Conditions for vigorous, innovative art ambience ?

goodstein, I hang out with artist and musicians (we collaborate).

We see almost nothing worthy coming out of the commercial and academic art worlds and have chosen to be marginalized by it and laugh at their seeming lack of understanding. They can tell you what art is, We can agree on who is good and who isn't but when we look at the environment they choose to surround themselves with we part ways.

Thev'e become detached from the true source of art, if you allow me to say it that way

Well I think if there truly is any argument, it is
brought about by the muddying of the waters of
fine and commercial art.

For my own part, I take heart in the fact that the
major art schools are not yet willing to discard the
burden of art history.... drawing, design, painting
and sculpture courses still abound....with
the addition of new technologies....

(she laughs subversively, hehehehehe!!!!!!!!)

JL says: "Actually, I've never seen a worst fight match. I'm sure you and Florence would be great friends if you could both take off the neuromuscular armor. "

agreed absolutely.

Shepaints, Do you ever go to MOCA. It's my fave.

that and MOLAA in long beach which is in the largest museum dedicated to latin art in America and was torn down and is being rebuilt huge and fancy when it is done it will be the talk of the town.

Sorry for off topic goldtein. Innless you want to ring in on this too.

If art, in the sense of truly fine art, is ever marginalized to the point that it is driven underground, that may be the best thing that could happen to it.

the Avant-garde?

no, I don't agree with that at all. I was a mature student, graduating in 2000 and my experience of my own and other degree shows and univerities nationwide was that painting was alive and well despite conceptual art. There is exciting work going on. Many artists use digital imagery as part of their oeuvre but not many use it exclusively. I enjoy its use as you know but it's only a part of my work - painting is in the majority by a long way. Few galleries show digital imagery. Actually a lot of galleries don't even show traditional printmaking, like etchings, collagraphs, lithographs etc

I'm catching up on this thread so forgive me if this repeats what has already been said - I'm starting on page 1

Heck, I can dowload a Rembrandt, scan its attributes , mess with the color pallette, distort i9t, punch it and prod it and Bingo, instant art. I dont need no steenkeng education. Farmer

Farmer I can't believe you are saying this - are you serious??? have you seen a Rembrandt? stood in front of it? if you have I can't believe that this flippant comment would be made.

I'd seen reproductions of Rembrandt in books and admired the skill but wasn't particularly moved by his work on the whole - the self portraits come across best. Standing in front of the original, inches away from swirls and gloops and scratchy paint surface, seeing them coalesce into flesh and lace and mysterious darkness and taking you into the personal space of the subject, up close and personal, their character jumping out of the painting - that is another world.

Reproductions cannot begin to show the reality of good paintings


Listen, Im not trying to rub salt but I actually hear this crap all the time. Photoshop has a feature called "watercolor" which allows us to take a photo and mess with the "focus" and pallette, so that it becomes an erzats EDward Hopper. I can make an El Greco out of a photo by adjusting the coordinates and layers. Farmer

the watercolour feature in Photoshop (and I love Photoshop) is terrible and doesn't remotely resemble a real watercolour with its luminous liquid qualities - I'm not talking about amateur watercolours, rigid and over controlled, but watercolour used like Turner or modern masters of the medium - gestural, alive, again a different world of beautiful marks, colour, expression and life.

I love messing about with photoshop and creating pieces but I still think painting has an extra quality that it will never have, I feel the same about screen printing - the flatness is a limiting element, the sensuality of surface that gs mentions isn't there.


Graphics if a different kettle of fish to Fine Art - consumable, disposable.

A good teacher should never create clones of himself but develop individuality - i had one tutor like that but refused to become a clone and avoided his courses.

I think there is a worrying general dumbing down in all areas (look at TV) and the public perception and press coverage of art often reflects this. Very basic and unoriginal art is accepted as good because the perpetrator is good at spiel and knows the right people

There is also too much of an idea amongst amateurs with little understanding or skill that if they produce it and say 'it is art' - then it is art. This is particularly so with abstraction. Now I know there is no judge standing by to say 'here's the dividing line - this is art and this is not' and I don't want there to be - BUT to be art it has to be something more than a mere copy, some ideas behind it - this could be as simple as catching the wind throught the trees in a landscape or the colours of a sky as they subtly change from height to horizon - or it could be political, complex, narrative - anything - but some intellectual input and thought on colour, composition, marks, gestures, materials used etc etc etc It needs to make people stop and stare and care.

David Prentice's work is known to Florence and John and they both admire it - BUT again, as with Rembrandt - to stand in front of the original is a breathtaking experience, way beyond what can be taken in looking at a reproduction. The layers of colour, the scumbled surface with underpainting showing through, the bold sweeps of colour, gestural, immediate, contrasting with the quieter moody areas of incredible subtlety - they absorb you, entrance you - a reproduction can't do that.

Rembrandt as I said got inside peoples personal space and caught their character, they were exposed, vulnerable, including his self portraits.

Lucian Freud is a crueller, more incisive onlooker but look at the quality of his work, it's superb. Good observational work goes on and will continue shepaints (and you carry it on too ).

Newspapers don't cover art that well. As GS says, big exhibitions are covered but nationals don't cover work from across the country or unknown artists. I wish they would - but did they ever? there has always been an establishment and part of that now is unfortunately the conceptual crowd - but they'll have their day, go out of fashion and painting, I believe, will still be there. Luckily there is a healthy scene with really talented painters here which is larger than the conceptual side overall

The public don't realise that some art, like some music or literature, requires some learning and knowledge to appreciate - they expect instant understanding and are intolerant of any theory or intellectual element - they want a picture rather than a painting, something familiar and comfortable, something to match the sofa - but this has always been the case ' a pot of paint flung in the face of the public' said a critic of one of Whistlers works.

Good posts

It's worthless to contribute to this thread--

It appears to me that many folks didn't understand Farmer's fillip of sarcasm.

was it sarcasm? I hope so

Thank you osso. Ive been a crier about the state of eart education for a while. The painting sections of the art department at some colleges , seems to be withering as the faculties age and only new "graphics people " are brought in.

I am concernd about how the state of the practice will evolve . Where will the new ones come from? Are we being marginalized by technology?
At the same time the few buyers of art are paying higher and higher prices (and many times removing from view) for many of the works that Jl and others have mentioned.

We try to support artists by buying works (as our budget allows-were not made of money), and many of these , after a suitable time of enjoyment, we donate to the permanent collections of museums who will, if they dont hang them, deaccession them to help raise money.

The Barnes museum in Bucks County Pa, is a well kept secret of post impressionist and modern works from various US and Russian sources. Dr BArnes had, in his will, left specific instructions not to screw with his collection and never move it. Well, its in a location that is visited only by students from the Philly art schools. Its now in a financial straight and they had been talking of deaccessioning stuff by Vlamink and kline and others. So the city of Philly makes a modest proposal to the trust to build a new museum and bring the stuff to Philly. Its a wonderful idea. However, many of the trustees (who are teat sucking law firms who live off residuals from the BArnes) dont wanna lose control.
This museum, if its ever built, will be another jewel in the crown of the string of great museums in the US.

Just a bit of news from the Philly area

No Amigo, I haven't been to either of the galleries
you note, but would love to one day.

To get back to the question, I believe that a
vigorous, innovative art ambience does
exist in the commercial areas which Farmerman mentions....gaming etc.

What are the conditions for this?

An every hungry public for one. A public which is willing to part with a relatively small investment for
a games from which they can expect ever increasing sophistication every year.

Lots of jobs for commercial artists there. Many of the fine animators etc. come from Canada...
Sheridan College is world reknowned for its grads...

Additionally, the buying public has the financial means to afford upgrades and changes in
the gaming equipment.

Digital art is to painting what artificial intelligence is to actual human intelligence. Close in some ways but worlds apart in the essential ways.
We should be grateful to Farmerman for serving (intentinally or not) as our devil's advocate. He is invoking some great responses and formulations of the value of real painting.

Grateful? More like navel gazing disguised as devils advocacy...

You are free to go play elsewhere.
Florence's threads are always vital. This one raises issues that are certainly vital to artists, as seen in the comments evoked.

Actually, Osso, it seems to me that Farmer is essentially sincere here, except that he spices his dish with sarcastic flavors reflecting, more than anything else, his playfulness and sense of mischief.

She Paints raised a very important issue, some posts ago...namely the acceptance of Andy Warhol's work as "fine arts". Clearly deriving its forms, its colors and its sense of space from two dimensional commercial art, acceptance into a "loftier" sphere of Warhol's work marked a profound change in standards, culture, spatial vision.
Heretofore, the best in commercial art had been influenced by the fine arts ( see earlier Vander Beer and IBM ads). But the tables turned with Warhol. Business was triumphant, victorious. In all areas, profit trounced creativity.
This is not to say that creativity is utterly lacking in digital mastery and playing around. Creativity is there....But anyone who can tell the difference between a Rembrandt self portrait and a Warhol
portrait of Marilyn can see that we have entered a new age...which we are just beginning to understand. Some of that new understanding leads
to the fear that we have left something profoundly necessary and good and beautiful and meaningful behind...and are the losers for an unclear gain.
One thing is for sure: Not everyone can see the difference between the Rembrandt and the Warhol. Those who can see that difference express their rebellion at the passing of the older age with grief and fury and indignation.
Aside: it is not a question of friendship or healing bruised egos. It is a question of a dedication some have made to something profound, that still demands recognition for the passed and profound.