West Campus open journals
Feature photo: Sam Berg putting up his work in BookPeople Cafe, Central Austin. Taken by me. This article was modified from its original publication on The Daily Texan website and flipbook from September 21, 2023.
On a West Campus lamp post facing 24th St. hangs a scan of a diary entry. Handwritten, scattered, and covered with sketches and crossed-out words, the taped scan reads: “There’s some deep underlying force of attraction that compels us to want closeness with others.” Some bypassers walk past it, not noticing it above another poster looking for a band drummer. But others stop to read it, and the anonymous writer is heard.
24th St. and Rio Grande intersection lamppost captured on an iPhone camera by me on August 26. The posters were taken down and replaced by other affiche a week later.
Sam Berg is the artist behind the @_OpenJournal_ username tagged on the bottom of the label paper. The scan flaps back and forth in the September breeze.
“The beauty of expression is the ability to know yourself and to be able to show other people what it is that you feel,” Berg said. “If someone can see [my] page and see it for what it is, then I can connect with that person.”
Berg posts illustrations on social media and sells art prints in local coffee shops outside of studying film at UT Austin. I met him for our interview inside a local BookPeople coffee corner – one of the walls here being the new host for his work. Local artists reserve the space to put up their work months in advance, said the cafe’s Assistant Manager Emily Klenk, and the wait can be up to a year long.
“When I first started here, 13 years ago, [the art wall] was already in progress,” Klenk said. “It's good for the community and for people to have an outlet to other people's views and passions. Whether it’s writing, art, drawing, painting, whatever it is, it creates a spark in somebody else, a total stranger.”
Sam Berg on September 5, 2023. Taken by me. Sam and I continued talking after the interview, the recording turned off, as I passed the prints up to him from an organized file compartment that he said his girlfriend (now fiancé) set up for him. After I left, I saw that he completely redid the entire arrangement.
Berg lived in Kenya before moving to the United States and has been doodling since he first discovered he was able to listen better when he did it in class as a kid. Nowadays, creating art is more than just his hobby; it is also a medium for his thoughts and an attempt at a full-time career.
“I moved around a lot,” Berg said. “With every life, the context in which you exist is constantly changing and you may never go back to the same place. The one thing that has been consistent for me has been drawing.”
Berg’s art is a culmination of pen etches and marker outlines as he switches between cartoon and surrealist styles. On his Instagram and YouTube, he describes his work as one that centers around the environment, character, and story.
“No one can take away your paper and your pen from you,” Berg said “You go places in your own mind, worldbuild, explore and express yourself. I think I have a lot to share with the world.”
Illustrations of Berg’s work at BookPeople Cafe, September 5, 2023. Taken by me.
I keep returning to one interesting point in all of this: I would have never had the conversation that I had with Sam if it wasn’t for his public manifesto. When shedding such intimacy of his personal world onto strangers, he makes the reader ask, “Can art be authentic if the artist knows other people will see it?”
Berg’s friend, biochemistry senior Brinkley Morse, bought two of Berg's science-fiction drawings which he said he keeps on his bedroom wall back in Houston.
“It's a dialogue,” Morse said. “You've got the artist, and then the art. There's a gap between them and an even bigger gap between the art and the viewer. Sam's setting up a pretty intimate dialogue.”
The Rio Grande market on Saturday evenings makes for another hub that features Berg’s work next to homemade jewelry and craft vendors. Berg said every time he posts a new drawing, he talks to at least one person about it.
"It’s nothing crazy, but it is culture,” Berg said. “This relationship I have with making stuff has been something I really love.”
As he writes about existential ideas, challenges his own beliefs, and puts honesty at the forefront, the answer to my earlier question is yes, public art can be authentic. But, only if done unapologetically and true to the artist.
“Whether on social media or not, it’s the same philosophy: I love doing [art] and will not be afraid of what people say about it. I make something, show it to you, you feel something — and that is perfect.”
