Art school dropout becomes writer, loses everything, & picks up art again

Hey, it’s me. Mike, Mike Sieber and yeah, I’m an art school dropout. See, I wanted to draw comics, either comic books or newspaper strips (remember those?) and thought the best way to get into the biz was to go to art school, which I did.

But, art schools are a lot of money, and the old car broke down, and well, no more art schools.

Not much luck with comics, I pivoted to graphic design and writing. Did pretty well doing copywriting for marketing companies and ad design for newspapers.

I was doing pretty well by the standards of someone living in a small town in Ohio where high school football games were more important than church, and meth is what you did for fun.

Then, everything fell apart. Got laid off from the newspaper and lost two of my biggest clients in the same month.

The YouTube algorithm showed me a guy showing off his sketchbook, and I was like, “Hey, I used to do that.”

So, no job, can’t get hired as an old man, depressed, I got back to drawing to pass the time. Then the YouTube algorithm showed me a guy doing loose watercolor sketching, and I was like, “Hey, I never really did watercolors since I was a kid and never liked them, but it looks fun.”

It took awhile to get the drawing skills back and I’m still working on the painting, but I’m having fun.

I hope you enjoy the work!