i agree with the temperment of this forum regarding conceptual art. its a shame that most top art schools are being poluted by philosophy majors rather than painters. im one of those strange people that will give anything a chance so i realy do enjoy some conceptual ar however my solid interest is in what alot of people consider old art. conceptual art has done some good things for art history- the artist sarah sze is very stimulating. she creates instalations from thousands of miscellaneous objects and literaly transforms the enviroment and an absolutly awsome way... however alot of these conceptual peoples especialy in academic circles are taletless and brainless. I take that back, i guess you have to be realy smart to write a 20 page paper on a topic that is insignificant. i firmly belive that painting is not dead. the painter inka essenhigh is one of my favorites. i highly recomend checking her out-
www.essenhigh.com - she graduated from my undergrad program in the early 90s and is on fire in ny. good luck portal in finding a good grad program, what kind of art do you do? the only advice i can give is find a program that will like you and does similar things as you- so they wont try to change you and waste your time and... they will give you more funding. - phantomx disolves into the thin air
Philosophers get paid much less than conceptual artists. Heck, I'd sell a vaccum cleaner for a million dollars. I'd feel a little dirty afterwards, but isn't that what vaccums are for?
You'll have to teach me how to dissolve into air. I went to a show with Essenhigh in it a year ago and have been a fan ever since. I work in oils, my style isn't quite fleshed out yet but you could describe it as representative, colorful, mysterious, and crowded. Lately Iv'e been on a people and animals grotesque sort of kick, but don't worry, I'm not a furry. I do all other kinds of art, but not as seriously as painting. I am not worried about grad school so much as having to succomb to mediocre commercial art jobs to pay for food and whatnot. Let me know if you have any grad school suggestions, and I'd love to hear you tear my art apart, once my unpaid webdesigner does me favors and uploads my site. Also, why not post more often? I'd like to hear about what kind of work you do and are interested in.
claudio bravo
X returns in a cloud of mist, hello again everyone- well, portal - i probably shouldnt be the one giving advice on getting into grad schools. well i take that back i did get in last year just didnt want to go at the time.. there are a few major things to keep in mind when applying- definitly talk to the people heading the program personaly. This can be by phone or letters that you slaved to perfection. id also visit the school and talk to the painting chair in person. i realy think that this will make 50% difference in getting a full scholarship or not. i keep getting partial tuition waivers and that dosent fly with me, however i made the mistake of not visiting the schools. anyway, your work sounds interesting- and when you have your site running definitly let me know so can see it. your work is representational- is it observational or from memory? its interesting that you mentioned your compostions are filled with many many figures and animals. i think im naturaly a space kind of guy- the space is almost more important than the things i paint- sometime i i even consider emtyness an object. well, to say what kind of work im doing its also represntational- i used to be still life freak- i approached painting like a scientist- i wanted to really know reality and whats truly there. so i ofcourse, i was a great admirer of bravos work- its funny during a criti my drawing teacher mentioned seing a bravo in one his dealers offices in manhattan. bravo had painted an egg- and complimented mine being superior lol . but dont worry, im not an egotistical person cause ive seen bravos work and i still say i have alot to learn- nowadays ive droped the super real unanimate objects they where loaded with way too much symbolism that kind of hurt me to paint. it reminded me of someone too much- so i started doing a more surealistic approach and droped that matter and started painting comic style chariters and funny lookin creatures in a landscape completly made from sugar. very larger in size- they kinda looked like a cross between a preraphalite and a japanese animation.- my work has dramaticaly changed in the past few months - usualy i stay on a kick for atleast a good year. i have been painting empty parkinglots- with a few gohstly looking figures lingering in the space. i tend to sketch a parking lot just to make a good composition and the rest is fiction. the figures are people that i know that have come and gone in my life yet have no identifyable chariteristics- i approach the subject in the way to not let the idenity of the thing control the painintg- i want my feeling to be told through the application of paint- you can tell if a painter is passive or in love by the way his or her brush attacks the conscious- i guess waht im trying to say is im less interested in making a statement and more interested in projecting a feeling. its interesting that seein true great art can nrearly turn me inside out- and have a physical effect rather than just intelectual- anyway, i just typed way too much- i never get to talk about art. so finding this forum is very cool to me-- anyway phantomX poffs and disapears
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Too bad PhantomX has left our dimension. I wanted to tell him how interesting his comments are. His parking lot theme is riveting. In my youth I was a parking lot attendant at night in Los Angeles. I often waited in the lot for cars to arrive, but often just started into the weakly lit dark. I would have loved to see Phantom's "ghosts" in the corners of the large lot. I hope to remember to tell him this when and if he returns.
Phantom, those are some really wonderful descriptions of your art. Yours too, Portal. I have a clear mental image now, and am impressed!
And I liked the sugar substrate.....
I am glad conceptual art happened, and like - though I didn't at first, I went kicking and if not screaming, scoffing - a bunch of it. Also don't like a bunch of it.
I like some art of many periods. I love some art of many periods. I am crazed for some art that I barely heard of and happened to see personally. Always looking...
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Osso, to me the best thing about conceptual art is that it may (or should) have underscored the value of poetic, expressive and aesthetic art.
I don't know, jl, I think conceptual has room within it for being poetic, expressive, aesthetic, even all those together in some piquant figuration. I just haven't been following it.
i agree that conceptual art can be very poetic. Conceptual art often fails however this is not because conceptual art is bad- its usualy due to conceptual artist are on the front lines of progression and obviously the first to be shot down. It does take alot of guts to try something new and may very fail terribly. Most conceptual art leaves me bored and asking myself, so what?..... . however, i remeber seeing a film created by the artist Shirin Neshat dealing with the roles of male and female in the middle east. i want to say that it reflected on muslim culture however im not 100% certain of that - anyway it was soooooo good- and gave me e peak into a completly different dimension that painting just could never even attempt to capture. it was very poetic infact, someone asked the question after seeing her work who wants to make films rather than painting - nearly every painter in the room agreed they would like to make films including myself... it was just that powerful. another aspect with conceptual art- how do you sell it? its much harder to to sell a pile of flickering tvs in a room rather than a portable painting... dont want to sound like sell out but you gotta make that money...its just a fact of life - i reaslize if you where interested in making money maybe you should try accounting- but it feels good to make alot of money from painting especialy if you had integrity in making the work. it will take sometime before conceptual artist fin there way into most art buyers home
jlnobody, you definitly know what im talking about the way you described your parking lot attendant job that you had before - im going to ask i rather weird question- did that space and vast emptyness able you to think more clearly or maybe even let you daydream better?? im interestedf in the concept of static noise- like when you ears are hear nothing at all but your mind will create a sound of static or slight ring- to fill that space... i wonder if the same can be done visualy
truth
Phantom, not a "wierd" question at all. It is the sort, I suppose, asked by artists (including poets) all the time. I can't say I remember my mind set at that time very clearly; it was forty five years ago. But I do recall a sense of mental openness, whether it be to daydreams or a kind of relaxed concentration, I can't say. I was meditating at that time with a Japanese Zen master, so who knows what my orientation was? I do think that our mental nature abhors a vacuum such that when you "stop" thinking (conscious thinking), thoughts and images will come to you ready, willing, or not. When I want to enjoy abstract images (usually images I cannot reproduce on canvas, but they are great beginnings), I sit, close my eyes, and about ten or fifteen minutes later "receive" images. I remember how fascinated I was to find the contents of a thoroughly enclosed closet covered with layers of dust. Someone suggested that it was a kind of background or default dust. He called it a "cosmic dust," which permeates everything. I also remember a blind friend who said that he did not see black. Instead, it was a kind of "white" (a default color?). And, of course, when we are able to cut off all sound we end up hearing our hearing mechanism. Is that what you mean by "static noise"? Do you think that perhaps a spatial "static ring" is what the color field painter, Rothko, was after? A view of sight itself?
Phantom X- your work sounds very interesting. I can't get a mental picture of a "sugar landscape" but I can visualize the parking lots and the concept sounds interesting. I like how the overall feeling of the piece is more important to you than the specifics or the concept. I like to approach poetry in this way, the lingering taste the piece leaves in your mouth.
What personally irks me about minimalist/conceptual/abstract art is it's trancendence from the shocking (1960's) when it questioned and put forth new ideas to the not noticable at all. Abstract/conceptual art now serves as the backround for swanky parties, fashion shows, and corporate buildings. The art does the job of decoration, fills a space, but demands nothing from the viewer. It has become the visual elevator music of corporate america.
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Portal Star, I like what you say about "the overall feeling" of a work of art. That, and the IMMEDIACY of aesthetic sensation and composition, is what moves me the most. But notice that in my case I feel these qualities more with abstract art (whether it be non-objective or representational, doesn't matter). Too bad, you're right, that it has become banal, mere decoration of venues like corporate lobbies. But better that than the hyper-kitsche abstract art seen on hospital walls. Corporate buildings use, very often, good abstract art because that culture proclaims for itself an elite status. That's not the fault of the art, of course. But I only WISH I could hear a well-played Mozart quartet or see reproductions of modernist art on elevators.
Yes, there is this lowest common denominator thing that seems to impel those who produce these materials....
