[post] artblog.net

Bluefish by Martin Hoogasian

2012-01-07T12:32:00.001-05:00

Bluefish, a photo by M. Hoogasian on Flickr.

Via Flickr:
2012 Acrylic on Paper ~24 x 36"

Red Cups by Erika Alfonso

2011-11-28T15:08:00.001-05:00

Red Cups, originally uploaded by Erika Alfonso.

Acrylic on canvas, 38x46, 2011

Blaue Reiter by Kanstantin Sushenko

2011-11-18T10:30:00.001-05:00

Blaue Reiter, a photo by ykonsu on Flickr.

Oil pastel on paper 30x22 cm

High and Low: What is Excellence in the Arts? by Franklin Einspruch

2011-11-13T16:47:00.001-05:00

Keynote speech delivered at Augusta State University, October 21, 2011
via http://www.einspruch.com/ [posted here with permission of the author]

Greetings, and thanks to Professor Kristin Casaletto, the Morris Museum of Art, and Augusta State University for having me here to speak to you all today. My topic is High and Low: What Is Excellence in the Arts?, and I’m hoping that by the end of my talk, everything you thought you knew about the matter will be thoroughly undermined.

Excellence, literally, is the state in which something or someone can be said to excel. To excel is to surpass, to be superior, to outdo. In the arts, we have loads of poor and mediocre examples, and the excellent ones are superior to them. Okay, we’re done. I’ll take your questions.

Actually, hold on. I’d like to examine what happens when you look at an art object and perceive it to have excellence. Let’s say that an artist has made some beautiful thing. You look at it and say, Wow. You experience a pleasant feeling of joy or excitement. Your attention goes to it and lingers there. Also, “excellence,” as I said, implies superiority to other art objects. In the past you have looked at other objects and not perceived excellence in them. Now that you’re looking at this one, the pleasure you get out of it has an additional quality of surprise, perhaps even relief, that reminds you that you are looking at something unusual. You don’t recall the inferior objects, but the excellent one stands out in relation to them.

There’s a simple question you can ask about this experience. You see excellence in this art object that I’ve been talking about. Is it actually there in the art object, or have you just seen it there? In other words, is excellence some objective quality about the art object, or is it your subjective experience of the art object?

There are a lot of good reasons to say that it’s subjective. “There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so,” said Hamlet to Rosencranz and Gildenstern. Subjectivity explains why taste varies. You like this work of art quite a lot, but your friend doesn’t. He prefers this other work of art over there. You think he’s crazy for preferring that one. You see excellence where he doesn’t, and vice-versa. This indicates that seeing excellence is a matter of opinion and individual experience. Those opinions and experiences aren’t facts about material objects. They’re opinions about what art is for and what makes it good.

But the idea of subjective excellence has some serious drawbacks. Although it can explain why your taste differs from your friend’s, it doesn’t explain why it might agree with the tastes of millions of other people. Millions of people love the art of Rembrandt. If there’s not something objectively excellent about Rembrandt, then you have to explain how millions of people concluded subjectively and individually that Rembrandt’s work was excellent.

One explanation you hear from the proponents of subjective excellence is that the consensus forms because people passively absorb the cultural values around them, and fall sway to marketing and propaganda. You think you have independent taste, but you’re really just acting out the presuppositions of your culture. Even the notion that you have independent taste is a presupposition of your culture. I have never been impressed with this idea because it’s basically a conspiracy theory. It’s not a conspiracy theory because it’s wrong—it may not be—but because it’s unfalsifiable, and because it favors a dramatic, convoluted explanation for the consensus over a simple one. The simple explanation is that quality exists in the object, objectively, and a lot of people—not everyone, but a lot of them—can see it.

Objective excellence also explains a phenomenon that I have never seen adequately discussed by art’s philosophers. During the modern Edo period, Japanese prints were so denigrated by the Japanese that they used them to wrap ceramics in preparation for sending them overseas. It’s only a little overstated to say that they looked at Utamaro about the same way we look at Styrofoam peanuts. This is how they were introduced to Europe, and how the French interest in them was sparked. Finally, Degas got a hold of them, and they thrilled him so much that he made works based on them that changed the course of Western painting.

This is easy to explain if there’s something objectively good about Utamaro, and impossible to explain if there isn’t. If the appreciation of Japanese prints depends on absorbing Japanese cultural values, Degas would not have been able to see any excellence in them, not only because he was French, but because even the Japanese at the time didn’t value them.

Proponents of subjective excellence would say that Degas appropriated the Japanese material in the same manner that European colonialists appropriated the resources of the colonies. But we’re not talking about sugar cane, which all humans can taste as sweet, but art, which—according to the people making that same argument about subjective excellence—is learned to be excellent from the surrounding culture. What’s more, it went in the other direction. The Japanese turned around and appropriated Art Nouveau. There are thousands of beautiful examples of Japanese Art Nouveau.

But again, there are problems with the idea of objective quality. The first one I already mentioned—just as subjective quality doesn’t explain the consensus, objective quality doesn’t explain differences of taste. At least, it doesn’t explain them very nicely. If something is objectively excellent, and you don’t see it, you’re failing to see a fact about the world. It is a kind of blindness, or maybe a kind of ignorance. At best it’s naivete.

That’s not such a drawback for the argument—the world often isn’t a nice place. The drawback is the notion that something could be a property of an object, but not a measurable one. We could say that a sculpture has mass, and weigh it. We could say that it has a color—blue, let’s say—and even if we disagreed about the nature of the color blue when it comes to vision or consciousness, we could take a spectrometer and measure the wavelength of the light reflecting off of it. What qualities can be said to properly belong to an object that we can’t measure? If the subjective explanation of consensus is a conspiracy theory, then the objective explanation of immeasurable properties is a kind of spiritualism. Excellence thus joins the company of things we believe to exist, and sometimes think we see, but can’t prove are there: deities, souls, aether. The former, we can’t prove to be false. The latter, we can’t prove to be true.

There’s another problem. If excellence existed in the object, we should be able to take the observable traits of excellence and reuse them to make other excellent works of art. This turns out to be completely unreliable. If you recombine the elements of an excellent work of art without sufficient artistry, you can end up with a nonfunctioning pile of meh made from excellent source material.

So excellence is not in the object, and it’s not us. Where is it?

This question first occurred to me a few years ago, and my initial answers to it were pretty clumsy. I’m not trained in philosophy, I’m trained in art. Late in my schooling some teachers encouraged me to write, and it turned out that I had some talent for crafting prose. So I began writing art criticism, but I didn’t have an aesthetic theory worked out. I had an ear for words, an eye for art, and a huge disregard for the baleful consequences of voicing your honest opinion. I figured out pretty quickly that in order to be persuasive, and not sound like a ranting lunatic, you have to rely on reasonableness. Not reason, because opinions about art can’t be logically proven, but reasonableness, in which one premise follows another without too much stretching. For art criticism, this is enough.

Upon finding out that I was an art critic, someone recently asked me what my theoretical background is. I don’t have a theoretical background. I have a method, and I can sum it up in four words: look, and look again.

Also, I’m a practitioner. I make art, and like any serious artist I try to make whatever I’m working on a little better than the last thing I made. Every now and then I succeed, and the rest of the time I try not to hate life. So any answer to this question has to be a pragmatic one. And the first thing to recognize from a pragmatic standpoint is that to make art, I don’t need an answer to this question. The urge to make art comes out of a place where everything is its own justification. I can sense in my guts whether my current painting is going well or not, and all the theory in the world isn’t going to help make it better. I have to claw my way up the mountain like everyone does.

On the other hand, I’m also an art writer. Writers hate not knowing things. It’s a different mode of living from being an artist, and the two modes don’t necessarily help each other. When you, as an artist, have unknowns in your life, you can just shrug and keep working. When you’re a writer, it sticks in your craw.

So I have worked out a pragmatic answer: Excellence is art’s reproductive drive. Excellent traits in art trigger the feelings, emotions, and attentions of the viewer. Thus aroused, an artist sets out to reproduce those traits in a new arrangement of materials. Thus the cycle begins anew. It’s not subjective or objective because it’s dynamic.

“Beauty brings copies of itself into being,” wrote the philosopher Elaine Scarry. I agree with that, and believe that excellence is a related project. The difference with excellence is that in order for an artist to succeed in his attempt to relive those feelings and emotions, in order for have his attention worked upon in the same way as the art that inspired him, a copy won’t do the trick. If it’s a very good copy, other people might enjoy it just as much as the original, as long as they weren’t side by side. There are examples of artists who have copied their own work so that they could sell them to different collectors, and it’s likely that each collector enjoyed his version of the work as much as any of the others. But for the artist who made the copy, the two works will always be side by side. The original is an act of discovery and wonder. Copying a great work of art by someone else can be profoundly edifying. But to copy a masterpiece repeatedly, or to copy yourself even once, is a chore.

Excellence in the arts might be best understood as pressure to be both good and different. In order to relive the effect that good art has on you, you cannot do the same thing as the art that affected you so. This even happens within the confines of your own art. If you make a good painting, for instance, it would be sensible to make a series of similar ones with minor variations. If you keep this up long enough, you’ll make two terrible discoveries.

The first terrible discovery is that Painting #2 isn’t as good as Painting #1. This is because when you made Painting #1, you were paying attention only to your desires and feelings and excitement in the act of discovery. When you made Painting #2, you were thinking about Painting #1. That screwed up the whole process, and it probably doesn’t get fully unscrewed until Painting #5.

The second terrible discovery is that at some point, maybe Painting #10 or #20, maybe later, the minor variations aren’t cutting it anymore. Whatever was good about Painting #1 is there in Painting #15, but it’s dead, you’re tired of it, and you don’t want to see it again. In order to get back into goodness, the state of attention and emotion brought about by good art, you have to enact bigger variations. And because excellence is a dynamic, it’s impossible to know how many traits or which traits are the right ones to copy or not copy. The problem is nearly paradoxical. The only way to relive the experience that good art gives you is by making things that are different from that art, and it’s usually not obvious as to how the new art should be different.

At this point, a lot of artists chicken out. One way to chicken out is to make art that has intellectual justifications instead of visual ones. If the work fails as art, at least it provoked a discussion or made you think about some issue, so the rationale goes. Another way to chicken out is to do something outlandish, so that if it’s neither all that good nor all that different, at least it’s noticeable. There are hundreds of ways to chicken out. Figuring out how to make something good and different, when it’s not obvious how to do so, requires courage.

On the outside of the creative process, as a viewer, excellence is less of a dynamic and more of an artifact. The excellence is recorded in the composition as triggers of certain emotions and attentions. As a viewer, you get to bask in the glow. But the dynamic of excellence takes place at the macro level as well. Styles of art have limited possibilities. Successful styles, once they're established by great artists, draw in a great number of lesser artists. Over time, all of them working together on the same problem makes it harder and harder to do something both good and different within that style. Just as it is in the progress of a single artist, the minor variations don't cut it anymore, and a bigger variation is necessary. This is how new styles come into being. Often the great artists make their own stylistic shifts, but more commonly, new artists set off their own directions. Even as a viewer, you can see too many examples of one style. After a while you want to see something good, but different. Usually you'll revisit favorite examples of the familiar style and seek out new examples within it, but it's also possible to tire of a whole genre for a long time.

I believe that the triggers work in the way they do because of similarity between humans. In a nutshell, most of what we are, we have in common. There are differences, of course, and culture and upbringing exaggerate those differences. Your upbringing may prevent you from ever developing a taste for, say, kimchee. But no amount of acculturation, education, or indoctrination will cause you to grow antlers. You stay human and share a lot of predilections with your fellow humans. This explains how we can have both variation of taste and consensus, how the arts can be universal but not affect everyone in the same way, and how cultures can develop distinct styles but non-members of a culture can appreciate their objects. The triggers are the property of the material object, but we can’t measure them because the experience that makes those triggers important takes place within human consciousness.

So what are those triggers, exactly? Here’s the mystery—they could be anything. We only know they exist by virtue of being able to work on the feelings of the viewer. Here it’s a shape, there it’s a color, here it’s a fine piece of drawing, there it’s an uncontrolled splash. More importantly, it’s the appearance of those forms in the context of a successful composition. Sometimes it’s the successful composition itself.

When those triggers work on your feelings, they can do it in a gross or subtle way, often both at the same time. At the grossest level, the trigger evokes some specific emotion or response, or preys upon your attention in a formulaic way. A horror movie, for instance, is trying to make you feel fear while sucking you into a narrative. This manipulation of particular feelings is melodrama. That sounds pejorative, but I think that all art relies on melodrama to some degree. You could look at melodrama as failed drama, but I suspect that a lot of successful art relies on a few big, obvious ideas, and the question is how to work those obvious ideas in an interesting, heartfelt manner. So I tend to look at it the other way around—drama is redeemed melodrama.

At the other end of the spectrum, the subtle end, the trigger evokes an innate sense of rightness in the universe, what we call the sublime. If melodrama is an attempt to goad your attention and feelings in a particular direction, the sublime draws your attention and feelings towards it like a flame draws a moth. This experience is impossible to describe. In fact, the impossibility of describing it is likely why we have art in the first place—to be taken beyond words. Gustav Mahler once said that if a composer could say what he had to say in words he would not bother trying to say it in music.

That said, if an artist sets out to trigger sublime emotions, he’s just turning the sublime into a melodramatic project. This happens in a lot of failed high art. There are Tintorettos, for example, that in my opinion just thrash ridiculously. Conversely, the melodramatic, executed with enough artistic force, can reach the sublime in spite of itself. In the Road Runner cartoons, by the time Wile E. Coyote falls to his doom for the fifth time in ninety seconds, the fundamental absurdity of the universe is as palpable as in anything written by Camus. Not only are you better off succeeding at low art than failing at high art, you’re better off concentrating on excellence relative to your own work, your colleagues’, and nature, and letting the sublime take care of itself.

I just compared some paintings to an animated cartoon and threw out the terms “low art” and “high art” as if they were given. The idea that there is a distinction between art forms marked by high culture and refined taste on one hand, and popular culture and crude taste on the other, has been unraveling for 150 years. People thought Manet’s Luncheon on the Grass was a crude gesture. By the middle of the 20th century we had Andy Warhol painting soup cans, and the best new music on earth was being composed by jazz musicians. In the last two decades of the 20th century, philosophical movements rose to prominence that said that all of these distinctions between high and low were arbitrary and elitist. On this point, I believe, they came as close to being right about something as they ever did. There is no good reason for high art and low art not to intermingle freely, both stylistically and categorically. Things of value are being produced by low art all the time, and these things are worth study and consideration.

And yet, some art forms have access to the sublime that other art forms don’t. Road Runner has moments of the sublime, as does Led Zeppelin, Calvin and Hobbes, and Star Trek. The world would be poorer without them. But compared to Botticelli, whose work resides in the sublime full-time, their work takes place at a lower level of activity. Moreover, their work should take place at a lower level of activity—good entertainment, and intelligent, sensitive craft as applied within the parameters of rock ‘n’ roll, newspaper comics, and television, respectively. Calvin and Hobbes would have been terrible if Bill Watterson had tried to be Botticelli seven days a week. To be fair, I think Botticelli would have been a bad cartoonist. Tintoretto, though, would have been a great one.

I did just say that you don’t want to turn the sublime into a melodramatic project by aiming your work in that direction, but a high artist should have the sublime in the back of his head as a reminder of what is possible in his art form. From there, he should concentrate on excellence and hope the sublime creeps into his work of its own accord.

High and low art have so much in common in the way they operate that we can say that they run alongside one another. High art has more access to the sublime, but triggers that are less than sublime, merely good (although good is nothing to sneeze at), or melodramatic, overlap with those in low art all the way down. There is something lower than both high art and low art. That is the middle.

We don’t use the term “middle art,” and in my opinion there is no middle art. There doesn’t have to be, with so much overlap between high and low. There is, however, middlebrow taste. Middlebrow taste is a kind of chickening out of taste, in which you settle for familiarity instead of demanding excellence.

If you have healthy highbrow taste, you’ll argue with your highbrow friends about whether Pere Goriot or The Country Doctor was the better Balzac novel. If you have healthy lowbrow taste, you’ll argue with your lowbrow friends about whether Next Generation or Deep Space Nine was the better arc of Star Trek. These activities are identical to the extent that they both recognize that excellence exists in art, and that it’s worthwhile to make distinctions between examples thereof. In fact, I think it’s hard to prove that the former conversation is better in any significant way than the latter one. Whether either of them ends up being illuminating or pathetic has more to do with the people in the conversation than the topic.

The main concern of middlebrow taste is not excellence, but allegiance. People with middlebrow taste for low art are interested in having complete sets of things. Comic book companies occasionally put out the same issue with four different covers in order to separate the middlebrows from their money. In low art, these people are called fanboys. Because they like something, they feel allegiance to it, and the allegiance causes them to like things that are done in the same manner. They never experience the feeling that creators have that I described earlier, when they hit their equivalent of Painting #15. When the creators can’t take it anymore, and decide to play electric instead of acoustic guitar, or do the alternate-universe version of their comic book, fanboys wail like the wounded.

People with middlebrow taste in high art are similarly driven. Sometimes you run into someone who only likes Surrealism, for instance. They know Dali and Magritte but haven’t heard of Paul Delvaux or Max Ernst. They’re not interested in knowing about automatic surrealists like Joan Miro or Arshile Gorky. They’ve latched on to particular traits, and styles of art that don’t share those traits don’t appear to them as good art.

That’s a primitive example, but this attitude permeates the high art world. Last month a multi-millionaire contemporary art collector made this statement in his online column in the New York Observer: “The art world of now is about graphic imagery, sexuality and the media; it reflects our experience of the world around us. … It’s political, it’s provocative and it’s about the world in which we are living.” These were his reasons for not liking the de Kooning retrospective which is up at the Museum of Modern Art right now. This is a thoroughly middlebrow attitude about art. De Kooning doesn’t share the traits that he associates with art that matters, so it doesn’t appear to him as art that matters.

So now that you know what excellence is, demand it. Go high, go low, but demand it. Whatever you do, don’t chicken out.

Dream of Beelzevub by George Bethea

2011-11-08T17:06:00.001-05:00

Dream of Beelzevub, originally uploaded by georgebethea28.

Acrylic on Canvas
48x72" 2011

Paradise Now by Scott Bennett

2011-10-19T16:41:00.001-04:00

Paradise Now, originally uploaded by Scott Bennett Studio.

2011, acrylic on panel, 15 x 19"

Furnace by George Bethea [+ an essay]

2011-07-20T11:14:00.003-04:00

Furnace, originally uploaded by georgebethea28.

"Every battle is won before it is ever fought."
Sun Tzu

Those who have been watching George Bethea's career have been watching a master come into his prime right before their eyes. He is a teacher, a guy down the street, a marathon runner, a father, and an artist making some of the most innovative paintings anywhere.

Many people ask of an abstract painting, "how long did it take?" My answer is "how old is the artist?" This response is not an evasion; it points to a greater truth: every artwork is a summation of the artist's experiences up to the time it was made.

The choices George Bethea has made in his life have helped him become the artist he is today. The Sun Tzu quote above points to the fact that Bethea has, perhaps unknowingly, positioned himself to succeed by a combination of talent, hard work, and a bit of luck. Bethea's story is one that any serious young artist today should come to grips with - to understand where the frontier of painting lies. He has immersed himself with the work of the best artists of the past and worked incessantly in his studio to test his strengths against theirs. His current mastery is a hard-fought set of skills that he has rightfully earned. That these paintings appear at once effortless and deeply complex is the fruit of these labors.

As Sun Tzu said, a master warrior does not need the latest weaponry to win wars. He needs to only understand what has worked in past battles and to align that understanding with his current situation. Similarly, a master artist doesn't need the latest gimmicks, trends, fashions and techniques, only a deep understanding of previous art and the drive to make something even more beautiful, more fully human. An artist this good renews his tradition with grace, not strategy. It has been a long time since anyone has renewed the tradition of painting as beautifully as George Bethea.

Lucas Blanco

Artwork: George Bethea
Furnace
Acrylic on Canvas
60x48" 2011

All Along the Watchtower by Susan Roth

2011-07-18T10:41:00.005-04:00

Click on the image to enlarge.

Visit her photo stream on Flickr.

Japanese tea bowl for Jack

2011-07-10T19:30:00.000-04:00

Click on the images for slide show. Name of artist unknown - Iwate Prefecture

Sailboating by Martin Hoogasian

2011-06-30T22:42:00.001-04:00

Sailboating, originally uploaded by M. Hoogasian.

-2011 - acrylic on canvas - 23" x45"

Firewalker by Walter D. Bannard

2011-05-31T02:27:00.001-04:00

11_13A - Firewalker, originally uploaded by WBannard.

Rocks and Waves 1 by Martin Hoogasian

2011-04-26T23:44:00.001-04:00

Rocks and Waves 1, originally uploaded by M. Hoogasian.

Acrylic on paper - 2'x3' - 2011

New Work by Andy Gambrell

2011-04-16T11:08:00.000-04:00

Click on any image to start slide show.

The artist writes: "These pictures are made with ground dirt and leaves suspended in polyurethane applied with rollers, and the shapes on top are made with spray paint applied to joint compound that has been troweled on. The soil is from my family's property in South Carolina, the geometry is from constellations, and the color comes from the Southern landscape. Each is about 49" square. These four will be in a group show opening this weekend called "The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly" at Studioplex in Atlanta, one of SCAD's galleries in the city."

View more paintings at andygambrell.com.

Letter to a Young Artist

2011-04-09T12:30:00.001-04:00

Most people will naturally assume that talent is something artists are born with. The historical record highlights the child prodigies and holds them up as shining examples of 'what an artist is like'. So a stereotype like that is constantly reinforced by the culture which wants to believe it. One problem though: what about the master artists who excel later in life and do their best work in their 40s and 50s? BTW some of these master artists had little or no 'official art training' as youngsters.

You are right that "no one is born knowing...anything..." but you might be putting yourself at a disadvantage by worrying / being bothered by what other people think / believe. I get caught up in this too at times but it has not been helpful. I see a lot of artists whose work is compromised because they want to 'fit in' with what they perceive as the desires of culture. That might end up being an impossible riddle to solve because as Greenberg said 'You never predict, when it comes to art anyhow. That's another wonderful thing about art: you can't predict where the next good art's coming from, and I like that." So trying to predict what culture wants maybe equally futile. It has been much more beneficial for me to just practice and not to worry about the 'art'. Plus its just more fun!

Back when I was your age I talked to John Link (my professor at Western Michigan University at the time) and I told him something similar to what you are telling me now. My contention was that Art History felt like a burden because there is no getting around the masterpieces that stood in the way of a young artist's development. I felt overwhelmed (and sometimes still do) by the great art of the past and thought that it would be impossible to match, or even come close to their level of mastery. At that time I was discovering his essays and starting to see art and painting as something very special that culture was giving up on. His contention was that great art was still being made today and that it was up to us to recognize and embrace it / rush to greet it in our own work so to speak (I maybe misquoting him a bit, but that was what I took away from the discussion.) It didn't make as much sense to me at the time as it does now. What I now see as the modernist impulse is to make something great in the simplest / purest way possible. An almost organic / simple mastery of materials that not only matches the great art of the past but improves upon it through innovation and grace.

So long story short, what once felt like a burden became a catalyst to work harder and seek out other artists who would push me to improve. So now I can tell you with the same level of confidence as John told me, that there really are great artists working out there and they are damn inspiring. I'll be honest though that it took me a long time to 'see' their work. There were times when nothing inspired me and then there were times when it felt like the entire world had opened up to me and had became paint-able (for lack of a better word). So look more and worry less!

The link above speaks to Mozart's intense proclivity to practice. Speaking of child prodigies right? What the link doesn't mention is that while he was practicing he was probably in the same state of mind that he would later be in while he was making some of the greatest music mankind has ever known. I don't think of practice the same way that most people do. I would recommend that the best practice for a young artist is to look at as much art as he or she can and to make as many pictures as possible.

I'm not sure if you went to the Iggy Pop lecture on Wednesday but he said a few things that I found very reassuring:
1) Artists should do what they love.
2) When you are young and at college find young people who believe in and work towards those ideals that you yourself believe in. They are out there.
3) disrupt the areas of the status quo that you don't agree with. Seek those area out.

1 and 2 were no brainers for me. 3 I'm still working on. Some of the above isn't directly related to what you wrote but hopefully these words help in some way.

Lucas

March 24 by Harry Stooshinoff

2011-03-26T22:01:00.002-04:00

March 24, originally uploaded by Landscape Painting.

March 24 -
8.25" x 7.25" -
Harry Stooshinoff -
Acrylic on paper -
2011

The artist writes: "Spring is not coming easily....still quite cold, but the snow is steadily disappearing. I paint a lot of pictures based on these snow patches every year."

Afternoon Tea by Aimee Kark

2011-03-21T17:47:00.002-04:00

Afternoon Tea, originally uploaded by SD STUDIOs*.

Afternoon Tea -
Aimee Kark -
Acrylic on canvas -
47.25 x 39.75" -
2010 -
Photo by Darryl Hughto

Mag by George Bethea

2011-03-14T08:26:00.001-04:00

Mag, originally uploaded by georgebethea28.

- Acrylic on Canvas
- 72x48" - 2011

Gardener by Jeff Kurland

2011-03-04T06:16:00.001-05:00

gardener, originally uploaded by jeffkurland1.

Acrylic on paper -
12" x 12" -
2002 -

Ashley (young ballerina) by Darryl Hughto

2011-03-01T07:33:00.001-05:00

Ashley, originally uploaded by SD STUDIOs*.

Acrylic on canvas -
40 x 28 -
2005 -

Smoke Signals by Jennissa Hart

2011-02-23T13:16:00.003-05:00

Smoke signals, originally uploaded by SD STUDIOs*.

43.5 x 35"
acrylic on canvas
2010

Collateral images.
photo by Darryl Hughto

Scott Bennett's Recent Landscapes

2011-02-16T15:58:00.003-05:00

Click on any image to start slide show.

Scott Bennett continues to paint original and honestly felt landscapes. An exhibition which will include many of these paintings opens on March 11th, 2011, and runs through April 22nd at the Limestone Gallery.

Limestone Gallery

105 Brooklea Drive

Fayetteville, NY 13066

315-632-4445

Quixote by Walter D. Bannard

2011-02-15T17:11:00.001-05:00

11_3B - Quixote, originally uploaded by WBannard.

Studio Door by Konstantin Sushenko

2011-02-09T16:55:00.001-05:00

studio door, originally uploaded by ykonsu.

Oil on canvas
50 x 50 cm

Kohinoor - By Walter D. Bannard

2011-02-06T17:04:00.001-05:00

11_2B - Kohinoor, originally uploaded by WBannard.

New paintings by Terry Fenton

2011-01-30T22:39:00.001-05:00

Click on any image to start slide show.

Terry Fenton is a damn good painter. He writes:

"I'm also enclosing some images of more recent paintings - most still in the works. They may be darker than they appear on the screen. One's beginning with (P) are oil on paper, 18.5 x 30 in. The others are oil on thin hardboard, 24 x 39 in. Most of the latter aren't quite finished."

Maybe someone can head up to Saskatchewan and ask him politely to put his brushes down. As these look mighty finished to my eye.

All images courtesy of the artist.

Botsford Flashback by Martin Hoogasian

2011-01-24T00:26:00.001-05:00

Botsford Flashback, originally uploaded by M. Hoogasian.

2011 Acrylic on Canvas 41" x 45"

2 Minute Art History Lesson - by Darby Bannard

2011-01-12T12:53:00.006-05:00

From left to right: Kerry Ware, George Bethea, Darby Bannard, Kathleen Staples and David Marsh

The 20th century was the century of innovation. Ezra Pound declared "Make it new" and the artists who came to prominence - the Fauvists, Cubist, Dadaists, Surrealists and Abstract Expressionists - shared that idea, making every effort to invent and revise and be different.

Abstract painting was in its heyday at mid-century. It made art that was not only new but also brought about the first major art movement to produce works which didn't even look like one another. This movement - Abstract Expressionism - was displaced in the '60s by Pop art and minimalism and these, in turn, by post-modernism and many other styles and methods and isms.

All this innovation, dividing and displacing generated dozens of diverse ways of making art, all fighting for a place in an art world that was exploding but still way too small to accommodate even a small fraction of the enormous resulting production. It is a huge hodge-podge. This is the situation today.

We are abstract painters. We believe in its intrinsic ability to spiritually nourish us. We realize that it has taken a back seat for a generation but we also recognize that it never exhausted its potential and, in its great variety, can support talent of every kind.

We also understand that abstract painting may seem somewhat esoteric and unfamiliar and that people have trouble with it, so we want to show you what we are doing and do our best to explain ourselves to everyone who is interested.

Presented by Walter Darby Bannard during an ARTTABLE event at the Center for Visual Communication on 1/11/2011 in Miami, Fl.

[title added]

ARTTABLE at the Center for Visual Communication

2011-01-11T12:50:00.000-05:00

Reminder; the Center for Visual Communication will be hosting ARTTABLE today at 5:45.

Center for Visual Communication
541 NW 27th St,
Miami, FL 33127

Click on the photo to visit their facebook account

Wendy's Hill by Harry Stooshinoff

2010-12-15T21:56:00.002-05:00

Wendy's Hill, originally uploaded by Landscape Painting.

8.25 x 7.25 inches
Pencil and acrylic on heavy, acid-free, gessoed artist's paper
2010

@Etsy

Harry Stooshinoff writes: "The last bit was painting a final layer on the sky. Everything needs to look fresh and easy.....I swear I feel like many of these can die on the operating table at any moment....I don't show you those.....luckily there aren't too many."

I think most of the artists who read this blog can relate!

December's First Snow 4 by Martin Hoogasian

2010-12-11T09:55:00.001-05:00

December's First Snow 4, originally uploaded by M. Hoogasian.

2010 Acrylic on Paper 35' X 23"

ECAS - Edmonton Contemporary Artists' Society 18th Annual Exhibition

2010-11-30T13:12:00.001-05:00

Click on the images to see larger versions.

Edmonton appears to be one last stronghold for the modernist tradition. If you were an artist included in this exhibition and you would like to add information below your artwork: please fill out this form. All photos by Russell Bingham.

Front Porch by Scott Bennett

2010-11-20T11:47:00.001-05:00

Front Porch, originally uploaded by Scott Bennett Studio.

2010, a/c, 33.5 x 40.75"

thankjack by Duncan Johnson

2010-11-10T12:52:00.001-05:00

thankjack, originally uploaded by duncanjohnson.

Acrylic on EVA foam panel approx. 12 x 18

Red-Lacuna By Phillip R Spence

2010-10-30T14:28:00.001-04:00

Red-Lacuna, originally uploaded by prspence7.

100929 by Konstantin Sushenko

2010-10-19T10:13:00.002-04:00

100929, originally uploaded by ykonsu.

Queen of Night by Darryl Hughto

2010-10-13T21:00:00.006-04:00

Queen of Night, originally uploaded by SD STUDIOs*.

Abstract Miami Opening Reception October 9, 7pm -9pm

2010-10-08T16:08:00.002-04:00

If you are in Miami, go see this show. Here is the press release. And here is a little more information about the Center for Visual Communication. Below is a detail of the gallery's recent email update. Artists Include: Darby Bannard, George Bethea, Andy Gambrell, David Marsh, Sean Smith, Kathleen Staples, Kerry Ware.

The Center for Visual Communication is located at:
541 NW 27th Street · Miami FL 33127
Call: 305-571-1415 for more info

Mindo by Walter Darby Bannard

2010-10-03T02:40:00.001-04:00

10_28B Mindo, originally uploaded by WBannard.

Mindo is the title of a new painting by Walter Darby Bannard. The artist might be referring to the secluded cloud forest perish in Ecuador with the same name but that does not really matter. Its not the title that makes this painting work. The painting works because it is a damn good painting. A rational explanation can not explain why this picture sets up as well as it does. The best I can do is point to a few characteristics that I think support my conclusion that this painting and its cousin Toy Box are both masterpieces.

The large geo-organic shapes that support a patch work of brush strokes at times evoke Cezanne and at other times dissolve into the background. The warmer colors found in his latest paintings make a clean break away from the starker cooler tones that have dominated the artist's last few years of production. It is as if Bannard had to work his way through these paintings in order to reach richer aesthetic pastures.

For Bannard, whose career has had many mature styles, these new paintings bridge them all. Mindo is perhaps an unintentional meshed vision that spans these periods. The best aspects of his scallop, minimal and [for lack of a better descriptor] his 90's paintings show up here. Bannard's earlier styles often relied on one or two types of marks or tool actions. These new paintings show a comfort level with his materials to the point that the artist seems to be wary of letting old habits get in the way of his own aesthetic discoveries.

Rather than a drawback, Bannard pushes back against these habits to make new types of marks as he comfortably fluctuates between drawn, squeegeed, brushed, and raked marks. This back and forth mark making produces pictorial pressure points that punctuate these innovative surfaces. These areas of dense visual activity are in direct contrast to the large shapes and open spaces that they compliment.

As he always has, Bannard continues to let his materials have the final say and lets them guide his decisions in the studio. Just as a herder who comes to know the unruly members of his flock, Bannard steers his paint masterfully until the result is simply a beautiful painting.

Full disclosure: Mr. Bannard was my graduate adviser at the University of Miami while I was earning my MFA there and I consider him a friend and a mentor.

Estrada Branca by Leonora Weissmann

2010-09-24T09:19:00.014-04:00

Leonora Weissmann is making some very good pictures. Her strength in painting shows itself most clearly in her landscapes. Estrada Branca caught my eye right away. The frontal perspective recalls a contemporary photograph. But instead of the flat deadpan, monotony that categorizes that aesthetic dead end, Weissmann kickstarts her surfaces with collaged and painted elements that have abrupt, crisp edges that create tension across the picture plane. This effect is heightened when the artist adds dense definition to the background and leaves the foreground painterly.

Garden Still Life By Darryl Hughto

2010-08-30T18:54:00.002-04:00

Garden Still Life, originally uploaded by SD STUDIOs*.

Darryl Hughto's recently uploaded some killer landscapes that are a sight for sore eyes. That is all.

HF by George Bethea

2010-08-17T09:48:00.001-04:00

HF, originally uploaded by georgebethea28.

Sometimes art will give you trouble because the best art will challenge your previously held perceptions of quality and prove those perceptions wrong. The aesthetic proof as it were, becomes irrefutable through the viewer's own experience so long as the viewer is open to it. This painting caught my attention when the artist invited myself and a few others to see his latest work. Large abstract work is best experienced in person but even online this picture packs a powerful punch.

femme nue by Ernest Joseph Laurent 1915

2010-08-10T08:14:00.003-04:00

femme nue 1915, originally uploaded by artinconnu.

Ernest Joseph Laurent (1859 - 1929) via: artinconnu.blogspot.com/ Sometimes I come across a painting on flickr that just feels right. Most of the art I post here is by living artists but I'll gladly make exceptions when I find paintings like this. I always tell my students that it is best not to crop off portions of the body within a composition. That problem doesn't seem to matter with this painting. I like paintings that defy conventional compositional devises and this is one of them.

Brighton Beach, Brooklyn by Jeff Kurland

2010-08-06T12:57:00.002-04:00

Brighton Beach, Brooklyn, originally uploaded by jeffkurland1.

Here is a beautiful painting by Jeff Kurland. I love the Hofmann like color and playfulness of this painting. Everything about this picture feels buoyant, as if it is just about ready to fly apart with pleasure.

The artist writes about the process that went into making it in the comment section of this painting's flickr page:

"Note that this painting is not a collage but was made by a transfer process. Acrylic paint has been transfered from plastic sheeting to cold press watercolor paper. Paints drawn direct from tubes, as well as thin washes and scumbles, gestural brushwork, and torn and cut edges, are all embedded in acrylic medium. It's a little indirect since I begin by painting on plastic sheeting, then cut and compose. I like the spontaneity of the process and sense that I can try anything. Hofmann is definitely an influence (as seen in this painting) but the process and direction is a synthesis of many influences."

This is a knockout painting Jeff. Looking forward to seeing more.

Burroughs by Marcus Gannuscio

2010-07-27T14:17:00.004-04:00

Burroughs, originally uploaded by mgannuscio.

You have to like a guy who runs a website called www.reallygoodpaintings.com
Marcus Gannuscio from Portland Oregon has a fine touch. To my eye his self portraits and still lives stand out from the rest of his work on flickr.

Hyacinth and Green Bowl by Scott Bennett

2010-07-25T21:55:00.003-04:00

Hyacinth and Green Bowl, originally uploaded by Scott Bennett Studio.

Scott Bennett continues to paint exceedingly good pictures. I look forward to seeing what comes out of his new studio.

Neptune

2010-07-16T21:19:00.001-04:00

Neptune, originally uploaded by TutuaBoshell.

I'm glad to see Tutua Boshell has joined flickr. Keep an eye on this talented artist. Click on the image to see some of her recent work.

Lost Dog via Salute the Rough Guys

2010-07-13T08:32:00.002-04:00

Lost Dog, originally uploaded by salutetheroughguys.

A good long while ago during the heyday of artblog.net Salute the Rough Guys was offering free tee-shirts for all. I still get a lot of laughs every time I wear mine proudly. This one is a classic, print it out and hang it up near the water cooler. Click on the image to see more humorous quotes that the rough guys screen printed and posted throughout New York.

Marquis de Lafayette by Susan Roth

2010-06-23T18:12:00.001-04:00

Marquis de Lafayette, originally uploaded by SD STUDIOs*.

Susan Roth
Acrylic, acrylic skin,
boxtop on canvas
27 x 22

This is a powerful painting. Susan Roth's artwork often came up in the comment section on the now retired artblog.net. She continues to keep the object high and make very inventive work. Click on the image to see more of her work and that of her very talented husband Darryl Hughto.

groot naakt op rug

2010-06-21T18:14:00.001-04:00

groot naakt op rug, originally uploaded by Bernard de Wolff.

groot naakt op rug [nude on rug]
Bernard de Wolff.
Oilpainting.
120 x 140 cm.

Interesting Dutch painter Bernard de Wolff. Some of his colors feel unresolved but overall worth a look. Click on the photo to see his photo-stream.

Fishing lures

2010-06-19T18:09:00.001-04:00

Fishing lures, originally uploaded by lucasblanco.

Lucas Blanco
9.5 x 10
Acrylic on board
2010

The Point

2010-06-12T00:27:00.001-04:00

The Point, originally uploaded by M. Hoogasian.

This view feels familiar. Along Lake Michigan somewhere. Sometimes art can bring you back home.

Painting by Martin Hoogasian

New Paintings

2010-06-05T10:55:00.003-04:00

Since it's only been Lucas posting for a while, I decided, what the heck, I'm going to solicit some comments on my own paintings. Usually I post my own work on my own blog, but today I'm going to throw my latest two up here to see if anyone wants to say anything about them.

I like how they both turned out but this is a departure for me. I've written back and forth with Franklin a couple of times about Van Gogh, whose reproductions I've been looking at carefully. I found a site with his drawings, too, which put something together for me. I could see how he was using line in his paintings. Vincent, I could see, was breaking up his forms into dashes, long and short straight lines, mostly, and his pencil drawings lead directly to his paintings, which are really just drawings with color. Franklin wrote that every line is a division, but I don't think that's how Van Gogh is using them. He uses them to define surfaces.

I also began to see that he doesn't attempt a true perspective. When I approach a painting or drawing, I tend to use smaller lines for things that are farther away. Van Gogh doesn't -- for him, perspective comes mostly from height on the canvas. The closer to the bottom edge something is, the closer it is to the viewer. His lines, meanwhile, are all the same thickness, bringing everything right up against the picture plane.

I've thought before that I can't paint this way because I don't see the world this way. Franklin suggested I look into Precisionism, but I haven't seen any in real life since he suggested that and there aren't a lot of those around to find. So instead I've been looking at Van Gogh and finally it occurred to me that maybe he didn't so much see the world this way as maybe he decided to see the world this way.

So I decided to try it myself.

These are both 24 by 24 inches or so. I pulled off a branch of Japanese knotweed on my way to the studio. Click on the images to get the full version (these are most likely cropped on this page).

Still life by Dave Gray

2010-06-03T10:33:00.002-04:00

Still life, originally uploaded by dgray_xplane.

With a little bit of work one can find some excellent artwork on Flickr. My strategy has always been to find a few artists I like and look up their contacts. Often this yields better results than using Flickr's search engine.

Dave Gray is the CEO of Xplane. His approach to painting is somewhat hit or miss. There are some gems and some false starts in his photo-stream. If he were to take his hobby a little more seriously I think there is good chance that he will become very successful. You can see he has a nice touch and a good sense of color. Rare traits these days and I hope he keeps at it. Take a look: http://www.flickr.com/photos/davegray/

More info about his company can be found here: http://www.xplane.com/

Franklin's Journal has been updated

2010-06-01T16:28:00.000-04:00

Franklin has updated his journal

http://www.einspruch.com/journal/

Highlights include:

The WDB archive being one step closer to completion.

http://www.wdbannard.org/

and a new painting that has just a little bit too much blue in it for my taste.

Metropolitan Spring, 2010, oil on canvas, 20 x 16 inches

George Bethea's V1

2010-05-24T16:24:00.002-04:00

V1, originally uploaded by georgebethea28.

George Bethea continues to make some of the most innovative paintings that I have seen in quite sometime. Leave it to George to demonstrate that abstract painting has only just begun to show us what paint can do. These paintings just flat out kick ass.

Like a farmer with a bountiful harvest, Bethea's paintings seem to just grow from his studio and stay forever ripe on his Flickr photo stream.

Meanwhile in Gay Paree...

2010-05-20T10:57:00.000-04:00

[Via WSJ] PARIS—A lone thief stole five paintings possibly worth hundreds of millions of euros, including major works by Picasso and Matisse, in a brazen overnight heist Thursday from a Paris modern-art museum, police and prosecutors said.

--------------

Art thefts always have intrigue me.

Even buying art is art with new financial product [Via Reuters]

2010-05-17T17:09:00.001-04:00

I thought of doing something like this as a publicity stunt once.

Funny to see someone actually try it.

Richard Diebenkorn at Sotheby's

2010-05-12T14:53:00.000-04:00

If anyone wants to buy me this little painting which is coming up for auction tomorrow. I'd appreciate it. Thanks.

More F.E. Journal

2010-05-10T12:15:00.000-04:00

Franklin wrote a long post on/in his new journal. And I'm framing my first dollar from www.painttwits.com. Party.

The New Journal

2010-05-04T09:52:00.000-04:00

Franklin's new weekly is up. His new journal format doesn't have a commenting section but it is designed cleanly and written clearly. In it he touches on subjects as far ranging as Artblog.net and Twitter. He has also included four recent oil paintings towards the end of his first entry. Of which I think Metropolitan Fall is a particularly well put together landscape.

Go. Read.

2010-05-01T16:04:00.001-04:00

Go read this: Judith Schaechter on beauty.

Face to Face

2010-04-28T11:59:00.002-04:00

At Edge Zones:

Face to Face is the name given to an exhibition of self portraits with five artists who have used paint as their primary medium throughout their careers.

Self portraiture has a long and storied tradition. If you are an artist and have never created one I recommend giving it a shot. Most artists learn that they themselves can be their own most patient model. But regardless of patience, the quality of a self portrait is not related in any way with the effort that went into making it. If that were the case, all that would be required would be sufficient ambition, patience, and enough raw materials. Creating art doesn't work that way.

   Creating a self portrait requires the artist to look inwardly and outwardly simultaneously. No other genre of art asks this of an artist so directly and with the results so blatantly apparent. I say directly here to emphasize how this differs from creating other forms of art.

   Of course many artists argue that art of any format requires this dual perspective but self portraiture is special for one simple reason. A self portrait strips the artist of his insecurities and neatly packages them in the form of a painting and displays all of them for everyone to see. Self portraiture could best be described as an unrelenting form of realism. The best self portraits are imbued with an honesty that is uncanny. If a self portrait is sufficiently honest, then it most likely instilled some humility along the way.

   I often tell my students who are worried about finding their own style of art that they shouldn't worry about this search and concentrate rather on the making of whatever it is they happen to be creating. I assure them that their own style is inside of themselves anyway and the best way to discover that innate talent is by working hard and looking at as much art as possible. For myself this discovery came about by painting a lot of self portraits. By creating these paintings I realized just how much more I need to see and learn about art.

   The best self portraits depict a confluence of an artist's state of mind aligned with his passions and abilities and finally translated into materials. Considering the work in this show, the artists have paid many dues to their craft and profession. It was an honor to have been asked to exhibit my own work with this group of fine artists and it is a pleasure to see our work hanging together face to face.

Lucas Blanco

Franklin Einspruch: 2010 Artist Statement [Via Facebook]

2010-04-23T11:17:00.001-04:00

"You are not quite in control of nature; you are part of nature. It doesn't mean that you are helpless, either. It means that the whole question in art is to be wide awake, to be as attentive as possible, for the artist and for the person who looks at it or listens to it." - Fairfield Porter

First, my art celebrates the ordinary. I take it on faith that everything merits attention, and if I'm paying attention in the right way, the profound will spring up out of normal, everyday living. The sound of splashing water provided enough material for Basho or Thoreau to work with. Likewise some dusty bottles for Morandi. I subscribe to this tradition, if one could call it that. When I paint in oil, I paint portraits or scenes around my neighborhood. For watercolors, I prefer still lifes and figure studies. My comics depict people attending to the circumstances of their lives; the drama, even the narrator, often remain implied rather than explicit.

Second, it celebrates brevity. Economy of execution invites the "mental collaboration of the audience," as one writer puts it. To my eye, doing much with little represents the height of artistic achievement. I practice accordingly.

Third, it celebrates materials. I paint in oils with a wide palette knife and a loaded brush. My watercolors preserve the effects of water on the medium. When working with the Web, where I present most of my comics, I edit the code for expressive purposes and manipulate images using programs I've written. I trained as a modernist, and very much believe in the successful operation of materials as an end in itself, even while working figuratively, narratively, or digitally. The thrilling fact that materials and arrangements thereof can convey feeling is the primary reason I make art.

intérieur by Aurélia Frey

2010-04-23T09:34:00.002-04:00

intérieur, originally uploaded by Aurélia Frey.

Aurélia Frey is an excellent photographer. Many of her photos remind me of paintings. And in her case that is a good thing. Checkout her photostream.

The Bullshit Artists - via the New York Observer

2010-04-20T23:13:00.002-04:00




		The Bullshit Artists \| The New York Observer

	Yours truly writes:
		An article entitled The Bullshit Artists, from The New York Observer. The audio features the author Leon Neyfakh who is worth a listen. The Audio requires RealPlayer.



	© 2009 RealNetworks, Inc. RealPlayer is a registered trademark of RealNetworks, Inc.

Why the Internet hasn't revolutionized the art world

2010-04-17T11:33:00.000-04:00

I always thought the Internet would improve the art market. I've long viewed the gallery system as broken. Its goal has always been to filter the vast amounts of art into manageable marketable amounts. Ideally the best art would correspond with the most sales and vice versa. I thought, naively perhaps, that the best new art would gain prominence online and be picked by savvy collectors whose eye could differentiate artwork with intrinsic quality.

The Internet hasn't really changed much about the art market at all, although some artists are making names for themselves with an online presence. Most of these artists are of the flash-in-the-pan variety, fizzling as soon as they appear online. Where are the artists who have been able to launch sustainable art careers online by consistently creating high quality art? Is this even possible? And if not, why?

Based on my observations and communications with fellow artists who sell their work online, to be successful requires some combination of the following characteristics. Their prices must be affordable for the art collector. They must exhibit a consistent approach to quality and style. And these artists tend to use established social networks to promote their artwork without resorting to paid advertising. I argue that just having one’s work online for sale is a form of advertising. But most seem to agree that paid advertising, in any form, doesn't improve sales.

I started a database of art websites that either sell art or promote artists online. Most of these websites take the virtual Wal-Mart approach: low prices plus low quality equals success. I think this is an ineffective approach to selling art in today's economic climate.

Because these sites are often unorganized, even if an art collector knows what he or she likes, that person might not be able to find it. Keywords and tags can differentiate subject matter, color, and any number of other criteria, but I am unconvinced that a search engine will ever be able to accurately define aesthetic excellence, especially as regards the works of unestablished artists.

Since most art collectors do not have the time to sift through these websites to discover one lost artistic gem most collectors still rely on galleries to assist them in identifying quality art for purchase.

The irony of online egalitarian art websites is that these sites actually reinforce the gallery system they were created to circumvent. Most of these art websites do this inadvertently by appearing not to distinguish between top quality work and kitsch. This makes most of them ineffective. Even those few websites that make quality a priority do so in a way that reflects an unrefined aesthetic.

The author is an artist and the CEO of Painttwits Inc.

BBC's The Beauty of Maps

2010-04-15T09:03:00.002-04:00

Cellarius Star Map, 1660 (detail)

The BBC has put together a simple interactive page highlighting five historical maps. As a kid I always loved maps and would spend hours just looking and reading names of distant lands. I especially loved globes where the seeing was enhanced by the tactile geography under my fingertips. Comparing that experience as a child with these digital maps shows how little visual / actual experiential information can be transmitted online. Although I can zoom in to my hearts content there is something missing. What is that thing and how can I patent it?

Be sure to check out the Serio-Comic War Map for the year 1877.

Harry Stooshinoff, another Canadian artist

2010-04-13T14:16:00.002-04:00

Picture 745, originally uploaded by Landscape Painting.

There was a lot of talk on Franklin's blog about Canadian artists. I don't recall ever talking about Harry Stooshinoff but I think he is an extremely talented artist working seemingly in obscurity.

His approach to landscape is highly unique and often incorporates collage. Most of his work is small which he justifies by saying: "Because an intimate scale encourages maximum intuition, freedom and experimentation."

I always look forward to seeing his updates on his Flickr photostream. You can also see more of his work at his blog.

'My very own Paintings' a review

2010-04-12T17:27:00.004-04:00

I, ODOM, 1

David Marsh

Acrylic and Gold leaf on NBA licensed basketball jersey

2008

David Marsh's show My very own paintings opened Saturday at the U.M. Project space. The show consisted of collage paintings created the last few years while the artist was a graduate student. Marsh is an artist loaded with talent, but not knowing how best to develop it, has put together an uneven show. The paintings range quite a bit both in scale and quality.

In his Flickr profile the artist says "I address confidence, action, and progress in my work. Themes or ideas i feel that all artist of any substance consider"(sic). I think these are noble themes, but he should focus more intently on progress within his paintings. Marsh has plenty of confidence and he will make better pictures.

Television, set, pace was one of the strongest pieces but like several others feels overworked and premeditated. Its visual strength comes from its simple geometry, strong coloration, and the variety of parts used to pull it all together. The title, shaped canvas, and colors hammer the T.V. idea home. However, visual muscle is replaced here with connotation. There is a spontaneity about great art; this painting looks spontaneous at first and then turns around and looks forced. It holds together well enough but I think it could be a lot stronger.

One standout, called (Untitled) Faith, hangs unassumingly in the back of the gallery. Its color is reminiscent of a muted Sean Scully and does not suffer from the above-mentioned over-calculating hand that the artist sometimes indulges in. Rather, here we see a confident Marsh, unrestrained and focused. The strips seem to float above a tangled mass of various materials like a garage door crushing a pile of rags. Here visual tension manifests itself as it should, as the artist jams his materials into a painting, and it becomes form, not a concept forced to become something it does not want to be.

The weakest paintings in the show have large swaths of black paint covering most of the picture plane. I, ODOM,1 stands out as an exception here; it is a strong painting. This obvious tribute to Piet Mondrian recalls that artist's sense of balance and Marsh's color choice reinforces this comparison. This is also a somewhat smaller picture than the other black paintings in the show.

The unevenness might be the result of a young artist struggling with scale. Recently Marsh has been showing signs of having difficulty scaling up his images. In his past exhibitions I have seen him create large scale paintings with an ease that is rare for artists with twice his age or experience.

As critical as I am of this exhibition and as flawed as a few of these paintings are, I can not help but acknowledge the bravado and raw talent that this young artist processes. David Marsh continues to point to the bright future that abstract painting still promises to its practitioners and to those who still believe the project of Modernism has much to teach artists and mankind.

David Marsh - My Very Own Paintings

2010-04-09T09:21:00.001-04:00

David Marsh - My Very Own Paintings

The opening reception is Saturday April 10 from 7-10 pm and runs through May 1 at the University of Miami’s Wynwood Project Space. 2200A NW 2nd Ave.

---
I recommend not missing this show.

You can see some of his work here.

2010-04-08T10:39:00.003-04:00

At Artblog.net we often talked about cave paintings and how universal they are, and how they show that art has a power beyond the local, culturally-defined environment in which they were created. Thus it was with some excitement that I read on Roger Ebert's blog that the great filmmaker Werner Herzog had been given access to film a documentary about the cave paintings of Chauvet-Pont-d'Arc.

And, yes, there actually is an Arc there.

In these two videos, Herzog talks about his experience filming in the caves. It sounds absolutely fantastic. (He also, in an aside, mentions why 3D movies don't work so well, showing a broad understanding of the neurological processes of perception -- I think Herzog would be a great guy to have dinner with!)

If You See Something You Like

2010-04-08T10:30:00.001-04:00

Re-reading the selected snippets Greg Cook chose for his essay discussing Franklin's post "Yokelism with your wallet out", I had a thought about this bit: "Bostonians, and everyone else, will buy art if they see something they like and can afford."

I'm not sure about this. It seems to me this conclusion is as much a result of a thought experiment, of a world view, as any other conclusion. For example, we could say that Bostonians will buy art if they see something wildly overpriced (because the higher price indicates higher worth). Or that Bostonians will buy art if an authority tells them to buy it (because most people have trouble telling if they like art without someone else validating it). Or that Bostonians will, in the main, never buy art (because most people don't buy original art anyway).

Any one of those is a valid model supported by anecdote. (I've had more than one discussion about selling my art on eBay where it was suggested I raise my prices significantly to generate more sales -- which isn't exactly the logic of Adam Smith as I understand it.)

It would be nice to get out of the realm of anecdote when it comes to selling art but I don't know any sources of actual data. Plenty of people are willing to give you free advice on how to sell your art online; for example Dan at Empty Easel has a list of very authoritative-sounding bullet points. And he'll even take some of your money to help you implement his suggestions. But does it work?

The only hard data I have is from my own experience. I sold a little over 200 Conté drawings and a few small paintings -- sketches in oil paint, really -- over two years on eBay. I never sold anything for more than $30 and was never able to drag my price point up any higher than about ten bucks on average. And even then most of what I posted stayed in my flat file. While I'm proud of my achievement -- minimal though it is -- I was never able to draw any more general conclusions from it. And later forays into eBay have yielded nothing. (I get the impression that the eBay environment has changed in some way but I can't offer anything solid to explain how or why.)

I tend to think part of the problem is that selling art online is simply not good; art needs to be experienced in person. But of course the hurdles to getting art out in front of people are large. This is why we have galleries and art dealers.

I'm not sure where this leaves us. Art is such an individual matter and so irreducible -- one person interacting with one work of art -- it may be we can only deal in anecdotes.

It is Springtime in a post artblog landscape

2010-04-06T19:44:00.005-04:00

Update: This blog is a stream of artworks that deserve special attention. I'd post more often but there are very few artworks that I feel qualify.
10/30/2010
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Hello Artblog.net reader and commenter,

I was saddened to learn that Franklin Einspruch will no longer be maintaining and updating Artblog.net. Although I was an infrequent commenter on the blog, I followed nearly all of the discussions that took place there over the years with great interest. Artblog.net produced some of the best art criticism and clearest writing about the visual arts that I have read in quite some time.

After seeing the results of a survey that I sent to a number of Artblog.net readers who responded quite favorably to the idea of a post artblog.net artblog I decided to give this site a go. The name of this blog draws from that central idea and the art truism that any art related topic with the word 'post' in it seems to garner a lot of critical acclaim and notoriety simply for being so named.

You will notice a few similarities: anonymous comments are allowed (for now), comments close after seven days, simple and uncluttered layout, no ads for now, Franklin's rules are going to be more or less enforced although I like contentious debate and will be much more lenient as a moderator.

And a few differences: multiple authors, Disqus commenting system, new blogspot domain, share buttons to post to selected social networks. Links in Disqus do not need to be hot linked. Meaning you can just cut and past your link into your comment.

I was a big fan of how the old blog functioned. Apparently this hand cared for code also caused some technical problems unfortunately. Blogger + Disqus is far from a perfect solution but they are strong proven stable platforms also they have some user friendly advantages.

If you are interested in becoming an author/artist. You have to get my attention with your art or writing here or in the comment section. I will be inviting several artists and writers in the coming days and weeks.

Enjoy!

Edit- Also I'll be adding to this list of people who have linked to us in the past. We want to thank all those who have linked to us and helped point viewers our way. This will serve as our blog roll.

http://heinerbuhr.blogspot.com/
http://artspertise.blogspot.com/
http://ameletal.com
http://bradmorganart.blogspot.com/
http://www.crywalt.com/ [also an author]
http://18rabbitgallery.com/