest to him, but he does have respect for their style and crucial additions to the arts. Instead, he feels drawn to contemporary icons like Dave Kinsey, David Choe and Shepard Fairey who combine street art techniques with pop culture and politics to make statements through images and text.

FOUND
2006-present
Expressing himself through his own style was not as easy as identifying artists that he admired. Andre wrestled with two questions: “How can I create my own style and what can I do with it professionally?” He continued painting and started “feeling the energy.” He wondered if he would ever be able to show his work in a gallery. The final project that quarter was to use any type of creative medium, but it had to include the human figure or part of the human figure in the project. What resulted was Struggle II. That painting prompted Andre’s instructor to say, “more people need to see your work.”

His instructor’s encouragement kept Andre painting, but he wanted to get a feel for what the public thought of his work and at the very least to “get it out there and get exposure.” Only instructors, classmates, and a few family and friends had ever seen his creative side. He was getting restless to see his pieces exhibited on gallery walls so he started searching on Craigslist for opportunities. Johnny Cashmere of Northwest Finesse posted a call to urban artists to show their work in a Pioneer Square nightclub called Trinity. His vision was to invite local artists, specifically those focused on street or hip-hop inspired art, to showcase their work hoping to attract those who usually would not consider a nightclub an art gallery.

The show was put together at the last minute and Andre only had three pieces to display. He was nervous, but he got “more confidence” from the attendees who were seeing his art for the first time and reacting positively to it. The show at Trinity turned into another show there the following month. Soon afterwards Andre was invited to exhibit his paintings, including more finished pieces, for the Ballard Art Walk and Caffe Bella in Belltown. Stephen Holden, gallery curator for the cafe, said that Andre’s paintings “trigger a lot of conversation amongst customers and employees.”

This blitz of exposure has left Andre still formulating his opinion of the Seattle art scene which is all very new to him. He transitioned from being just serious about school to also being serious about his personal work and exhibiting that work in area galleries. Andre sites two specific galleries, Roq La Rue and BLVD, as his focus for future exhibits because, in his opinion, they could be the start of placing Seattle on the map for urban/street inspired artwork.

CURRENT
Andre had only positive things to say about Cornish when I interviewed him for this article. I was curious why the graphic design program at Cornish was the right fit for him and he explained that their classes combine illustration and graphic design into a holistic visual communications program. Mostly he is excited about the blend of fine art into graphic design and he felt that it could be a great career choice for him. In Andre’s words, graphic design is getting your own message or someone else’s across which is “perfect” for him so he can provoke certain ideas through design.
He will be learning about an industry which is entirely new to him in the heart of Seattle where he believes he needs to be to grow further as an artist “right in the middle of everything.”

Andre has already relocated from Issaquah to Capitol Hill. You can most likely find him painting in his spare time, which is not much, both for himself and for various side projects including art direction for a new skateboard and snowboard company called Inversion designing the logo, skateboards, and softgoods with plans for further expansions into cut and sew clothing. Coming up with an identity for the new company has been a challenge because of the creative ambiguity the owner offers and because he finds that his ideas are already being done as fast as he thinks of them. His plan is to make Inversion pop out to the masses in ways that where not expected and continue to show his work in galleries.

CLOSING
Andre candidly told me that he is even surprised about how long he has lasted in the military, ten years to be exact. With his departure from his uniform not scheduled until August of 2007 anything could happen between now and then. Although he has made it safely through jumping out of airplanes, a tour in Iraq, and a peace keeping mission in New Orleans he still may be called to the Middle East or other parts of the world depending on how things materialize over the course of the year.

Andre admits that he is “getting selfish with this time,” but he makes himself clear that he is not anti-military. He is grateful for everything the military gave him such as travel experiences, friends, and a “willingness to travel outside his comfort zone and step over the line of uncertainty.” He may be ready to walk away from the rules, strict structure, and corporate mindset, but it was those attributes that helped discipline Andre into the artist he is becoming even though he says he “felt out of place in the military as an artist.”

He never was political, but admits being “more liberal now.” Increasingly he questioned his ideals, authority, and his purpose in the military, but to his question, ‘Is this what I like to do?’ consistently his answer is, ‘No.’ His decision not to re-enlist in the Army did not come without pressure from his superiors, which he understands by relating it to a business that wants to retain quality employees instead of training a bunch of question marks.

As Andre looks ahead to August 2007 he keeps focusing on the bigger picture and spends his time thinking of ways to train soldiers better and to help prepare them effectively for wartime. He plans to leave the Military honorably, with a clear conscience, and place his energy into his creativity with no more interruptions.
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For additional information about Andre Martin please visit his portfolio at www.dremartin.com.

News
Andre is going to be showing his work at Club Contour on 1st Ave starting September 4, 2006. He tells me that there will be some of his old pieces on display as well as some new ones he’s been working on this past week.