Ep #1: Sketchbooks as refuge, ritual, & reflection - with artist Helen Wells

Podcast

Jun 6

Do you ever find yourself feeling paralysed by that crisp new sketchbook, scared to make the first mark? My guest this week, the wonderful artist Helen Wells, knows that feeling all too well. But you won't want to miss how she finally broke through that fear and learned to embrace her sketchbooks as a playground for experimentation and growth - no judgments allowed!

We'll dive into Helen's journey as she shares juicy behind-the-scenes tales of pursuing art as a full-time career. How does she define success on her own terms? What helped build her resilience in the face of all those artistic struggles and rejections we all deal with? She's dishing out so much fantastic advice.

Whether you're just starting to dip your toes into the creative entrepreneurship waters or you're a seasoned pro, Helen's wisdom (and delightful sense of humor!) is sure to inspire you. Maybe you'll even get that extra nudge you need to quit being so precious with your sketchbook!

So grab that sketchbook you've been avoiding, a cup of something delicious, and join us for what's sure to be an energising creative pep talk. I cannot wait to share this one with you!

You can find the video version of our chat below (where you can also see me do a very quick sketch of Helen as we talk):

Or listen to the audio version (click the arrow at the bottom right to play):

Find out more about Helen:

Helen Wells is a British artist who creates abstract and semi abstract work alive with colour, pattern and shape. Her art is sometimes intuitive and intricate and sometimes bright and bold. It often features motifs observed in nature or shapes and ideas derived from drawing objects. She uses expressive mark making, pattern and color to create abstract pieces which feature repetition and rhythm, layers of complexity, organic forms and decorative detail.

In 2014 she won the Winsor and Newton Watercolor Revolution Prize which resulted in her art being displayed in The Saatchi Gallery in London. Her work has been on the walls of Gordon Ramsay restaurants, hotels and hospitals. It has featured on book covers and in magazines, been used in architecture projects and by high end brands. She is the author of the book Expressive Sketchbooks, Developing Creative Skills, Courage and Confidence published by Quarry Books in 2020. Thousands of students have taken her online art classes.

Visit Helen’s website
Find Helen on YouTube, Instagram, and Facebook

Please note this transcript has been edited for clarity.
Eli: So I am joined today by the amazing Helen Wells. She has been such an inspiration to me for a long time, and she was one of the reasons I decided to start YouTube in the first place. Her YouTube videos are a source of enormous colourful joy.
Helen: I am delighted to be here and thank you for being so generous with your feedback and comments. It's lovely. Thank you.
Eli: I think you're an absolute legend, and I'm thrilled to bits that you're going to be my inaugural podcast guest. Would you like to give us a little bit about your background and how you came to be where you are now?
Helen: Yes, I'd love to. I am a late bloomer when it comes to being an artist. I had a career before art and only really started art as my career when I was in my early 40s, late 30s. I'm 49 now, so I've been working as an artist for the last ten years, but I had a circuitous route to get here. I was a really arty child, always drawing, always painting, loving art. I think I wanted to be a textile designer when I was little. Then I got to my A-levels, which is sort of seventeen, eighteen—it's where in the UK you select your subjects if you're staying on at school. My school wanted me to do academic subjects and they didn't think art was academic enough.
Helen: I could go to university, but at the time, not all universities approved of art as a subject. I started doing art A-level, but it didn't fit in with the rest of my timetable, so I gave it up. I didn't realise that decision would have ramifications for my career. I didn't make any art at all in my 20s.
When I was about 29, I broke up with a boyfriend and was heartbroken and miserable. I had nothing to do for the summer, so I booked myself on a two-week painting course at the Slade in London, an art school. I loved it. I went from doing nothing at all to this kind of immersion, and it felt like a homecoming, an awakening. It was so exciting.
That started a passion for art, but as a hobby for personal nourishment, not as a career. Then, when I was about 40, about ten years ago, I was working in a job and had a career.
Helen: I had this moment of epiphany where I realised I was on the wrong path. It was such a strange experience. I was on a train platform waiting to go to a meeting, and I had a perfectly nice life and job. I hadn't allowed myself to think that art could be a career.
It felt like an out-of-body experience. Every cell in my body was shouting at me. There was no one else on the platform, and it felt very weird, but it was like my soul was screaming at me, telling me I needed to be an artist. It was such a powerful experience that it made me realise that maybe this was what I wanted to do. It felt like my subconscious was trying to wake me up and tell me my dreams and wishes, which I hadn't been able to acknowledge myself.
Because this experience was so powerful, I thought, "Okay, I've cracked open this thought and can't put it back in the box."
Helen: It was something I had to act on, so I did. I gave up my job without any idea how to become an artist. I didn't know any artists or how to run an art business, but I figured I'd find out along the way. I had some savings, so I knew I had a couple of months to work something out.
I decided to find a part-time job using my corporate skills so I could have time to work out the business of art and also discover who I was as an artist. Not just the business side, but also understanding what art I love and want to create.
That's the potted history. I've been trying to work as an artist for the last ten years and kept that part-time job for years.
Helen: It took four or five years until I felt ready, until I knew what I was doing and that I could support myself and pay the mortgage. That slow runway helped because it meant I could try things out without being desperate to earn money from day one. It gave me space and freedom to see who I was as an artist, what worked for me, what I enjoyed, and what connected with people.
Eli: It's such a sensible thing to do because a lot of both the creative process and starting a business involves just throwing spaghetti at the wall to see what sticks, figuring out what feels good, what you want to do, and who you want to be as an artist. There are so many ways to make money from creativity.
Helen: Exactly, and I didn't even know what those ways were. I had to research how to make money as an artist. When I first started, I thought I'd just be painting and selling paintings. That's what I did at the beginning, but I realised that's quite a hard way to earn a living if all my income is from selling original art at my price point. So I started trying out different things to see what felt good.
Eli: What does your breakdown look like now if you don't mind sharing with us?
Helen: Sure. In terms of where I get my money from, I sell original paintings, which is probably around fifteen to twenty percent of my income, maybe a little less. I sell online art classes, which are becoming a bigger part of my business—sketchbook classes, abstract art classes, and so on. I also licence my work for hotels and corporate offices, working with a couple of companies in the States.
The fourth bucket is special projects, which can be all sorts of things. For example, I did a big commission for a hospital in the States, creating nine original paintings, and I got paid a fee for writing my book. These special projects help to diversify my income alongside selling paintings and teaching classes.
Helen: Projects and licensing work well for me, aligning with my personality and business goals.
Eli: I love that. I think many people don't realise how many different slices of the income pie there are for artists.
Helen: That's right. It makes for an exciting career, but there's no clear path. It has taken me a long time to try things out and see what I enjoy and what resonates with people.
Eli: You mentioned your book, "Expressive Sketchbooks," which is a glorious book. You do a lot of classes about sketchbooks, and much of your YouTube content focuses on them. Can you talk a bit about the role your sketchbook has played in your creative development? They seem super important to you.
Helen: Yes, they really are. Sketchbooks have been fundamental and foundational to my art career. I credit sketchbooks with starting my career. They helped me discover who I was as an artist and what I was interested in. They allowed me to try different styles, techniques, subject matters, approaches, and materials without any pressure. They also serve as a great place to record all of that. Having a full sketchbook is a valuable resource.
Helen: You can look back and see the themes, whispers, clues, and signposts indicating what you’re clearly interested in and should pursue more. I find that sketchbooks have been a powerful creative companion.
Eli: Really?
Helen: Yes, they’ve given me a lot in terms of understanding who I am as an artist. I lean on them a lot. When I'm painting or creating, I'm always going back through my sketchbooks for ideas. It's like a filing cabinet for my art.
Eli: I love that you revisit your sketchbooks often. Do you find that influences your current work? Do you find threads to pull on from way back?
Helen: Yes, whenever I'm painting and feeling a bit stuck, I'll go through my sketchbooks and find an idea, motif, or shape that inspires me. I lean on them at every point in my art-making. For example, when I had a commission for a hospital, they wanted me to come up with samples. I went way back into my sketchbooks, gathering all sorts of ideas. It was like a ready-made resource of my own ideas—motifs, marks, colours, and combinations. I find it really helpful, like a support system or guide.
Eli: I love that. When you're working in your sketchbook, what drives you to pick it up? Do you find it therapeutic, or are you deliberately trying something?
Helen: Both, I think. I mentioned that I’ve had long COVID and some chronic fatigue issues, so when I'm poorly, the sketchbook is like a refuge—a safe haven. It’s a place to sit quietly and feel creative without planning a painting. It’s a place to reflect.
When I’m watching television, I’ll have a box of pencils and do something in my sketchbook to keep my hands busy. If I'm working on a series of paintings in my studio, that interaction with my sketchbook is different. On the sofa, I use pens and pencils, but in the studio, I might use paint, tissue paper, and glue. Sketchbooks can be both a safe haven and an adventure playground for me.
Eli: I love that. That's exactly how I feel about sketchbooks as well. One thing you do that I absolutely love is photocopying pages, sticking them back in, and making new pieces from the old. It's a very tangible, visceral process. How does that translate from the sketchbook pages to your final artwork?
Helen: I don't have a clear process where I copy a sketchbook page directly onto a painting. Everything I do in art making, whether in my sketchbook or in a painting, feeds into each other. When I photocopy, I'm thinking about the kind of mark, pattern, or line that interests me. Just the act of choosing it enlivens something in me.
In terms of how it translates to my painting, it's like muscle memory. I might have created something in my sketchbook years ago, photocopied it, played around, and made a collage. I might then take shapes and motifs from that collage and incorporate them into a painting. Everything is a stepping stone to something else.
All the experimenting and playing around I do in my sketchbook, if I'm reflective about it, can be used in my paintings. It's not always a conscious thing. I've developed a kind of handwriting in my art, so my mark-making naturally seeps into my paintings.
Eli: I find the relationship between artists and sketchbooks fascinating. There are so many different ways to use a sketchbook. For me, my sketchbook practice and the work I make rarely intersect. If I work something out too much in my sketchbook, I'm bored with the idea by the time it gets onto the canvas. When I stand in front of a blank canvas, it feels like possibility. My work is abstract, and I'm in a fugue state, playing with materials. One thing I've been trying this year is bringing the two sides of my practice together more.
Helen: Sometimes I go back through old sketchbooks and ask myself what's calling to me now. What page is singing to me? I reflect on why it's calling to me and how I can incorporate that into my painting.
Helen: I think it's about reflection and really thinking about why something is calling to me and how I can incorporate a moment of that into my painting. It's not about wholesale transferring what's in my sketchbook onto a canvas. It's about acknowledging the mark, colour combination, quality of the line, or layering in my sketchbook that resonates with me.
Eli: I love that.
Eli: Yeah, that's how I've been doing it as well. Often, it's like a composition or a single passage from something else that resonates.
Helen: Yes, it's like a hunting ground for me, a treasure chest of my own art that I can dig through and find what's helpful for me now.
Eli: I think there's a particular part of the creative process that I find intensely exciting, and it's this excavation of self. It's the search and discover part of being an artist.
Helen: Yes.
Eli: I've never been particularly interested in finding my style. The search and discover process never really goes away. It's like you add and subtract things, and your style evolves over time. I love what you said about it being your handwriting because we all have our own way of making work, which is natural. It's what comes out, and then you refine it.
Helen: Yes. I think our style of art is always evolving, always moving. There's a part of it that's innate, the things you're interested in or the ways you love to create, and then you add bits you've found along the journey. Art has taught me more about myself than any other job I've had because you're really digging deep sometimes.
Helen: I think, actually, what am I trying to say? What am I trying to do here? What is calling to me? What am I trying to express? What am I interested in? What is exciting me? What do I love here? It's quite a lot of self-reflection. But interesting, I mean, it's fascinating, I think.
Eli: Yeah, yeah, it's more of a vocation than a career.
Helen: I mean, that's a good way of describing it, definitely.
Eli: Really. So switching gears a little bit, I'd love to find out more about what your day-to-day looks like and how do you balance those creative needs, like the excavation, the searching and discovering, the playing and experimenting that are so necessary to fulfil the artistic part of yourself, with the very real, kind of prosaic, financial, structural needs of your business. How does that kind of balance out for you?
Helen: How does that balance out? I think what I have tried to do is build a business that allows creativity to be at the heart of it. Because I've built my business slowly and it evolved, and I tried lots of things on and I thought about what I liked, I didn't like, I think I'm now at a point where actually the business side of my business and the art side of my life are very intertwined. There is not a really clear boundary, or I don't think, "This is business and this is art." They are so intertwined that I couldn't unpick them. And I've done that quite intentionally, I think.
So, for example, if I'm creating a Youtube video, I'm talking about something that I'm currently interested in, I'm talking, I'm already doing. If I'm building a class for people, then it tends to be a process that I've developed and that I really love doing and that I'm passionate about and that I will do myself. And so, therefore, I'm basically working stuff out in my own art, and then I'm sharing what I found as my business, really. And so, it doesn't feel like I've got a business side and an art side. And because I share my sketchbooks, which are all workings out, aren't they? I'm not always going, "Right, okay. This is my beautiful finished painting." I'm going, "Look here's my scrappy sketchbook, and here this is what I was interested in. This is what I'm not interested in. This is what didn't work. This is, well, this was a mess." You know, so there's just being very, you know, honest about, in terms of sharing what I'm up to in my art. So that means that there's time for me to do the things that nourish me because it's part of my business.
Eli: Yeah, yeah, I call it Operation Marmite, which is probably a bit too convoluted to go into right now, but it's basically like what's the waste product almost of making art. And that becomes like the marketing and the business and the way you connect with people is just, I'm doing this stuff anyway, like come and have a look.
Helen: Yeah, yeah, and I think I'm getting better at sharing more. I think because when I started my Youtube channel, I just thought I'd pick a topic. I'm good today, I'm gonna talk about this, and I'd do loads of research and really spend days planning it. And now I think I am a little bit more, "This is what I'm interested in this week, this is the book I'm reading. It's beautiful. This is why I'm interested in this artist. This is what's really exciting me." And I think that makes it easier for me to show up because I'm sharing my enthusiasm, I'm sharing what I've learned, I'm sharing what I've done, and I'm sharing what's making me feel, you know, excited, and that feels like a good way to run a business to me.
Eli: Yeah, I mean, that enthusiasm and excitement is what makes your videos so engaging and what makes people want to be a part of that world. So, and things.
Helen: I think also I've structured my business in a way that doesn't take me away from what I want to do. So, you know, if I'm filming a class, I will be all in, filming the class, and an hour's class might take me a month. And then I will have a month where I'm just doing the things that I want to do. Just doing the things that are not related in any way to my business. So, it seems to work out.
Eli: So how does that look in terms of your day-to-day? Do you have a typical day? I think probably a typical week might be more accurate.
Helen: Yeah, a typical week. So I tend to spend some time painting, whether that is three mornings or three afternoons. That is the engine of everything else I do, so there has to be some dedicated time for painting. Then I probably spend a day a week on writing emails, doing a Youtube video, that sort of thing. I tend to do my accounts and finances in the evening while I'm watching television. I get back to people in the evening while I'm watching television. So I don't have a clear start and end to my day; it sort of slightly seeps into everything. But that's just how I've learned to run it. I don't have a set week. It depends on what I'm doing, but I tend to have at least a day for emails and a Youtube video or some sort of video, and I tend to have at least three afternoons or mornings painting. Other than that, it's all up for grabs.
Eli: That sounds lovely. That's really lovely. Yeah, a wonderful schedule.
Helen: It's lovely. Yeah, yeah. I mean, of course, there's lots of things that come with running a business, aren't there? That's non-negotiable. You have to get back to people, you have to do your taxes, you have to do your finances, you have to order more supplies, etc. There's a lot of that as well. But I've really found that if I don't have some painting time, then it has a knock-on effect on everything else.
Eli: Yeah, yeah, it's weird. It's a really strange career because the thing that you're doing or the product that you're creating is sort of like medicine for your soul. So, I don't know, it makes for a very strange kind of work week. Personally, I think it's absolutely fabulous. I couldn't imagine doing anything else. But yeah, it does make for a really interesting kind of work week.
Helen: Yeah, but it's yeah, yeah, and for ages, I don't think I really thought I was running a business. I mean, it really took me years and years for that penny to drop. It dropped really slowly. I don't know why it took me so long because I'd worked in business. I don't know why it took me so long. But I think I just wasn't approaching it with that real corporate entrepreneur mindset, and I'm not sure I still do, really. Like I've gotten better at it.
Eli: Now. Ah, but I find the same thing, and because I've run a business from home for so many years and now I've shifted my focus completely to making and selling art and making creativity the product. Weirdly, I feel sort of guilty now if I spend a day painting, and I have to really give myself a stern talking to, to be like no, this is the job now. Like this used to be the thing that you did to skive off. But...
Helen: The job. Yes, and actually, it's for me. It's the engine of everything else. If that doesn't happen, then I've got nothing interesting to talk about, I've got nothing to share with other people, I've got nothing to teach people. You know, I have to make that exactly the sacrosanct part of my week, unless if I'm filming a class, I tend to go all in for like two weeks or three weeks, or however long it's going to take, doing all of the filming and the editing and all that sort of stuff, then I don't...
Eli: Yeah, absolutely.
Helen: Then I don't have all that time, but I just sort of parcel those into time frames. So it's still not every week's the same, but I really do try and prioritise painting, creating, whatever I'm doing.
Eli: Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. And do you have any kind of rituals or specific workflows around your art making?
Helen: Yes, I do. I do have some. So, in terms of a ritual, I mean, I probably wouldn't call it a ritual, but I think it is. I tend to start my morning journaling. So, you know, Julia Cameron and The Artist's Way?
Eli: Yes.
Helen: So I tend to do my morning pages, and I find that very helpful as an artist, as an entrepreneur, as a human, and I really try to do that. It helps me just kind of meet myself and think about what I want to do in the day or the week to articulate thoughts to myself, to clarify what's going on. So I do those. I try to do those quite religiously, so that I would say is my daily ritual. And I do find that writing about my art in that way and writing about life also feeds into my art. It's just a moment of the day where I'm really listening to myself and my intuition and what's going on in my subconscious and what's irritating me, you know, whatever it is, what do I need to cook for tea, whatever it is appears on those pages, and it's like a clearing out and a clarity-providing exercise. So I do try to do that most days, so that's probably my ritual.
Helen: I also, I mean, I would call my sketchbooks probably a ritual in that I don't work in them every day, although people would think I do. I just, I mean, I'm not sure, I don't feel that. I didn't feel that. But I think I think...
Eli: You're so prolific. Like you seem to just be producing and producing.
Helen: The thing is that I share all of my workings out, so because I'm often sharing things in a sketchbook, it might look like I've created an awful lot because it's not a finalised thing. It's a half thing or a fragment of a thing. But then I do, you know, but then art is my hobby and my career, so there is that as well. I mean, I do dedicate time to it. That is very true. Um, so yeah, I think sketchbooks, not every day, but most days, if I've gone, say, three or four days without working in a sketchbook, I feel disconnected from myself as a creative human. So I do try to work in my sketchbooks frequently. And yes, so journaling and sketchbooks I would say are my rituals and workflows, and everything else is slightly movable.
Eli: Do you find that they ever kind of crossover? Do you ever do any kind of art journaling type thing, or do you find that your writing and your art are separate?
Helen: I keep them separate, and I keep thinking, why do I do this? So I would say for the last two years, every day, I thought I really should write in my sketchbook or, you know, create art and writing in one.
Helen: But somehow they're just separate, and I can't get them to mix, and I don't know why.
Eli: Now, I found exactly the same thing. Like, I'm the same. I do a lot of journaling, a lot of writing every morning, and I find it's almost like it's a different part of the brain that engages, and yeah, I don't do that sort of the same.
Helen: Yeah, maybe that's...
Eli: The same thing doesn't happen when I'm drawing or painting as it does when I'm writing. It's completely different, and both are necessary.
Helen: Yeah, I think both of them are necessary for me. It's where I, in both places, the sketchbook and my journal, where I meet myself. It's where I tune into what's going on. It's where I kind of unearth and discover. Yeah, I think both of them are fundamental actually to me being able to do what I do.
Eli: Yeah, I can see that. So do you have any advice for people who are, the thing that I get a lot on my channel in my comments and in conversations that I have with artists generally, is that a lot of people are a bit terrified of sketchbooks and feel the need to make like every piece in a sketchbook like a perfect finished drawing. What would you say to that? Do you have any advice?
Helen: Yes, yes, I think I did, because I think that used to be me. So when I came back to art making in my early 30s, I knew that I should be using a sketchbook. It felt like something I should do whilst I wanted to progress and I wanted to develop, and I wanted to practise, and I wanted to push my skills. And so, therefore, I knew a sketchbook was going to be a really good place to do that. But I was petrified of the sketchbook. I found it so confronting, and I think the reason I found it confronting is because I thought I had to create really great art in a sketchbook. I thought that the sketchbook was a reflection of me as an artist. So therefore, it had to look good, and if it didn't look good, then I wasn't a good artist. That, I think, was the mindset I brought to it. And it was only when I really flipped that mindset, I knew that I had to learn and develop, and if I wasn't going to get to grips with a sketchbook, then where was I going to learn and develop? So I sort of gave myself a bit of a talking to, and rather than judge my art in a sketchbook, I just said I was going to turn up the page, create, and if I didn't like what I created, I was not going to concentrate on all the terrible things and all the bad things and things I don't like. I was going to turn the page and start again tomorrow, and that really helped me to—it was basically just changing my mindset. Rather than thinking a sketchbook had to be a place where I created a masterpiece and it was where my worth was laid out. No, my sketchbook is somewhere where I play and experiment, and therefore I can make a mess. It can look terrible, I don't have to show anyone. It can be a private corner for me to work things out and develop my skills. So, I do understand the scariness of a sketchbook, and I think also it's like, what do you do in a sketchbook? And I quite often just do the same thing over and over again, pick a subject and repeat it, variations on a theme, is the technical sort of term for that. But I just think that we have to give ourselves permission to make stuff that doesn't look that great, and our art that feels genuinely ours is on the other side of all sorts of horrible, not very nice art. You know, you've just got to—it's part of the process, it's part of being a creative person, that you only really get to make the beautiful stuff if you've made quite a lot of the not-so-beautiful stuff along the way.
Eli: Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. You couldn't have said it better myself. I love that. I think it's such a shame that we have this sort of outcome-focused idea of art and that every single thing an artist produces is a masterpiece, and that's not true for any artist I've ever had a conversation with. Like, exactly.
Helen: Or any other walk of life, anything else. There is, you know, you practise your scales, you practise—you practise, you practise, you practise, and then you get better. I genuinely think that. I don't think art and art making is about innate talent. I think it's about practising, turning up, and tuning into what you like, what you are, not creating off someone else, creating off for yourself in the first instance is what I think helps us to kind of tune into who we are.
Eli: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Helen: Yeah, you're right. There's that really great quote, that Ira Glass quote, that when you the expectation and the reality There's a big gap, and because we have these, because we are arty folk, we probably know what we like, and we probably have really great taste, and we want to create something beautiful or stunning, and actually, it's really hard to do that straight off the bat, so you have to lower our expectations and increase our practice, I think.
Eli: Yeah, absolutely. And one more question, we've talked about the advice for artists doing a sketchbook but what’s your advice for artists who kind of want to do this as a career who want to actually kind of step up to the plate and be like okay I want to be a professional artist.
Helen: Well, what do I think the advice is? I think setting out or being clear about what kind of artist you want to be, what kind of business you want to have. There are so many different ways to run an art business, aren't there?
Eli: There are.
Helen: And I think just actually thinking where are my skills at, where do my skills and my art overlap, and how can I connect with an audience. So I think setting out what would be your ideal, what would be your dream business. You know what would. Be the thing that you would just be excited about and I think knowing that can be helpful and then I think you really my advice is just to throw lots of spaghetti at the Wall. You've got to try lots of things haven't you, you've got you know, maybe enter for competitions or I mean like that's what I did when I first started I entered all sorts of competitions I entered for open shows I you know tried making prints I tried selling in different places and just tried on all of these things to see what worked. And it's only through the doing that you then realise well that didn't quite work but this works or I enjoy this and you can course correct then can't you you can kind of so I think I think it's good to think what would be your dream business as a as a sort of wishful thinking, you know, in an ideal world. What would it be and then you've got to try and make reality fit that dream and it might not you know, but I think both of these things are quite helpful. How do you want your life to be as an artist? What would be success? Yes, defining success on your own terms is success about what you're creating? Is it about the money you're earning? Is it about public acclaim? You know we all have a different view of what a successful artist is don't we and I think defining it for yourself is a good starting point.
Helen: And then trying all sorts of things so finding your success criteria. Defining what would be your dream week activity. How you want your business to feel and trying a whole bunch of stuff and seeing what works, what connects what sells what doesn't sell. What you enjoy.
Eli: That's such good advice. That's such good advice. Thank you so so much for coming and talking with me today. I've had such a wonderful time with you. Where can people find you if they're interested in getting to know you better?
Helen: You find me on my website which is www.helenwellsart.com or I'm on YouTube or I'm on Instagram.
Eli: And all of Helen's links will be in the show notes so you can go down there and and click on all those links and go and follow her everywhere. She's amazing.
Helen: Ah, you're so sweet. Thank you Thank you It's lovely having a chat isn't it about art I Just you know we could talk all day couldn't we I think.
Eli: Ah, there's nothing better than a good old chat about art all right? Thank you so much. Helen. Bye everybody.