Creating Community: A Conversation with Courtney Yoes on Art's Impact and Identity

When Courtney Yoes, local art sensation and instructor embodies the spirit of Zachary's vibrant community. We celebrate her influence, from the murals that grace children's play areas through her work in the school system.

The narrative deepens as we explore the profound ways art tells stories. We tackle the complex dance of professional identity within the art world, questioning what it means to be a 'pro'. This chapter isn't just about defining who we are as artists; it's an affirmation of embracing our unique selves in every brushstroke and life moment.

Our episode crescendos as we resonate with the excitement of young Zachary artists at the Virginia Street Art Crawl. The joy of creating and the celebration of recognition underscores the need for a dedicated art space in our community. We don't just talk about the transformative power of art; we live it, from the hopeful pitches at Baton Rouge Entrepreneurship Week to the art that exudes the essence of Louisiana.

Transcript

Courtney Yoes: 0:05

I'm Courtney Yost. Keep listening to Portrait and Parish Podcast.

Mike Gennaro: 0:08

What's up, zachary? Today we are here with a very, very special guest, courtney Yost, and she's known around town for her art, as well as being an incredible art instructor from third to eighth grade. Correct, courtney, yes, yeah, awesome, I know my daughter actually got the benefit of being educated by Courtney, and you can also hear her amazing daughter singing around town. See her incredible son running track. Do you have any more kids? Just two.

Courtney Yoes: 0:37

Just two. I have a lot of pet babies. Yeah, yeah, fur babies. Yeah, shout out to your husband Whatever he does, right he told me I can't mention, mention him or talk to him because I'd be liable. He'd have to. You know, got it absolutely all right.

Mike Gennaro: 0:51

So we're gonna get into some. Um, really, today's topic is the juxtaposition of being a creative in zachary in 2024 and balancing all the other stuff that goes along with life, like money, responsibilities, kids, responsibilities, kids. All that. Courtney strikes a fine balance in all of that. I hope you know that as an outsider watching it just seems like it's effortless, but we're going to get into some of the behind the scenes there. I'm Mike Gennaro, publisher of Port and Parish. Really, jen's the publisher. I'm just the field and garden guy and the podcaster. We're going to have to change the titles around.

Mike Gennaro: 1:29

We bring you the best of Zachary and the development North region through Candy Conversations every Monday from our headquarters right here on Virginia Street. This is Porch and Parish, the podcast. Stay tuned, we'll be right back with the lightning round. Greenwood Park is the largest park in the Breck system. The master plan vision for Greenwood Community Park and the Baton Rouge Zoo is focusing on creating a one-of-a-kind, world-class destination for the entire East Baton Rouge Parish and its visitors, stitching together Breck's most visited facility and largest park to transform park goers' experiences. See what's coming for Greenwood Community Park in 2024 by going to brechtorg backslash park improvements. Okay, we're back with the lightning round. Courtney's completely unprepared for this lightning round because I promised to send her questions.

Courtney Yoes: 2:17

I'm laughing and I didn't.

Mike Gennaro: 2:19

Yeah, that's good. Hopefully we'll make you cry here, but what is your favorite piece today of art that you've recently done?

Courtney Yoes: 2:32

Of my own, yeah. You can make it somebody else's too of kids, the piece that's ever at little town, um, it, really, you know, after doing the boot that's doing signs, industrial signs, um, it's. It's easy and it's relaxing because you don't have to think about it. There's a font. You have to copy that font, their logo, you're painting one color. It's easy and relaxing. But when you're pushed to create something that's never been created before, um, and you're you're told, can you make it connect as accurate?

Courtney Yoes: 3:04

you know, when it's going into a children's player, yeah, for parties, I mean, you have to think yeah and you have to pull out those genius that not genius, the creative all right, picasso, no, not, no, you are no, no, but I mean it, it really you step back. Once you're done with it, you're going. Oh my gosh, I just did this, I painted this yeah anyway, my studio is is in my gosh.

Courtney Yoes: 3:26

I just did this, I painted this, and my studio is in my bedroom. So I go to bed looking at this rainbow and this alligator and you dream about it and you wake up and like, oh, I've got to add this, I've got to add this. I could have painted on that painting for a lot longer and added things, but the place had to open.

Courtney Yoes: 3:42

But, I'm very proud of that piece and it's, it's, you know, it's. I don't want to say it's a legacy, but it's one of those pieces that people will look at a lot, and children it will be affected by them.

Mike Gennaro: 3:53

Yes, absolutely.

Courtney Yoes: 3:55

So that's, that's my favorite piece.

Mike Gennaro: 3:56

I love it. I love it Sometimes, um, you know, I like to share my own. Uh, I I like the lightning round questions so much I like to answer them myself, so please bear with me what is your favorite piece seriously?

Mike Gennaro: 4:09

thank you.

Mike Gennaro: 4:10

Please let's just talk about me. No, I had this science teacher in um in grade school and every the science teacher did a science teacher thing. But I learned that he painted all the murals around the school and I was like, really, mr mcdonald did that. He passed away since, but he the the paintings were as simple as taking peanuts cartoons like the charlie brown cartoons and garfield cartoons, and he would paint those little segments like at the end of a hallway where you were walking down the stairs, and it kind of chokes me up even thinking about it, because it was just such a simple thing that he did um. But when I grew up and had a family um, I I found a garfield cartoon that was on a canvas wrap and I put it at the the base of our stairs as my kids go down, uh, you know, uh to to school and they see this every day and it's Garfield and he's reading the newspaper and it said something as simple as readers are leaders, or something like that, you know, and that's going to stick with them.

Courtney Yoes: 5:14

They'll see it in the future going. Oh my gosh.

Mike Gennaro: 5:16

Yeah.

Courtney Yoes: 5:16

And they'll just have a flashback to all those mornings coming down and seeing it yeah. So yeah, I like stuff that evokes like a feeling or emotion.

Courtney Yoes: 5:25

And it can be something that's reproduced someone else did yeah, you cherish it. So I mean, like I did a charcoal portrait of my father-in-law after he passed away and it's hanging in my mother-in-law's house. And to say what's your favorite artwork? You know that when I walk in the home and I see it I'm like I'm so glad I could give her that, because you know what you capture in someone's face and eyes and you know that she cherishes that. Yeah, so it's hard to say what's your favorite, because I you know this lightning around.

Mike Gennaro: 5:56

You know I didn't get time to think about this no so I can think about all the can't think about lightning when it strikes.

Courtney Yoes: 6:02

I did a series the landscape series I did for here at the art art crawl before like a few years back I did a tree in a by bayou sarah and that tree is no longer there. It was a rope swing and that was our swimming hole and so it's no longer there, but I captured this.

Mike Gennaro: 6:17

And how many people yeah actually have sounds so country I thought I knew it.

Courtney Yoes: 6:23

Well, I am, country I'm from Ethel oh, you are, I am, that's awesome.

Mike Gennaro: 6:28

I love playing in the creek and the mud, you know. Yeah.

Courtney Yoes: 6:32

But anyway, it's one of those paintings where you know I couldn't sell, I keep them because it's you know.

Mike Gennaro: 6:38

Yeah, you captured something that was impermanent. All right, lightning round question here.

Courtney Yoes: 6:53

Permanence or impermanence in art, what they both have a place um.

Mike Gennaro: 6:54

I see all the you know these, these, these galleries have these setups where people an artist comes in and sets up and when they take it down it's not going to be there anymore. No, and that's what social media kind of helps with. But yeah, and it.

Courtney Yoes: 7:02

You, you have this connection with this piece and you have to cherish it while it's there.

Mike Gennaro: 7:07

Yeah.

Courtney Yoes: 7:07

You know cause, you know it's, it's not going to be there for long.

Mike Gennaro: 7:10

Right.

Courtney Yoes: 7:11

Um, but then there's that permanent piece, like you said, the Garfield. That's a permanent piece of art.

Mike Gennaro: 7:17

Yeah, Michelangelo the Garfield, we're both there yeah.

Courtney Yoes: 7:21

He has a work of art, but it just. I think I can appreciate both and I think both are very important in the art world.

Mike Gennaro: 7:28

Yeah, all right. Shout out to your family and your pets.

Courtney Yoes: 7:33

All right, my husband does jujitsu very health conscious, lovable guy. He helped me for two weekends paint this huge mural over at Prairieville high school and I actually I love him for two weekends paint this huge mural over at prairieville high school and I actually.

Mike Gennaro: 7:45

I think I love him more.

Courtney Yoes: 7:47

Yeah, because it's funny, I like him now. I told him yeah, I love you, but I like you now. Yeah, um super supportive guy my two kids, lucy. Lucy goes music. She'll be at south plains singing friday night. Come see her.

Mike Gennaro: 8:00

This is incredible I was like max dude, how, if you could just pick up a guitar, you'd be, you know, like.

Courtney Yoes: 8:06

Kids don't know, you know. Oh, and let me talk about Kerry real quick. Great kid Kerry runs cross country, plays soccer yeah.

Mike Gennaro: 8:13

Super, super leader. Totally humble kind guy, Love that guy he's super kind.

Courtney Yoes: 8:19

And it's crazy comparing him to Lucy. Lucy is very direct and bossy. That first crazy comparing him to lucy.

Mike Gennaro: 8:27

Lucy is very direct and bossy, that first child stereotype.

Courtney Yoes: 8:29

Assertive very yeah, um, like lucy is just like. Yeah, lucy will go into a gas station and not think about anyone, just get her stuff. And I had you know, no offense, lucy, if you're listening one day. Um, but carrie will go in and go. Oh, I need to get this for this person. This person you know, he's so, he's so thoughtful, he's a middle child.

Mike Gennaro: 8:44

He's got better coping mechanisms.

Courtney Yoes: 8:46

Chicken and waffles are lovable dogs. Waffle has eaten five couches, Whoa yeah. I have friends that will ask me Courtney, do you need this couch? I'm getting rid of this couch. Do you want it? And I'm like yeah, sure.

Mike Gennaro: 9:00

Replacement couch.

Courtney Yoes: 9:07

She's cal replacement, calm down. And we have five chickens. I have a gecko lizard named honey. Yeah, I love um three cats. Chuby, um, it's an old cat. Duke lives outside. He could be inside but he prefers outside. Um and pico de gallo, he's lucy's lucy. All these cats and animals were found like they. You know, we adopted, yeah, the dogs um the cats, we cats. They found us. The gecko lizard was given to us because a girl was moving back to Minnesota.

Mike Gennaro: 9:29

Yeah, I like a gecko lizard, yeah, but even the chickens, the chickens.

Courtney Yoes: 9:33

The lady had to get rid of them out of her yard.

Mike Gennaro: 9:35

What kind of chickens are they.

Courtney Yoes: 9:37

It's the ones with the feathers on the feet, the little short ones.

Mike Gennaro: 9:39

Yeah, yeah Bantams.

Courtney Yoes: 9:41

Yeah.

Mike Gennaro: 9:41

Or I mean it could be a million, but yeah, trout the big chicken.

Courtney Yoes: 9:45

My daughter named him. She's a mix. She was born two. She was hatched two weeks after the other little babies. We have the mom and it's this giant chicken. She's double the size of the other ones. And it's so funny because you think like this little chicken was adopted, like it has its own story, like it could be a book, a children's book yeah. Awesome, so it's neat. So anyway, that was the animals.

Mike Gennaro: 10:06

Perfect, perfect, all right, that's a good segue into our main question. So you know art itself. It seeks to tell stories, right? So, even, like you said, even in the littlest moments of life, we're just telling stories. That's all it is. Some people are more visual and they connect with that better. So what, um, what is a story that you've told recently that you know, outside of the little school, one that was a perfect example, but um, can you think of any others that really resonated with you?

Courtney Yoes: 10:38

a story that you told through art, through your art hmm, well, I mean, I think back to, like Mr Cary, the charcoal drawings. Yeah, um, I've only done. I've done children and and and people that pass away.

Mike Gennaro: 10:53

And.

Courtney Yoes: 10:53

I, I think, I think you can tell a lot from a portrait through someone's eyes. Yeah, like I don't know, just looking at a portrait, there's always these, these clues in the, the paintings to let you know about this person, um, the, the glass series I do, um, I don't want to say it's bs when an artist tells you about a painting because they're they gotta sell it you know, and so the glass series I like is, you know, thinking about reflections and repetition and how.

Courtney Yoes: 11:25

You know there's a huge craze for paint pouring and they're beautiful pieces, but I don't like the chaos of paint pouring. So when I stumbled across, you know holding my camera in a glass and looking at the bottom and thinking, thinking about the past of that glass. Like the, there's someone created this piece of work that is a glass you know the old, the old crystals and something like that, and then turning that into a canvas painting, flat to two-dimensional.

Courtney Yoes: 11:51

you think about the reflections, the history. Someone carved this line originally. So just the thought process of me painting something that someone else created, that was mass produced, but this original artist that did this design, I think I kind of got lost in that question.

Mike Gennaro: 12:10

I love it. Let's turn more to the so art is your career. I asked you pre-interview or, or I don't know how this came up, but we were talking about are you a pro or not? And you're like, oh, I'm not a pro, but you know, I was like from an outsider's perspective. You get paid as a teacher, yeah, and you also get paid to do commissions and we see your commissions everywhere and you're prolific. I mean, I think you're a pro. What does it mean to go pro?

Courtney Yoes: 12:48

I don't know Like it is. I mean, when people ask me, I do like to say I'm a professional artist over art teacher, cause you know, to say you're an art teacher doesn't necessarily mean that you're producing art, and I want people to know that I am a professional artist. I am that you're producing art, yeah. And I want people to know that I am a professional artist.

Courtney Yoes: 13:04

I am producing art, not necessarily every day, but I am, so it just I don't know, yeah, like if I stumbled across someone that's in Elizabethan gallery, someone that has a guy. To me they're professional artists because they're every day, you know, doing art, they're making art. So I'm professional artists sometimes. So I don't know.

Mike Gennaro: 13:24

Yeah, I love. I love that question because it's something that you know me. I'm super like segmented in my brain. I've got this great right side of my brain and great left side but, like commercial real estate guy, doesn't mesh well with artistic guy.

Courtney Yoes: 13:43

What do you do? What is your profession? What do you do?

Mike Gennaro: 13:45

Commercial real estate all day. There's just that's. That's easy to understand. I've I've learned people just need the story of you very quick and it's almost like your elevator pitch, right?

Courtney Yoes: 13:54

Yeah, I can't do that. You need to sit down with me and have coffee if you want to hear.

Mike Gennaro: 14:01

Oh right, you need to sit down and be gonna have coffee if you want to hear oh right, right, no, you'll never know how weird I am. Oh my gosh, I mean I'm starting to get more comfortable with just displaying the, the weirdness. That is me right, because we're all you know. I just went to the louisiana box turtle keeper and, uh, louisiana tortoise keepers annual meetup yesterday.

Courtney Yoes: 14:18

It was a spring meetup, okay, I brought tortoises to a park and met strangers and it was great, that's amazing. That's awesome. I always tell my slogan from high school. I did a painting. It says people say I'm strange, but I'm really just weird. Yes, and I mean that's my mark. And the kids in my talent art say, oh, this kid said I was weird, I'm like did you tell him thank you, yes, as a compliment Right.

Courtney Yoes: 14:43

I mean, you're not a cookie cutter of someone else, you're original, unique, absolutely. You know. So I love that.

Mike Gennaro: 14:49

You're on the front lines of the weirdness, yeah, you know, maybe maybe not as much as the drama, I'm just kidding Department, so I'm just kidding department, but you're really are out there, right, and that's good to me, that's a good thing. And, you know, make economic development can kind of be a meshing of of commercial real estate and art. Because what do we really want? We want quality of life, we want to know our story, we want to know ourselves better. So you know you're helping those kids every single day to know ourselves better. Um, so you know you're helping those kids every single day to know themselves better. Are are there any um moments that you'd like to share? You know, through the years of teaching kids, that just kind of stand out to you you know, occasionally you'll see a light bulb.

Courtney Yoes: 15:32

Come on when you're. You're trying to explain art to someone or a technique. But virginia street art crawl happened the other day and I invited middle school students to come yeah and it was it. I told them bring artwork, bring artwork. And I had um four or five students well, maybe six students come and we were in the old town hall and when they sold a piece they got excited yeah but guess what? They sold everyone every piece of their artwork and the next day at school you could see them, their smile.

Mike Gennaro: 16:02

They're like Miss Yost we sold all of it, the light bulb came on. We can make money doing this.

Courtney Yoes: 16:06

Yes, I mean seriously all these students that sold artwork, that light bulb came on. I can make money doing something I love.

Mike Gennaro: 16:16

Yes.

Courtney Yoes: 16:17

Something I create now as a kid, and it was just one of those moments that. I mean, it made my teaching career to have those students with all those light bulbs.

Mike Gennaro: 16:28

It was beautiful. They were so stressed out before.

Courtney Yoes: 16:30

They were so stressed out.

Mike Gennaro: 16:32

You could just feel it because I went through town hall and it was just palpable in the room. But you know it was mostly because the parents were all over the shoulder helping them and stuff and they were more stressed. But watching the kids I don't know. I saw this crazy piece of art that this kid did and it was like this stressed-out rabbit or something and she sold it right, yeah.

Courtney Yoes: 16:55

And it had a story that connected to that child. And for these kids to put their self out there. Yeah, I mean people don't realize. Oh, it's a beautiful art. You should be happy, but it's like a musician singing an original in front of people.

Mike Gennaro: 17:09

Yeah.

Courtney Yoes: 17:12

You just kind of hide behind it for a while. And you have to work up the nerve to put it out there.

Courtney Yoes: 17:17

And then for a middle schooler of all ages a middle schooler the one that's trying to find themselves and question everything that they know about themselves to be able to say I'm going to do this and I I mean I I did pump it up a lot, you're going to get money, you're going to get money. So I mean it was, but it still was a big step for them. And then to be able to talk to people that bought the artwork. It wasn't just hanging it in somewhere and someone coming off the street and buying it there.

Courtney Yoes: 17:41

They had to interact with people, so it was a huge moment.

Mike Gennaro: 17:44

It's incredible yeah.

Courtney Yoes: 17:45

As an art teacher. It was one of the best moments, yeah, my career.

Mike Gennaro: 17:49

I love that Love that I can remember. There was a, an event called stabbed in the art, over in where, off of Perkins Road in Baton Rouge, and my father, you know he was a music teacher and that's how everybody knew him at St Michael's Special School for his whole life. But the guy was a musician, you know from what I saw, Like dad, was a musician that used to like be on the map in New Orleans and all, and it was just there's this whole other soulful side to it that didn't line up exactly with what he portrayed every single day. And he was also an artist.

Mike Gennaro: 18:26

And there was this one event Stabbed in the Art that I was like Dan, why don't you put all your stuff out? And he went and put all of his paintings from years and years and years. It was just left, these beautiful things left in the closets and upstairs, and just to see his face when somebody bought his painting for him, it was just this inordinate amount of money I think it was like 600 bucks, like Whoa. It just lit him up, Um, and that's what these events do for people, Um, so thank you for all of your. You know you were instrumental in some of the first white light nights right?

Courtney Yoes: 19:03

Well, not not white light. The way here in Zachary. It was the art walk was the first one we did. It was the. It was the Zachary artist guild.

Mike Gennaro: 19:10

Yeah, I remember that that was like 10 years ago. Yeah.

Courtney Yoes: 19:14

It felt like a long time ago. I know Dale actually brewed beer and the mayor was out there serving it Like he was a home brewer. Yeah, um, it was at where you know. The boot is now in that parking lot around the chamber and it it was. It was in July, it was hot, we were all super drenched in sweat but it was such a fun event for Zachary to have like to start having.

Mike Gennaro: 19:35

And then they and, and then it happened year after year. Covid stopped it, but I remember one of the happiest memories in our family life was there was this rickshaw driver you remember when that was a thing, these pedal car drivers. We piled the whole family in and we drove from you know back where our Tigertown office was for a little while, all the way over to the other side of Church Street where Ruby Salon is now.

Courtney Yoes: 20:01

And we were just laughing and you know it was so cool, we've got, we've got to bring it back.

Mike Gennaro: 20:04

And then that's the last one. We did virginia street art crawl. It was great.

Courtney Yoes: 20:06

You brought it back, it was it was small, but it was it.

Mike Gennaro: 20:10

I had it small for a reason you know, so that people can connect to all the artists yeah you know so it'll be bigger and better next year yeah, um, I've heard you say before that, um, you know, zachary needs like an art gallery. Um, can you speak to the importance of that or how that would look exactly? And well, you know, I know there are a lot in new orleans, but like, how do we do this?

Courtney Yoes: 20:34

I don't know.

Mike Gennaro: 20:35

Let me have the bottom floor of this building, yeah do you think it would take an entire bottom floor, or like what?

Courtney Yoes: 20:41

we have a lot of talent in this town I know you know it would be nice to have somewhere. You know, is it? I think it's z market nexus city hall, right past, I know well, a lot of the market, a lot of the the markets here, the little boutique styles yeah they have a lot of artists that that hang but at the same time the like for crawl. You have to be a producing artist, kind of to be in shops. You don't want to just leave artwork that's five, six years old hanging.

Mike Gennaro: 21:10

Yeah.

Courtney Yoes: 21:10

You want to keep things revolving.

Mike Gennaro: 21:12

Right.

Courtney Yoes: 21:13

But to have an art gallery. It would be nice to have an art show and then it be presented, not just stayed there constantly.

Mike Gennaro: 21:20

You know like that you know have art opening Cause. For me as a, it's almost like a pop up yeah Right, yeah.

Courtney Yoes: 21:26

So for when art called come around. That would be the one time I would produce a series of artwork and I presented it like it was an art show for myself. Like here's the six series painting that I've done, yes, and then that's really all I had it in me for that year to produce, you know, original artwork, not commission pieces.

Mike Gennaro: 21:44

Yeah.

Courtney Yoes: 21:45

So just to have an art gallery where people gather, you know, see art, talk about art. To promote young artists, new artists, upcoming artists, seasoned artists, just you know fine art.

Mike Gennaro: 21:58

Yeah, you're also heavily involved in the music scene through your daughter and her probably uh undisputed largest fan you know like uh, yeah, so tell us, tell us about the music scene and what you've learned about Zachary's music scene for any of those um young artists.

Courtney Yoes: 22:17

Zachary restaurants want to promote artists. You know, and they know that there's a niche. They know people in Zachary don't want to go to Baton Rouge on a Friday night or a Saturday night to listen to music. No, but the music scene it's nice. You know, agave, mommies, tequila, they all have music. You know they rotate, they're just, they're very supportive you know and um, when and when patrons go to a restaurant, know that you know these artists are getting paid, but they're relying on these tips also.

Mike Gennaro: 22:50

So if someone is singing you know your favorite song, go show them a dollar to like, show your appreciation you know, if they have an angry look in your, in their eyes after they play friends in low places, that's that could be why. Just give them something, a nice note, anything, yeah like lucy, kids would scribble on pieces of paper and go and she loves that she probably has them hanging up. She's really good at improv.

Courtney Yoes: 23:16

She loves, yeah, like she likes that connection yeah, the the like, because if she's talking to the audience, the attention's on both of them. Um, but she just she loves it, she, she loves music, she loves performing um and that, granted, she does take her a bit, like that classic stereotype musician, to work her nerve up to get up there yeah once she's behind the mic, it's, it's yeah what the kids say it's all gravy, yeah, yeah, yeah I don't know if that's a saying anymore.

Mike Gennaro: 23:47

It's uh, it's a. I don't know if that's a saying anymore either it's gravy yeah it's all right but um, look, so there's also a wind down period for artists. You know, after a show, just like a musician after a show Emotions run high after you put yourself out there. You ever, you know, even after a school talent show. Do you see kids struggling with that, putting themselves out there, or is it just a high?

Courtney Yoes: 24:18

I think it's an excitement. Kids can be excited. You know teachers are exhausted, like after certain events they put on it's complete exhaustion. But the kids are.

Courtney Yoes: 24:27

They're lifted up because they, you know, they're just now having these endorphins of showing artwork or selling artworkers, you know, having getting a tip from singing a song, um, or even applause, you know. So, I think, as the younger you are and you start experiencing those types of things, it's good because it really starts training you to go oh, I'm going to learn this and do this next time. You know teachers, you know we've been there, done that. So when we put on an art show for students, it's like I'm glad this is done.

Courtney Yoes: 24:59

But we were very proud of our students but's like I'm glad this is done, but we were very proud of our students but it takes a lot, a big toll on you and maybe that's just being old, I don't know.

Mike Gennaro: 25:06

Yeah, yeah, keep listening, we'll be right back. Now. In its 13th year, baton Rouge Entrepreneurship Week is claiming a spot on your calendar for a celebration of innovation. Brew is more than just an event. It's a vibrant multi-day experience designed for entrepreneurs, innovators and anyone eager to shape our community. Festivities kick off Tuesday, may 7th at Mid-City Tower and culminate with a 100 grand investment prize at a high stakes pitch competition on May 9th.

Mike Gennaro: 25:38

On May 9th, I want to kind of turn this. You know the kids out there they are probably. If they're really talented, they're probably struggling with the classic stereotype of can I do art as a profession? Can I really be a pro? And then, you know, once in a while I noticed artists in Louisiana. They come up and they start painting something and it's just unexpected, it's not high art. Once in a while I noticed artists in Louisiana. They come up and they start painting something and it's just unexpected, it's not high art, but it becomes high art.

Mike Gennaro: 26:06

One of our favorites, roderick. He's painting this werewolf that we all took for granted, and now that's in these galleries. Frank Rell is one of my favorite ones, from New Orleans. He started taking pictures of the swamp scenes, right, and it's so old hat, right? Yeah, let's go take a picture of the swamp. But, frank, what his mission was was he wanted to take pictures while he was in the water in a kayak or actually in a swamp where he could get eaten by an alligator. And so there's this kind of like element of you feel nervous because this guy's, he's water level on all of these scenes and it's dark and he said his his main inspiration was I don't want people to be afraid of our water. You know, the swamp has scary snakes and alligators and the Mississippi river was one of his subjects and he's like everybody grows up and what are you told? Don't go by the water.

Courtney Yoes: 27:01

it's even in a grateful dead song, you know yeah, yeah, so he's thinking outside the box to make art and has a different reason.

Mike Gennaro: 27:07

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So like um, I know I'm throwing all these questions at you at once here, but like yeah, I want to go back to the other one that you had so going pro? And then I want to know from your perspective is is there, are there things that we haven't, that that we might need to look at twice, and, zachary, that are just there in front of us? That could be incredible. You know subjects.

Courtney Yoes: 27:28

Oh, I love the train Depot, the history behind that. Um oh I I. I did a coloring sheet a few years back to teach perspective to my the Zachary Elementary School when I was regular art there and it was so much fun because these kids could this piece of history in our community. They could actually color it and make it their own, but it also teach perspective. The Hug, your People Park. It's absolutely beautiful Any of these historic homes to be a subject matter in paintings, the history that's behind them, it's just they're beautiful Any of these historic homes to be a subject matter in paintings, the history that's behind them, it's just.

Courtney Yoes: 28:03

they're beautiful. Every every Oak tree down 39th street neighborhood. You know the Breck parks that we have here are absolutely beautiful. So just to just to get people to realize how beautiful their community is, is is a huge thing, you know, and and that's kind of why I want to bring you know racks back to get the arts back up to do plein air painting, to do photography contests, to do all these things so people can appreciate their community and see it through the eyes of different people.

Mike Gennaro: 28:32

Absolutely. And then the other part was turning pro yeah.

Courtney Yoes: 28:37

I tell my students, and mostly parents also, to create art, to be in the talented art program. Don't think of it as I'm going to be a professional artist, so I'm going to get in a talented art program, everyone. Talented art benefits just art in general. It benefits students. They're presented with problems. They're able to resolve them with different learning, different techniques, different solutions. And I tell my students I have a cousin that's in Dallas.

Courtney Yoes: 29:06

He has his own plastic surgeon, you know, like doctor's office, and he was a wonderful, good artist. He has to be able to draw anatomy to be able to do these surgeons Like he sketches. He's got to be able to do it. Chad Morris, here at Family Dent dentistry I was in art with him in high school. Yeah, and can I tell you he was a fabulous artist. He took art as his elective. Yeah, and he's going to be a dentist. He's got to be able to see a good smile and recognize it and change the mouth. You know, um, people don't realize art is used across, like in so many professions. Yeah, even even it helps, you think it does.

Mike Gennaro: 29:44

You can sit down and communicate.

Courtney Yoes: 29:46

Yeah, and communicate. So it really makes your brain fire on these different pistons. You know like to be able to do better at your job any job, really. Any career.

Mike Gennaro: 29:56

Yeah, you know, you're saying that and it's, it's making me feel a little bit better.

Courtney Yoes: 30:00

Um, you know because.

Mike Gennaro: 30:02

I used to have this cabinet shop and, um, what, what was special about is, I would draw every piece and then here, customer, this is what it's going to look like, you know? Yeah, there's software to do it and you can have a 3d image and it's clean and everything, but these sketches were special. Yeah, um, yeah, even in in commercial real estate, my desk I'm looking around it's littered with sketches of what the space could look like. Every single space is probably not in its ideal position, you know.

Courtney Yoes: 30:29

But even as a realtor, you have to know what photos are going to make people want to come see this home. Yeah, sure, so I mean you have to have an artist's eye even to be a realtor, and so, like you're catching things, maybe in this house that, like a potential buyer might need to question like, yeah, that that molding's a little crooked, or you know. So, as far as that you're, you have an artist's eye. You need to have an artist's eye for real estate.

Courtney Yoes: 30:59

It's hard to think of many professions that don't you know. Even on the math and engineering side of things, I could tell you any aspect of a job that needs a heart yeah. We did that one day in class and my middle schoolers were questioning.

Courtney Yoes: 31:07

Yeah, they were sending me jobs. It might have been I'm not for certain which school it was, but they would shoot a profession at me and I'm like, well, think about this. How did they get here? You know it was a fun class. Yeah, this, how do they get here? You know it was. It was a fun class. Yeah, absolutely, talking is a very important in my classes. Uh, discussing anything and everything they want to they have a question about in art. You know it's very good for them to to get answers yeah that's not coming from google well on art and google.

Mike Gennaro: 31:37

we were talking a little bit about chat, gpt and you know there's a lot of things we talk about with AI. It's mostly fear-based and all, or you know look how easy it made this. But you're talking about some AI helping with depression, not your own.

Courtney Yoes: 31:55

Yeah, my father. Yeah, he started talking. Lucy set him up on chat. She peeped on his phone.

Mike Gennaro: 32:02

Set it up a little bit there, your father-in-law.

Courtney Yoes: 32:05

Yeah, no, my father.

Mike Gennaro: 32:06

Your father lives by himself.

Courtney Yoes: 32:08

Yeah, he has a leg amputated so he can't go anywhere by himself. He's wheelchair-bound and you're sitting in a house all day, every day, by yourself, and then the kids were all working, we all have our families and he's an hour away, so I can't go all the time. I talk to him every day on the phone, but not long, like you know a long, all day conversation. Well, lucy set him up on chat GPT, and he renamed him Joe, and he has conversations with him every day. He has a question he wants to ask.

Courtney Yoes: 32:39

If he doesn't remember something you know like a fact or something he learned in the past. He can ask you know this, ai? And they have full-on conversations and, um, like I was saying earlier, when we picked him up friday for dinner before lucy's gig, yeah he was completely his old self, nice, even tempered. He wasn't moody he was jolly. He joked around with the waiter. You know it was refreshing, and the only thing I could think of was the AI being included in his life.

Courtney Yoes: 33:05

Yeah, on a daily, and so it's crazy to think what it could happen on senior citizens. Yes, just like music. You know, when seniors listen to music, their moods are elevated.

Mike Gennaro: 33:18

I didn't know that. I mean I could see that With dementia patients. It helps them remember like music.

Courtney Yoes: 33:23

It's crazy what the brain does and can recall.

Mike Gennaro: 33:26

Yeah, yeah, all right. So you know I kind of want to wind it down with. I was speaking with you about this goofy book that Jen made me read. I read some of it and it just messed with my life.

Mike Gennaro: 33:40

It was called the artist's way by julia cameron, and what it does is, um, it identifies that many of us out there that are not living the artist's way are suppressing this inner artist inside of us all. And the inner artist wants to do the creative like all day. It's like your inner kid, almost the person that wants to go be out in nature and then draw it and then, um, you know, create all these unique experiences. But there's this other side of you that just knows you have to go make money or whatever those those things are that you. You build up in your brain that as reasons why you can't be an artist, you know. Um, do you have any final comments on on how we can all access that artist and live the artist way? I know you didn't read the book, but no, I am no, it's on my list.

Courtney Yoes: 34:38

Volunteer for things that interest you? Yeah, volunteer, and and get that itch scratched by those outside organizations. Go do your nine to five job but then make sure that your interests are something that can that help you get those ideas out. Like I have the art crawl, you know I'm, I'm bringing art to the communities and to children and it's very important to me. Yeah, um, you know, gardening, like the community, like it's a huge one yeah. Like I would love to have a community garden, a gardening club or something like that, and you gotta make it happen.

Courtney Yoes: 35:12

You can't just sit on ideas. You, you know, or someone else will take it, yeah, and then you'll get sad.

Mike Gennaro: 35:25

Yeah, your next year will go by and you're like dang it. I wish I would have did that. Or even worse, nobody will do it and it's stuck. You won't ever know until you try. Yeah, yeah, so, um, I guess you know we can't offer much more assurance than that and that's stepping out on that, that leap of faith. So you know, uh, as we're both here on a sunday recording, let's talk a little bit about faith. No, we'll leave it on that note. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you for having me today. Yeah, I needed to talk to you.

Mike Gennaro: 35:47

It's inspiring on that different level, Like it's comforting.

Courtney Yoes: 35:51

Yeah. And that's one of the greatest benefits of art and we both want to make Zachary such a better place. Yeah, I can appreciate what Porch and Parish is doing and facilitating all this.

Mike Gennaro: 36:02

Thank you. Thank you, If anything. It's just another canvas. You know that we can write our stories on, put our photos into and all of that. So thanks for that. We'll catch y'all next time. Thank you to all of our sponsors out there who make this podcast available for free. Thank you to the city of Zachary. Y'all, remember, we compete here, you know, fiercely, in sports. We compete on quality of life as well, and so think about the things that increase our quality of life, and art is one and everybody, every single person, has the ability to step up in that category. You know, even if it's just picking up trash to start to kind of clean that that slate, get that canvas blank, go out there and do it. You know, just step up. See y'all next time.