- Art truly heals and it's been proven over and over.

It's just hard to see the artist industry being hit so hard and there not really being a lot of support across the board.

(gently chiming bells) - Hello, my name is April Couch and I am the artist-owner of Totally Tangled Creations.

I am a Zentangle-inspired fine-line artist.

So I took Zentangle and my love of doodling and I married the two and came up with my own style.

It's almost like I was paralyzed, you know, for a while.

Probably for the first month I didn't do anything Zentangle-based at all.

And I had no motivation to because I kept thinking that I should be doing something for people, for someone else.

That I shouldn't be focused on creating things and promoting things that are not essential for people.

I had a huge mental block about my art being essential.

Until some of my customers started saying, "Hey, we'd like to make some purchases."

All of my sales happen on Facebook.

I put them out there and immediately people responded and say, "I want that piece.

I want that piece."

It's just not how I prefer to do business.

It's so impersonal.

And it gives me no joy.

(laughs) Because I didn't get to talk with the person, I get didn't get to hear about their kids or about their families and reconnect with people that I see, you know, from time to time.

So now I guess as a new normal for now, I know Summit Artspace has done a couple virtual art shows where people are submitting virtually and then you can walk through the show basically, at home on your computer.

The thing that I'm seeing now is the cancellation of art shows.

And for me, that's a huge deal because 80% of my sales are made at art shows.

Some of my artist friends, they do the art shows year round.

So most of them have already lost half of their income for the year.

People really don't understand the impact that this whole thing is having on artists as a whole.

And even, you know, when the government came out with the PPP loans, I don't think they realize two months of help is not really going to help a lot of artists.

But my income has been impacted just like anyone else's, yet you don't consider me a viable business when it comes to grants and different things that are being offered.

I think it's important for us as artists, to share what we're experiencing as artists and I think that resonates with a lot of people.

It's definitely something that has that healing effect and it has the ability to bring happiness into very sad moments.