Meet Fuego Gatsby | Visual Artist & Creative Director

We had the good fortune of connecting with Fuego Gatsby and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Fuego, what is the most important factor behind your success?
The most important factors behind my success is happiness and freedom. The freedom to creative full time bring me the ultimate joy. Coming from a military background and having such a structured upbringing from my parents always pushed me to search for my own sort of freedom in life. I’m thankful for my background for it provided me a sense of structure that came with this freedom that overall lead to my success in my industry. Still a long ways to go but I’m happy.

Alright, so let’s move onto what keeps you busy professionally?
I’m an all-around visual artist who has a passion for all things creative. I mean that literally too! I started my career off in a much different way than most artist for I started as a dancer. Battling, choreography, or cyphers you name it! I was there and ready to move. Dancing was freedom for me as I grew up struggling with depression from my father walking out on me and my mom when I was younger, but through dance I learned about myself a lot, learned how to submit to my vulnerabilities and overall had a vast understanding for movement. I felt like all of these qualities created the artist I am today for you need to be comfortable with your insecurities, you need to be vulnerable within your practice, and you need to understand movement in order to see your vision clearly. If it wasn’t for dance I wouldn’t be the artist or brand I am today.

As far as my developing my brand, I will say it definitely wasn’t hard but not easy either. I came in this industry pretty confident in where I was headed. The hard part was juggling the different skills I had and narrowing my focus, this I still struggle with. For just as many creatives I have many things I want to do and I used to jump from project to project without finishing one. What helped me was honestly a conversation I had with my parents when they told me “Even Michael Jordan couldn’t be great at everything he had to narrow down his focus.” Now as much as they were right about Michael Jordan I decided ask myself a series of questions “What if Michael Jordan played Golf to have better focus at the task at hand without too many mistakes? What if Michael Jordan played baseball to understand a field bigger than a court a lot better?”

These questions to some people may seem to be reading too much into things but these questions worked for me in a sense that I opened up pandoras box to my own questions. Balancing my skills wasn’t the issue, in my opinion, it was learning to use all my artistic skills to help one another reach full potential that was going to the trick to creating a unique brand and story to tell. The lesson I learned from all this was to never settle for opinions but to dive deeper into them through questions to see what you learn. The more you know, the more you’ll grow and the more you’ll be able to show to a world that seeks value through even the smallest aspects of life. That is where the appreciation for art begins and where teh artist can create his or own path.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
I would first tell them to come during the week of Street Meet lol. Next I would invite them to go eat at Vons in Seattle for its definitely a favorite spot to both eat and drink. If they were in for a good time I would either take them to Cap Hill for drinks and pizza at Marios pizza or take them to Belltowne where we could drink and play arcaded games at Jupiter Lounge. Seattle has a lot to offer and a lot of cool parks to see the full city, like at Kerry Park and Gas Works park. Theres underground put put golfing at Flat Stick Pub and adventurous walks around Pikes Market area. Now I happen to be a big fashion lover so I’m definitely taking any of my friends to the best places to shop at such as Valley of Roses Vintage Boutique, Red Light Vintage Mall, Bon Voyage vintage boutique, and many more.

I’m overall fun person who literally likes to do whatever and explore. Even if I haven’t been somewhere I’m down to explore new parts of wherever I’m at even if its a new alley I’ve never been down before.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
Wow there’s so many people to thank from afar and locally. I would first like to dedicate a shout out to an artist, friend, and client Jazire. She’s an amazing musical artist and business owner who has always taken a chance on me with entrusting her visuals, time, and knowledge. I work for her as an A&R ,film director, and content strategist in which she allows me so much freedom and range to really go the extra mile in all aspects. I would also like to shout out my brother from another Nixo fortune who has since day one always believed in my abilities as a creative director and allowed me to push his creativity to the next level. We all have ideas as creatives, but don’t have too many people who will take a chance on delivering these ideas. That brings me to the organization that has not only trusted me to lead them but also trusted me into a community where I no longer felt like an outsider, Street Meet Washington. This organization meets up once a month and allows creatives to network and create content with one another with no strings attached. The community is so wholesome, warm hearted, and welcoming of anyone who has a passion to create. The first moment I came to the event I was so excited to be around other visual artist such as myself and be able to just create, share knowledge, and network with new people.

Instagram: www.instagram.com/fuego_gatsby

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/darrell-spencer-263592210/

Twitter: www.twitter.com/fuego_gatsby

Youtube: www.youtube.com/keloo2010