My name is Evan Miller. I'm a native to Colorado; born July 2nd, 1986 in Longmont. Currently, I'm a Double Major in Painting and Drawing with a minor in Poetry at Colorado State University. I have two happily married, supportive parents. My father earned his Master's Degree in Chemical Engineering. My mother completed her Bachelor's in three years (perhaps less, I cannot give a correct duration off hand nor the emphasis of her studies). I have one brother and one sister. My mother's parents, the only grandparents I have left, were both college teachers. My grandfather, a Professor of Biology. My grandmother, a teacher of such things as Latin. My father's cousin is a painter in Montana, my mother's sister is a painter based in Longmont. Based on my family, it would be impossible for me to keep any dignity if I refused to be as active as I am.

Like any other child, I loved to draw with crayons. As I grew I couldn't stop. It's not that I like art, but that I have to create it. I have to release the images born in my mind. I am infatuated with art. Aside from art, I was once obsessed with basketball. My father and I used to play it for hours, and in fact it seemed our whole relationship depended on that game. My identity was defined by it, because most people who thought of me thought also of basketball.

Going into high school, I spent 8 to 10 hours per diam at a park near my parent's house practicing basketball. I took two water bottles and food each day so I wouldn't have to leave until the park closed after dark. In high school a career in basketball seemed possible, at least for a free college education. I received feedback from college scouts for my ambidextrous ability in the sport, as well as my inability to back down from anyone on the court. I'd trained my left hand so well, I could take jump shots from the same distance as my right. However, high school politics ruined the game for me, and when I partially tore my left achilles...it was over.

The second to last game I played, I'd almost single handedly brought my team back from defeat. The game after, I quit. My team's point guard--who'd been defending a south paw by forcing him to the left and allowing him to score the majority of the opponent's points--told our team in the locker room that all we had to do to win was force our opponents to the middle. It is perhaps the dumbest thing I remember hearing in high school, my first observant proof that some people are too blind by their own faults to learn anything, and I cleaned my locker that night when everyone left without a word. The coach of that team cried when I quit. The coach of my team the year before had already quit, disgusted by the politics within the high school system. I never cried, though I think I should have. I wanted to be Kevin Garnett growing up. I still have dreams at night about playing that game, and the dream is always ruined by my disgust for the team's varsity coach.

The following week we were scheduled to play the team I'd almost beaten. My younger brother played that night, so I'd come to see his game (the first I'd witnessed without being a player in any sense). I ran into the coach of that team, and he gasped upon seeing me. It's the only time in my life I've actually seen someone gasp at the sight of my face. Immediately he asked where I'd been? I told him I'd quit due to personal issues, and he offered me a spot on his team if I was willing to transfer high schools.

The first vicissitude of my life was walking away from basketball, and I lost that part of my identity for only the artist/the poet. However, my drive to fully commit every ounce of my being into what I do was never left behind. I write poetry as much as I do art--correction, poetry is art. My favorites are Anna Ahkmatova, Marina Tsvetayeva, Ezra Pound, T.S. Eliot, Adrienne Rich, Mariann Moore, and Mina Loy.

I've been dabbling with novels, and am almost done with my first book. My five recommended books to read are: The Brothers Karamazov, The Unbearable Lightness of Being (anything by Kundera is magnificent), One Thousand Years of Solitude, A Guide to Kulchur, and Rememberances of Thing's Past (a.k.a. In Search of Lost Time; which is seven novels and 3000 pages long).

If I don't stay busy...if I don't do art (I consider writing to be an equivalent to art, especially poetry since both visual arts and poetry are based on observation) I suffer from intense anxiety attacks. Some people have cocaine, I have graphite and words. I don't bleed blood, but paint, upon every surface I can run my hands. I am as dependent on art as some elderly couples are dependent on their spouses for mental stability. God damn it, I sound too serious...

A lot of my artwork today is reaction to political events (particularly war and economics). I also prefer to meditate on the human abstract of "love", what is love? I do not know. All I am is a vessel flooded with thoughts, with blood under flesh, flesh and blood over bone, using eyes to observe and two hands connected with a mind to record those observations to the best of my ability. I do not have any qualms with artwork not related to those two veins of human existence, but I feel that artists have an obligation to react to major events of human history. T.S. Eliot once wrote:

“The possible interests of a poet are unlimited; the more intelligent he is the better; the more intelligent he is the more likely that he will have interests: our only condition is that he turn them into poetry, and not merely meditate on them poetically.” (Eliot, Thomas S. The Wasteland: and Other Writings. New York: Random House, Inc., 2002. 232.)

For me, being an artist is a moral obligation: creating visual reaction(s) to what I concern my thoughts. Since artists are living witness to those events (even if they try to deny their eyes witness to those events today) that future persons will only be able to read about, they must create a mark of visual art concerning some aspect of such events. If they do not, then they are failing themselves as an artist; they will fail the world as an artist. Art need not be always beautiful. The morbid, the grotesque truth of what occurs in the world today must be reacted to: I choose to react to such truths.

These days, an artist like me must be careful, but must also be bold and educated (much as David was educated; as Goya was observant to war and Kollwitz was after). Artists have an obligation in these dark days to be the scribes of uncomfortable issues, because these days they are happening and many days from now may they not be.
Aside from art, I study martial arts of the Samurai. I love nothing more than a hookah and a stiff whiskey. I view economics as arguably the most valuable area of study today, next to science and mathematics. Very few of the people I hang out with are American, and among my group of friends we speak about 12 languages (I've never counted the exact number). I am not a complication, I am a simplicity; I am simple, I am assumed by human analysis to be complicated. I am what many title Evan Miller. Thank you, sincerely, for visiting my website. I hope you enjoy it.