Andy and the Adobe Monster
Andy (my co-worker but not her real name) is beginning to tackle
the Adobe Monster. Today she was happy with herself. (I hadn't realized how overwhelming it was to her at first.) So I drew her a picture of her and the horrible Adobe monster. She laughed and said next I
would have to show her beating up the Adobe monster.
Note: The "Adobe Monster" represents a series of high-end design products
which are not very user-friendly.
How GOOD does a work of art need to be?
How GOOD does a work of art need to be? Well, you should have technical expertise that, itself, is adequate to produce
an emotional impact. You have to be able to paint. To that you add the message. By "the message", I don't literally mean "story".
I mean what you want to convey. In other words, if you want an impressionist type of painting, you are able to paint it and
if you want a painting that draws the audience in, you can do it. It want an illustration, on the order of the Saturday Evening
Post, you can do it. Now this doesn't necessarily mean that everyone's going to like your work. People have their
preferences, just as critics and judges have their preferences. But you, as artist (or writer or muscian), if you are comfortable
with your technical expertise and you have something to communicate, then you are on your way. (And I heartily recommend that
you read the link that I put in this article for more information from a master writer. Click here for Art, More About.)
Discussing Art with my friend the artist...
Discussing the difference between fine art and illustration my artist
friend suggests that Fine Art allows the viewer to contribute while Illustration usually attempts to merely depict. Some
Illustration, of course, is fine art. The distinction is perhaps not very meaningful, since illustration, well done,
is definitely art and "fine art" done by amateurs isn't very fine. I like the process of painting, probably partly because,
after many years of practice, I'm pretty much at ease with it. That doesn't prevent me from feeling, sometimes, in the middle
of painting, like I haven't the right to call myself an artist. (A painting can mature, sometimes, like a teen with hormone
problems.) But I like the words of L. Ron Hubbard: "ART is a word which summarizes THE QUALITY OF COMMUNICATION." Read the whole article by clicking the link. Communication involves interchange
and duplication with understanding.
Sometimes I'll do a poem and no one will understand (happened recently)
and then someone will, and I feel different -- somehow cheered up and understood again! And happy. Pictures are, I think,
more basic to us and therefore easier to understand. Abstract art, however, like "language poetry" left a lot of people out
in the cold. There's an inverse effect. The artist is to some extent responsible for the quality of communication. If I hear
a poem or see a painting that I just simply DON'T understand, I feel sadder and less capable and more lonely. So Art is a
word that summarizes the Quality of Communication. We are all here. We can communicate with guns and hatred or not at all,
and that's not art.
If I could siphon sunset
If I could siphon sunset, preserve mist mornings in a jar, I might not have
to paint. Looking at an art magazine this morning, I realized again how many fine artists there are past and present. I don't really have to contribute to this
vast and growing visual inventory. So I can . . . or not . . . as I please.
Nomenclature of "Art"
Any subject has its "nomenclature", its words.
Part of understanding the subject is understanding the words.
ART: Any artistic
endeavor, such as painting, sculpture, singing, playing an instrument, or dancing. Also
a craft, such as ceramics, jewelry, or wood carving. North Light Dictionary of Art Terms
Derivation: from Indo-European
root ar- meaning "to fit together". Note: the full definition given in any good dictionary is interesting because of the many different meanings which
have attached themselves to this little word through the ages.
We're having a heat wave
In the 90's here! I'm chilly in the office air.
More contemplative than active right now
Here I am at the computer on a fairly nice day, instead of being out and
about. BUT I did finally get the latest issue of The Federal Poet in the mail with one of my own poems in it. And I vacuumed the floors. So I'm
not such a BAAAAaaaaaaAAAdddDD person after all.
"Fine" Art and illustration
During my lifetime, there has been an ongoing discussion about the relationship
between "fine art" and illustration, usually since I'm a "fine artist" with the implication that illustration and commerical
art are "inferior" to "Fine Art." And after many years, I am willing to say that I think the distrinction is meaningless.
Encarta.com traces the etymology or origin of art to [13th century. Via French from the
Latin stem art- skill (source of English artisan and artificial). Ultimately from an Indo-European word meaning to fit together.]
My final appraisal is that "fine art", illustration, commercial art, are
means of attracting, communicating, catching our attention, conveying a meaning or some combination of these.
Many years ago when I was young and rode the bus, I was impressed by an
ad on the bus, a large picture of a hot dog, with someone's name spelled out in mustard and the tag line: "What if everybody
signed their work?"
Spring
I know spring is here because I'm wearing short sleeves and a blouse I haven't ironed to work. Boy am I glad to get out
of those turtlenecks -- until Fall I hope, and then I'll be just as happy to put them on again.
 Over the weekend, I finished the "Fast Food" painting and entered it in the Art League of Alexandria monthly show at the Torpedo Factory in Alexandria. It was accepted. This show, which is based around the theme "Food and the Still Life" is, (I must admit, who pulled a sour
face when she heard about "theme" shows) a very interesting show with some really outstanding pieces.
Water
Water is one of my favorite subjects in a painting. It
can be placid, joyous, reflective, rebellious; it can be light, dark and stormy, opaque, transparent and everything in between.
It can easily not be there, or it can be there only as a mirror. A painting
of mine that captures this quality is "Yellow Reflections", painted on site at the fisherman's wharf in Portland Maine (that's
Maine, not Oregon) which captures the reflection of the yellow grain elevator not visible in the painting as I painted the
small boats docked at the floating quay at low tide.
Or check out this picture of Renoir's The Boating Party from the Phillips Collection. Though the interaction of the humans
in the painting is of interest, if you get a chance to see the original, at the Phillips Collection in Washington DC, notice
the play of light on the still life, the almost-not-there quality of the liquid in the glasses.
Tue, May 4, 2004 | link
Scumble and Glaze
Two terms that don't seem to be much used by students of modern painting
are "scumble" and "glaze." I think this may be because, from the time of the Impressionists, artists have been entranced by
the ability to directly and quickly put down an "impression." This isn't entirely the fault of the impressionists. They themselves
were a product of technology. Suddenly, there developed a field (or class?) of color preparation technicians who found it
profitable to grind and package (tube) paint and to discover and market new colors. But the "old masters" used glazing
and scumbling to enhance their paintings, working in a slower and more restricted palette. Glazes were thin layers of pure
color, immersed in a medium, that were applied over an undercoat. Glazes always slightly darkened the underpainting. Scumbling
involved the application of a lighter opaque color over a darker underlayer but in such a way as to allow some of the
underlying color to show through in parts. Glazing has the benefit that the pure color (if a transparent color like alizarin
crimson, viridian, ultramarine blue) gave a jewel-like feel to the passage. It wasn't dulled by the addition of white to lighten.
Scumble has the benefit that it mimics nature in its insistence that there is more than one color there, that seeing consists
of interpreting levels and depth.
May my life be enhanced by scumbles and glazes.
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