Hey there! I’m John Morfis, the artist & teacher behind all things helloartsy. I develop lessons and courses that help people learn how to draw and paint properly. Why helloartsy? It’s a silly name I picked a long time ago and now I’m kinda stuck with it. Oh well. HelloArtsy is the place for logical, no-nonsense drawing & painting instruction. When you’ve had just about enough of all the artistic jibber-jabber, you can come here for straight-to-the-point techniques for expediting your artistic skills!
I believe everyone’s artistic education should be more logical and less flaky.
An Artist was Born Created
I began drawing from a very young age. I loved the solitude and the ability to impress people with something I created. That motivation has never left me.
Spending long hours behind pencil and paper I soon discovered oil paints around the age of 16. I was perplexed and amazed at the same time. I loved how workable the paint was, but it was tricky to control; especially compared to drawing tools such as pencil.
So I continued fumbling and eventually went to college for art. I was eager to learn how to make my paintings sing with fantastic realism! Surely college would prepare me for a career as an oil painter? Not really.
The college professors were mostly concerned with abstract art, theory, and artistic hocus pocus. I kept pursuing. Eventually I learned some fabulous drawing and painting techniques. Some I read about and others I discovered later in life by studying with some master painters. Boy oh boy did I unknowingly waste a bunch of years. It turns out that knowing the right techniques makes all the difference. This is one of the main reasons I continue to teach. I don’t want YOU to make all the artsy blunders I made over the past 25 years.
From Amateur to Pro
It’s hard to believe that not too long ago I struggled to represent things on paper. I constantly fought with my art materials and got mediocre results. I could occasionally sell a painting but it was at a very low price. And sales were few and far between. Now I routinely sell paintings in the $2,000 – $12,000 range! I rarely struggle to put my creations down on canvas anymore. Making art is amazingly joyful now.
I’ve exhibited my paintings in museums and have even been featured in some fine art publications:
It’s been a bit of a wild ride but there is nothing wild about my drawing and painting methods at all. In fact, my structured approach to making art has been a fundamental catalyst to my success in the art world.
My Philosophy
I believe anybody can become an amazing artist. They just need the right techniques, tools, and habits. I show students how to do this. In short, I create amazing artists. I do this by cutting through all the nonsense and demonstrating the most direct ways to create beautiful works of art. I don’t have a wishy-washy bone in my body. Everything I do and teach is based on learnable, replicable logic. If you’ve read some of the lessons throughout this website you can see that one of my superpowers is the ability to breakdown complex drawing and painting topics into simpler, manageable skills. This is paramount if you are to succeed as an artist. Small wins as a artist-in-training add up big time.
If you desire to become better at drawing and painting, consider taking one of my courses.