But why the change? Was it that, in an art scene increasingly driven by fads, drawing became du jour simply because it hadn’t been for a very long time? Or were other, less obvious factors at work?
In fact, the re-emergence of drawing was far from market-driven, and its increase in profile a far slower process than any newly voguish status might suggest.
To understand something of its current impact, it’s necessary to look back at the closing years of the 20th century. A time when, to the eyes of many, the art scene looked very different indeed.
Throughout much of the 1990s visual austerity and a certain restraint governed the work of a new wave of artists; many of them British, many high-profile.
Figures such as Darren Almond, Damien Hirst, Martin Creed, Rachel Whiteread and a re-discovered Allan McCollum typified an art scene driven by hands-off, conceptual practice and stringent theoretical undertow.
Even artists whose work, by contrast, seemed more ludic and theatrical – Maurizio Catellan, the Chapman brothers, an ever-enduring Jeff Koons – shared a taste for slick, expensive, mechanized output. And in fact, looking back, there’s a certain synchronistic poetry to the fact that Marc Quinn’s ‘Self’ portrait, a principal icon of the era, quite literally froze the blood.
Further tendencies underpinned the general sense of pristine, chilly surface. Graphic design in the late 90s exulted in the hard edges of its newly perfect digital genesis, while on a popular level, serious flirtation with ‘minimalism’ induced homeowners to replace comfort with pristine surface and spacious void.
Clearly, any attempt to rapidly define a moment in art history is doomed to over-simplification. A vast array of artists stand in lush counterpoint to Hirst’s surgically steely cabinets or Whiteread’s pale, negative spaces. The work of Peter Doig, Marlene Dumas, Daniel Richter and Jörg Immendorf – to name just a few – all manifest an obvious delight in exuberant mark-making or absorbed, painterly gesture.
Yet it’s certainly true that what generally made the headlines – the dissected sheep, the on/off lights, the unmade beds – were essentially ‘conceptual’ works that side-lined direct artistic intervention. And it’s also true that, with the internet truly coming of age in the ’90s, such highly publicized aesthetics became instantly and widely accessible for the first time in any history. In the mass public eye, art had gained a hard, new edge.
Yet elsewhere, a wildly contrasting vision was being far less well documented. On America’s West Coast, in particular, the long-gestating seeds of a brimming alternative scene were beginning to bear considerable fruit. Its influences were multiple and diverse, yet shared the fact that all lay well outside the contemporary mainstream.
In LA, for example, the ‘underground’ drawings of Ray Pettibon – linked initially to the rock scene then distributed through short-run zines – had garnered fervent admirers throughout the late ’70s & ’80s. A major exhibition in 1992 succeeded in raising his profile both throughout the States and abroad.
Yet Pettibon’s work was merely the best-known facet of a burgeoning counter-culture. One which, since 1986, had found a major advocate in the now legendary La Luz De Jesus gallery in downtown LA.
This space, located incongruously above an offbeat gift store, focused entirely on artists whose backgrounds and influences sprang from an array of popular cultures such as illustration, folk art, comics and tattooing. And this output, crucially, tended towards an intricate figurative craftsmanship more closely associated at the time with illustration than so-called ‘fine’ art.
The gallery and its stable of artists proved a speedy and influential local success, and in 1994, Juxtapoz, a magazine founded by Robert Williams (himself an artist and friend of famed underground artist Robert Crumb) also began to showcase this growing wave of alternative art.
Utterly at odds with the rarefied, theory-led aesthetic dominating contemporary practice at the time, this new sensibility came to be regarded as a movement. Its roots and position were defined by not just one label, but two: Low-Brow, or Pop Surrealism.
Resolutely populist – bordering, even, on kitsch – its appropriation of popular style and content within a fine art context questioned long-held assumptions regarding the parameters of art itself. Revisiting the earliest tenets of Pop Art, it nevertheless totally dismissed that movement’s later associations with Warholian mass production.
And in San Francisco, too, similar trends were at work.
In the 1990s a group of artists including Chris Johansen, Clare E Rojas and Barry McGee emerged to form a distinctive new scene. Their work, though sharing much with the Low-Brow phenomenon, differed in several important respects and became known as the ‘Mission School’ in recognition of its essentially San Franciscan flavor.
Local influences contributed to a more whimsical, looser approach to image-making than LA tendencies at the time. Street art such as graffiti formed an intrinsic part of the scene, but was generally refined into a figurative rather than textual medium. The legacy of underground comics pioneered by the likes of Robert Crumb was also evident in cartoon-like characterization and a witty, humorous edge.
More importantly still, while painting lay at the heart of the Low-Brow movement, drawing was much more widely adopted by the Mission School artists.
In a nod to the hand-drawn agitprop and pyschedelia of ’60s Haight-Ashbury, they revived techniques such as detailed patterning, hand-lettering and découpage. Materials, too, were frequently unconventional; ball-point pens, markers, recycled paper, wood or metal all found a part in the Mission School look.
This ‘regional’ distinction was clearly underlined in publicity for a 2000 show at LA’s New Image Gallery:
SAN FRANCISCO DRAWING SHOW curated by: Alicia McCarthy and Chris Johanson. May 19 – June 17, 2000.
Straight out of San Francisco, drawings of over 15 artists will be exhibited …. Currently there are important artistic trends developing out of San Francisco. Drawing is at the root of this development.
Meanwhile, however, America’s East Coast found itself forced (for once) to gradually acknowledge a nexus of creativity occurring elsewhere. While many commentators, curators and gallerists became increasingly aware that some kind of real cultural shift was taking place, others seemed slow or simply unwilling to recognize its impact or legitimacy.
Yet the growing appeal of Low-Brow and related work – especially amongst a generation of new and emerging artists – was undeniable. New galleries opened to deal exclusively in the genre, and Juxtapoz, along with many of its featured artists, began to acquire a cult following. Its international distribution and the broad reach of the internet helped ensure that this new sensibility filtered beyond the US.
The ‘unofficial’ Californian scene gathering pace in the ’90s was intrinsically linked to a rejection of prevailing artistic practice – the notion, as Fred Tomaselli later put it, “…that people are a bit tired of the over-rationalism (sic) of the art world, this idea that you can get to everything through the cerebral.”
Yet its ethos was otherwise hugely democratic and unifying, a statement of validity for neglected or side-lined art. There can be little doubt that its emergence provided an impetus behind the current interest in drawing.
But this interest – and with it, the resurgence of a particular kind of artistic engagement – was not, of course, solely confined to America’s West Coast.
Elsewhere in the States, Laylah Ali’s first major show of meticulously patterned, faux-naif works took place at Chicago’s MOCA in 1999 (she had been featured, along with Chris Johansen, at New York’s Drawing Center in the summer of 1998).
Julie Mehretu, likewise emerging towards the end of the ’90s, fused painting with drawing in a myriad of complex mark-making, while Canada’s Royal Art Lodge, formed in 1996, produced whimsical drawings, paintings and objects reminiscent of the Mission School’s output.
In Europe, similar trends were also underway. As the 20th century drew to its close, Sweden’s Jockum Nordstrüm was gaining recognition for his beautifully rendered, twisted tableaux of far from ordinary life. Switzerland’s Marc Bauer produced vigorous drawings that exemplified the medium’s strength, and in Britain the hand-drawn zine was adopted by Olivia Plender, albeit in a highly polished form.
While drawing, obviously, had never disappeared entirely from the gallery, these artists represent just a few of those contributing to its rapidly growing visibility towards the end of the ’90s. A resurgence now so evident that, though prompted by certain definable factors, it nevertheless seems organic, almost essential; a phenomenon that quite possibly identifies as well as answers very current needs amongst today’s young artists.
And what are they?
Well to start with, drawing is cheap. For those struggling with the high costs of studio space and materials, it’s a medium that’s financially viable as well as a manageable means of production.
What’s more, it’s hugely inclusive. Everyone, at some point, has experienced the act of drawing at some level, a participation which affords even the most casual observer a sense of involvement in the medium; a visceral engagement in its use that conceptual art forms often lack.
Yet despite this refreshingly egalitarian glow, it also appears that much of today’s output seems directed towards highly individual, even arcane expression, a practice exemplified by intricate, almost obsessive mark-making.
On the one hand, this wholly supports an ethos by which today’s artists seem to demand an intimate, personal and evident engagement with their art.
Painstaking detail and labor-intensive mark-making represent artistic endeavor for which the artist alone is responsible. No third-party construction teams, no assistants on hand to dab a brush as directed. This art is about making in the purest possible sense.
A parallel explosion in use of craft elements – beading, glittering, collage, embroidery – as well as the growing popularity of zines and artists’ books – mirrors this quest for hands-on, highly personalized involvement.
Yet more intriguingly, demands for creative ownership may well serve needs besides a revision of artistic involvement.
Art, of course, has always been about reflecting and interpreting the world, but the early 21st century seems to have experienced a particularly profound re-appraisal of exactly what the world involves. The outlook is an uneasy one, marked by a growing sense of schism and dislocation, and in particular, the notion of circumstance veering out of control.
To return briefly to Pop Surrealism, true to its ’surrealist’ label the movement is marked by subversion of apparent reality. Typically, this takes on disturbing, anxiety-ridden form; bio-morphed figures inhabit scenarios laden with threat; an undertow of violence is darkly enhanced by imagery plucked from childhood.
And importantly, unlike Surrealism, which investigates the interior spaces of the human psyche, Pop Surrealism obliquely focuses on physical, actual realities. Those genetic hybrids, ruined landscapes and constant simmer of threat don’t merely exist in our nightmares. They’re with us now.
The movement itself may have had its day as far as the art market is concerned, but the zeitgeist it portrays is clearly here to stay.
Consider, for a moment, Jean Dubuffet’s famous description of L’Art Brut
“Those works created from solitude and from pure and authentic creative impulses – where the worries of competition, acclaim and social promotion do not interfere – are, because of these very facts, more precious than the productions of professions. … we cannot avoid the feeling that in relation to these works, cultural art in its entirety appears to be the game of a futile society, a fallacious parade.”
Though written in the 1950s, the proclamation reads now like a perfect manifesto for the kind of anti-establishment art scene we’ve been discussing. Yet quite apart from epitomizing a ‘purer’ alternative to the mainstream, the kind of art Dubuffet describes now carries connotations far beyond those of his original assessment.
The ’simplicity’ of naïve or folk art harks back – in popular nostalgia at least – to carefree, less complex times in which a sense of place and purpose were clearly defined. It’s little wonder that its revival coincides with acute apprehension regarding our own, turbulent times.
By contrast, much outsider art is clearly associated with not belonging – a characteristic most evident in its embrace of art produced by the mentally ill.
Yet here again there’s a definite connection. Such work often originates through its use as a therapeutic tool; a fact that throws interesting light on the intricate, involved delineation of much recent drawing and painting. Indeed, in its conspicuous efforts to order, pattern and negotiate space, such complexity provides almost casebook examples of conflict-solving Gestalt.
More interestingly still, a significant proportion of contemporary practice doesn’t just seek to interpret complex realities, but actually sets out to create them through construction of highly personal, alternative worlds.
Paul Noble’s well-known drawings of fictional ‘Nobson Newtown’ are devoid of human figures, yet imbued with visual invention and idiosyncratic textual comment. A clear intention is to provide a reflection of the mind of their maker: as Noble himself puts it, “town planning as self-portraiture”.
Other artists’ fictional worlds provide similar arenas for grappling with issues that echo or parallel our own.
Michael Whittle, a recent graduate from the Royal College of Art, creates intricate drawings melding religious iconography with motifs garnered from heraldry, alchemy and science. The resulting images, snapshots of impossible states, underpin the artist’s own desire to “make sense of reality” while also investigating “… man’s attempts to come to terms with existence”.
Camille Rose Garcia (whose practice, though largely identified with painting, includes much drawing) is well known for deceptively enchanting visions of what amounts to a near-dystopia. A recurring cast of characters battle to save or destroy a poisoned, dying world. The baddies, unfortunately, seem to be winning.
Art today appears to be grappling with a spiritual, political and therapeutic function that arguably, it hasn’t reflected quite so clearly for centuries. And the fact that drawing, the most immediate and spontaneous of mediums, forms a vital aspect of the interpretation of a complex world should come as no surprise.
Postscript: Drawing right now – who we’re liking
The energy of the California scene continues apace, with San Francisco still arguably the epicentre of new drawing – check out the wonderful work of Sara Thustra, Sacha Eckes, Andrew Schoultz and Simone Shubuck (a San Francisco native, though now resident in New York).
LA practice remains particularly diverse, but artists who make exciting use of drawing include Travis Millard, Adam Janes and Gina Triplett.
Elsewhere in the States, we enjoy the work of Carter, Aurel Schmidt and UK-born Dominic McGill (best known for his epic, 65ft ‘Project for a New American Century’).
In Europe, Richard Höglund produces interesting drawings informed by semiotics, and in the UK, artists of note include Sarah Woodfine and Adam Dant (the latter have both been recipients of the Jerwood Drawing Prize.
Most exciting of all, newcomer Laura Oldfield Ford creates large-scale, beautifully rendered drawings with astute political commentary at their core, as well as the cult zine ‘Savage Messiah, an extraordinary foray into the psycho-geographic terrain of London.
By: Mike Brennan
About the Author:
Read more on Drawing Conclusions – the Rise of Drawing in the Contemporary Art Scene…
Filed under Visual Art by on Jan 16th, 2010. 
The photography gallery of Yossi Milo exists upstairs from a taxi garage. The PaceWildenstein’s Minimalist mausoleum on West 25th is down the street from old artist’s coops. Elite art collectors rub shoulders with auto mechanics as they walk through the streets. But despite this unusual relationship, after more than ten years of growth, the Chelsea neighborhood possesses more than 250 galleries that extend from West 13th to West 29th Streets and from 10th Avenue to the West Side Highway in Manhattan, about twice the amount of galleries SoHo had in the early 1990’s.
The migration to Chelsea is a large scale New York City event that has never happened before. All species of art galleries exist in Chelsea in different stages of development. Its crop of galleries consists of parallel realities catering to different audiences and markets from the avant-garde to the academic. With art from places as far as India and as close as Williamsburg, Chelsea reflects contemporary art’s global marketplace.
"Chelsea is now the dominant marketplace for art culture in New York," said Renee Vara, an Adjunct Professor at New York University and Lecturer at Guggenheim Museum, where she teaches art history, art theory, and museum studies, and is a private independent curator and art historian. "It offers efficiency and a separate enclave with a collective and attractive element."
The breakthrough into Chelsea began in 1988 with the opening of the Dia Foundation, now Dia Center for the Arts. This cultural pioneer set up camp in a vicinity where spaces were large and rents were cheap. By late 1994, Matthew Marks, then a young Upper East Side dealer, expanded to West 22nd Street and started the "art party scene" in the new neighborhood. At the time, it was impossible to predict how Chelsea would be transformed or how fast changes would happen.
Paula Cooper arrived in 1996. Cooper had opened SoHo’s first art gallery in 1968 and then joined about 15 other art dealers and moved to far west Chelsea. The space in Chelsea opened in an old garage on West 21st Street, between 10th and 11th avenues. Because of Cooper’s prominence in the art world and her role in developing SoHo, many art and real estate entrepreneurs took her move as a sign that the neighborhood west of 10th Avenue and bound by 20th and 26th streets was about to be transformed.
The transformation of Chelsea was the answer for rents that had spiralled out of control in SoHo. With most galleries renting and not owning their spaces in SoHo, galleries sought out new ventures in other territories where rents were cheaper or the option of owning a building was presented. The idea of Chelsea was ripe for its time when the art world was ready to break old traditions with SoHo. They found them in Chelsea.
As Chelsea dominated the art scene, Mary Boone signaled another stage in her personal evolution as a dealer by establishing a Chelsea branch of her high profile gallery. Gluckman Mayner Architects created a dramatic Chelsea gallery for Boone. Richard Gluckman’s association with Boone dates back to her days on West Broadway. He also designed her gallery at 745 Fifth Avenue.
Boone opened her first space in SoHo on Broadway in 1979 moving into the same building that housed Leo Castelli and Ileana Sonnabend’s legendary galleries. Boone later looked for space on 57th Street in the traditional neighborhood of the New York art world.
The layout and details of the Chelsea gallery originated from the design of her uptown space. The architect created a powerful juxtaposition between the details associated with his work and the rugged quality of original wood trusses and wood plank ceiling, which are exposed arcing over the space. The floors are steel-troweled concrete slab, which mimics the floor treatment uptown. And the fa-cade’s storefront of translucent glass reminds one of Gluckman’s design at Boone’s West Broadway gallery. In Chelsea, all three rooms receive natural light by way of the translucent storefront windows in the reception area and through a small central skylight in the rear. The 12-ft.-wide main exhibition area contains a translucent skylight that traverses the entire length of the 24-ft.-high display wall. Spotlights provide additional lighting.
As the Chelsea area continued to transform, people moved into the area’s first pricey loft conversion on West 22nd Street. Savanna Partners, a young real estate development firm, bought that property at a July 1994 auction for $3 million. Because of zoning requirements, it took Savanna Partners one and a half years to get approvals, even though there was very little manufacturing activity and little hope for any more industrial growth.
Today, Savanna builds huge lofts and rents the street-level spaces to galleries and restaurants. Not far to the south, on 17th Street, World Wide Holdings Corp. does something similar, and the Meatpacking District of the far west Village has practically disappeared as old warehouses are being-turned into apartments.
Among Chelsea gallery spaces are other SoHo exiles like John Weber, Barbara Gladstone, Metro Pictures, 303 Gallery, Bose Pacia Gallery, and Agora Gallery.
"Chelsea affords you access to critics and curators that make the rounds regularly to look at galleries," said Dr. Steve Pacia, co-founder and co-partner with Dr Arani Bose of the Bose Pacia Gallery on West 26th Street.
Bose Pacia Gallery, established in 1994 in SoHo, was the first gallery in the West specializing in contemporary art from South Asia. During the last ten years, Bose Pacia has held over 30 exhibitions and is internationally regarded for promoting the South Asian avant-garde. Visual artists from South Asia work within a unique space that is informed by many cultures, languages and religions. Bose Pacia fosters an active discourse between these artists and the international art community by featuring exhibitions that contextualize contemporary art from this geographic region within its rich artistic traditions and current social tensions.
Established in 1984 in SoHo by a fine artist, Agora Gallery more than doubled its space when it moved to Chelsea in 2003. A gallery without borders, Agora was one of the pioneer galleries providing representation to both national and international artists.
Recent interviews by its director, Angela Di Bello, in Business News Weekend (NBC) Hellenic Public Radio, and the Wall Street Journal have brought additional attention and visitors to Chelsea.
The New Museum also left SoHo for an interim spot in Chelsea but has closed its doors, with the exception of its bookstore space at the Chelsea Art Museum, for a year and a half until the construction of its much anticipated new building on the Bowery is opened. Designed by the acclaimed Tokyo based company of Sejima and Nishizawa/SA-NAA, the new 60,000 square foot, seven-story New Museum will be the first art museum building constructed in downtown Manhattan in over a century.
By: Donna Clovis
About the Author:
Filed under Visual Art by on Jan 14th, 2010.
The photography gallery of Yossi Milo exists upstairs from a taxi garage. The PaceWildenstein’s Minimalist mausoleum on West 25th is down the street from old artist’s coops. Elite art collectors rub shoulders with auto mechanics as they walk through the streets. But despite this unusual relationship, after more than ten years of growth, the Chelsea neighborhood possesses more than 250 galleries that extend from West 13th to West 29th Streets and from 10th Avenue to the West Side Highway in Manhattan, about twice the amount of galleries SoHo had in the early 1990’s.
The migration to Chelsea is a large scale New York City event that has never happened before. All species of art galleries exist in Chelsea in different stages of development. Its crop of galleries consists of parallel realities catering to different audiences and markets from the avant-garde to the academic. With art from places as far as India and as close as Williamsburg, Chelsea reflects contemporary art’s global marketplace.
"Chelsea is now the dominant marketplace for art culture in New York," said Renee Vara, an Adjunct Professor at New York University and Lecturer at Guggenheim Museum, where she teaches art history, art theory, and museum studies, and is a private independent curator and art historian. "It offers efficiency and a separate enclave with a collective and attractive element."
The breakthrough into Chelsea began in 1988 with the opening of the Dia Foundation, now Dia Center for the Arts. This cultural pioneer set up camp in a vicinity where spaces were large and rents were cheap. By late 1994, Matthew Marks, then a young Upper East Side dealer, expanded to West 22nd Street and started the "art party scene" in the new neighborhood. At the time, it was impossible to predict how Chelsea would be transformed or how fast changes would happen.
Paula Cooper arrived in 1996. Cooper had opened SoHo’s first art gallery in 1968 and then joined about 15 other art dealers and moved to far west Chelsea. The space in Chelsea opened in an old garage on West 21st Street, between 10th and 11th avenues. Because of Cooper’s prominence in the art world and her role in developing SoHo, many art and real estate entrepreneurs took her move as a sign that the neighborhood west of 10th Avenue and bound by 20th and 26th streets was about to be transformed.
The transformation of Chelsea was the answer for rents that had spiralled out of control in SoHo. With most galleries renting and not owning their spaces in SoHo, galleries sought out new ventures in other territories where rents were cheaper or the option of owning a building was presented. The idea of Chelsea was ripe for its time when the art world was ready to break old traditions with SoHo. They found them in Chelsea.
As Chelsea dominated the art scene, Mary Boone signaled another stage in her personal evolution as a dealer by establishing a Chelsea branch of her high profile gallery. Gluckman Mayner Architects created a dramatic Chelsea gallery for Boone. Richard Gluckman’s association with Boone dates back to her days on West Broadway. He also designed her gallery at 745 Fifth Avenue.
Boone opened her first space in SoHo on Broadway in 1979 moving into the same building that housed Leo Castelli and Ileana Sonnabend’s legendary galleries. Boone later looked for space on 57th Street in the traditional neighborhood of the New York art world.
The layout and details of the Chelsea gallery originated from the design of her uptown space. The architect created a powerful juxtaposition between the details associated with his work and the rugged quality of original wood trusses and wood plank ceiling, which are exposed arcing over the space. The floors are steel-troweled concrete slab, which mimics the floor treatment uptown. And the fa-cade’s storefront of translucent glass reminds one of Gluckman’s design at Boone’s West Broadway gallery. In Chelsea, all three rooms receive natural light by way of the translucent storefront windows in the reception area and through a small central skylight in the rear. The 12-ft.-wide main exhibition area contains a translucent skylight that traverses the entire length of the 24-ft.-high display wall. Spotlights provide additional lighting.
As the Chelsea area continued to transform, people moved into the area’s first pricey loft conversion on West 22nd Street. Savanna Partners, a young real estate development firm, bought that property at a July 1994 auction for $3 million. Because of zoning requirements, it took Savanna Partners one and a half years to get approvals, even though there was very little manufacturing activity and little hope for any more industrial growth.
Today, Savanna builds huge lofts and rents the street-level spaces to galleries and restaurants. Not far to the south, on 17th Street, World Wide Holdings Corp. does something similar, and the Meatpacking District of the far west Village has practically disappeared as old warehouses are being-turned into apartments.
Among Chelsea gallery spaces are other SoHo exiles like John Weber, Barbara Gladstone, Metro Pictures, 303 Gallery, Bose Pacia Gallery, and Agora Gallery.
"Chelsea affords you access to critics and curators that make the rounds regularly to look at galleries," said Dr. Steve Pacia, co-founder and co-partner with Dr Arani Bose of the Bose Pacia Gallery on West 26th Street.
Bose Pacia Gallery, established in 1994 in SoHo, was the first gallery in the West specializing in contemporary art from South Asia. During the last ten years, Bose Pacia has held over 30 exhibitions and is internationally regarded for promoting the South Asian avant-garde. Visual artists from South Asia work within a unique space that is informed by many cultures, languages and religions. Bose Pacia fosters an active discourse between these artists and the international art community by featuring exhibitions that contextualize contemporary art from this geographic region within its rich artistic traditions and current social tensions.
Established in 1984 in SoHo by a fine artist, Agora Gallery more than doubled its space when it moved to Chelsea in 2003. A gallery without borders, Agora was one of the pioneer galleries providing representation to both national and international artists.
Recent interviews by its director, Angela Di Bello, in Business News Weekend (NBC) Hellenic Public Radio, and the Wall Street Journal have brought additional attention and visitors to Chelsea.
The New Museum also left SoHo for an interim spot in Chelsea but has closed its doors, with the exception of its bookstore space at the Chelsea Art Museum, for a year and a half until the construction of its much anticipated new building on the Bowery is opened. Designed by the acclaimed Tokyo based company of Sejima and Nishizawa/SA-NAA, the new 60,000 square foot, seven-story New Museum will be the first art museum building constructed in downtown Manhattan in over a century.
By: Donna Clovis
About the Author:
Filed under Visual Art by on Jan 14th, 2010.
Art can be lucrative if you had the eye and if you can research a little.
BUYING ART FOR THE NEWBIES
It is not simply for art for art’s sake. You must really know what you want and if you are planning to display it at your house, condo or building. As art is very broad in terms of styles and kind. Asked yourselves if you want a landscape, an abstract, a still life, a pen and ink etc…
How much is your budget? How much are you willing to pay? Most paintings now a days are competitively priced but usually…if you are buying from a relatively unknown artist it can prove to be affordable and the same time it can also be gamble ( hoping the art or the artist in the future can turn out to be another Jackson Pollack, Picasso or Juan Luna).
Well known artist or established artist works are usually high priced but it can prove to be worth your money in the long run. The market value of the art you bought is usually tied up with just how well respected or career driven the artist was. The tendency is his or her price would surely go up if there is a demand for it especially if that artist becomes a national artist—you hit the goldmine!
When buying art works, it pays to asked around either an art curator, professional art dealer, an art gallery owner or used to your advantage harness the power of the net. But really nothing beats when it is recommended by close friends or relatives.
BUYING ART FOR BEGINNERS
1) You must know the difference between buying oil, watercolor, pastel or acrylic. It is important to know what art materials are involved with the creation of that art work you are buying. Materials used by the artist should be high quality so the colors would be preserve or retain for a long, long time.
2) Decide if you are going to buy directly from the artist itself, to an art dealer or go straight to the art gallery. Consider the framing, delivery and other services involved when negotiating with the price or what is included to your payment.
When buying through an art gallery, you usually get to know the profile of the artist and essentially getting a proof or certificate that what your buying is real not fake (as in original) and also verify if it has several reproductions already such as the print version.
If you are buying directly from the artist, you have the option to ask for an authentication paper complete with the artist’s signature.
3) Regardless if what you bought is from a relatively unknown artist or considered a masterpiece, you should also know how to preserve or maintain it. As time goes by it will be moisture and humidity to be the art pieces main enemy! Colors can fade. A retouch might be needed. Furthermore, don’t expose the painting to the sunlight as the harmful ultra violent rays can affect the colors of the paintings.
4) Your art should reflect your aesthetic taste. Choose art that can help you relax like a landscape or underwater. An art that can make you think like abstracts, an art that reflects your dreams and fantasies like surreal paintings. It brings out your personality and something that brings a certain kind of fulfillment—one that you can be truly proud of hanging at your walls.
5) You must remember value or price of your art work will not go up over night. Hence, treat it like a mutual fund or a time deposit.
6) Always buy from reliable sources. The traditional way is still the best there is.
FACTORS TO CONSIDER WHEN RE-SELLING YOUR ART
1) Finding a prospective buyer is not easy. Unless, you have a cultured/art loving network. You can off course go through the expert hands of an professional art dealer or art gallery owner but they also get a great deal of share of your selling price.
2) Keep all the receipts, relevant documents like a copy of artist resume or any proofs of ownership. Especially if is a high end piece of art work.
Later on with enough experience you can build a collection that you can benefit from it in the long run. Always remember…time is your friend; don’t assume you can profit from your art work right away. The good news is…art doesn’t really decline instead its price usually goes up!
In the meantime, enjoy that priceless beauty of the art work you had purchased.
http://noliespanola.digitalwebdesignstudio.com/
By: vernie evangelista
About the Author:
Filed under Visual Art by on Jan 2nd, 2010.
Art and Art Galleries is what can provide a status symbol these days. Imagine having guests at your newly renovated most modern apartment. There is no TV. You don’t even have a stereo system. All you have is an old gramophone and a collection of records. This is double WOW. Guests are nervously swallowing their saliva in powerless envy. How brave. How original. You stand there in the spot light of fame.
The walls of your rebellious home are decorated with modern art. I do not mean those painting bought at tourists squares in Paris and other pop cities. I am talking authentic, natural art works collected by the means of internet research.
Your walls are decorated by brilliant artworks of artists from badly suffered Eastern Europe. Well, if you want a good painting you need to find an artist with a bleeding heart. I think that the true artist is the one who suffers the most. Hey. Try to find the suffering ones in North America. They would sing a poem of a cold burger or better yet, they would paint in oil the sadness of a cold burger. This is not going to make you stand out. Your home must become an art gallery. A gallery of deep revelations and the pain the must go with them. Knowledge, love and pain are all related. They are all from the same family. They are Siamese triplets.
You collect art. The old record is playing the forgotten tune. The fireplace emanates the deep odor of burnt wood. The semi dark apartment with most original paintings highlighted in the fashionably selected lights make you proud and victorious.
‘I ran my own art gallery’ you say casually and look in the mirror. This is a very pleasant thing to say. You repeat louder: ‘I ran my own art gallery’. I like to buy art and sell art. It makes me feel important.
Let’s put all the sarcasm aside. These are the days when we start doubting the value of overpriced techno toys the return to art is not the answer but a clue. We need clues as the old world model is shattering. Art galleries will prevail. Those who buy art and sell art will too.
By: Muneca
About the Author:
Filed under Visual Art by on Jan 1st, 2010.
The Chelsea art community is boasting of the new involvement with the thirty-something crowd. Texting your friends about the newest opening and exhibition is easy. With new artists and emerging galleries experimenting with various concepts and ideas, the diversity of Chelsea has now catered to this new audience and market giving new energy and vitality to art spaces for creativity.
Melissa Sarti, a 32-year-old graduate student from Hunter College stands on the corner of West 25th and 10th Ave. messaging a friend about an art exhibition this Thursday night. “Hey Carl, meet me at 6:30 at White Box,” she wrote. “There’s an awesome installation I want to see and some friends I want you to meet.”
The Chelsea corner where she stands seems to be a remote one with a taxi stand, a gas station and a crumbling warehouse just below an old, elevated railroad line. But she stands on the edge of the Chelsea art world, the largest museum-like space of contemporary art in the world. The sidewalk crowd builds as she walks toward the gallery spaces. She passes a large glass gallery window and moves closer to get a better glimpse of the huge space within an old brick factory. Melissa peers through the window. She sees them, clutching glasses of champagne and wine, as the crowd of young guests inside marvel at a new contemporary painting.
From Manhattan to Queens, the young trendsetters are coming out in droves, and not just for the wine. Last month at a reception at Agora Gallery Mary Ellen Henderson and Daniel frequent the gallery. “I like to know what’s going on in the galleries in the neighborhood. It’s kind of like for business and pleasure” answers Christina Freeman, a photographer, when asked why she made a point to come to the reception. “We’re artists by nature; some of us are fashion designers, so we have an interest in art. We can truly appreciate it”.
Erin Walker and Bren frequent the galleries on a regular basis, so what keeps them coming back? “It’s a good chance for us to catch up with each other, and also look for inspiration”. However, The Chelsea galleries are not just for those looking to enhance their knowledge of up-and-coming design trends in the contemporary art world. “I like to be able to come out on the weekends, and be able to go from gallery to gallery to gallery. Make an afternoon of it and go to brunch. Get a group of friends together to do something more interesting and define my own taste in art”, offered Jennifer Grace, a publishing assistant from Wired Magazine.
New Gangs of Gallerists
Sheri Pasquarella, a young art consultant and private dealer, invested in a 27th Street space that once held the Tunnel nightclub until 2001. Several young art gallerists moved their businesses from other parts of the city to a series of old loading docks along the south side of the former Tunnel site. Wanting to create an instant destination location, Pasquarella led the exodus of emerging-artist dealers to a promised land of barren street-level spaces between Eleventh and Twelfth Avenues. Oliver Kamm Gallery, Foxy Production, Derek Eller Gallery, Clementine Gallery, John Connelly Presents and Wallspace are now located here. This has added up to be just one of the most concerted efforts at expanding Chelsea’s gallery scene since the art world began abandoning SoHo for the West Side in the mid-1990s.
New Art Networks
Social networks for thirty-somethings in the arts is on the upswing. The Young Associates is one of the new social art groups started in Chelsea by a museum space. The Chelsea Art Museum program looks to connect young people with New York’s emerging art community, creating an energetic presence in the growth of the museum and a network of innovative thinkers within the arts. The group targets recent graduates and young professionals who would like to learn more about art in an intimate atmosphere that can be provided by a smaller museum. They interact with museum curators, meet artists from New York and create a forum within the framework of the Chelsea Art Museum for networking with other young people in the field. They organize special after parties following exhibition openings, curator-led art tours, gallery tours, talks with gallery owners, artist studio visits, invitational talks on trends in contemporary art, previews of auctions, and holiday parties.
Innovative Investors
Get out your auction paddles. A new generation of collectors, hedge-fund managers, technology entrepreneurs and others in their thirties have plunged into the world of contemporary art. During recent years, as world economies waned, prices in the closely watched top 2% of the contemporary-art market were up to 72%, according to London-based Art Market Research. In contrast, prices of top-tier works in the Old Masters and French Impressionist markets fell by 40% and 29%. Christopher Apgar, a young financial adviser, owns works ranging from Jean-Michel Basquiat, the graffiti artist who became an eighties phenomenon, to a silkscreen of Marilyn Monroe by Andy Warhol. His current hunt is for artistic creations by Gregory Crewdson, a photographer whose work includes promotional shots for the HBO series “Six Feet Under,” and Vic Muniz, known for making sculptures of iconic figures out of chocolate and then photographing the pieces.
Most young and new collectors have little interest in the Old Masters that captivated the previous generation. Part of the reason for the aversion is the astronomical prices they command. Contemporary works are less expensive and are more likely to double in value in a short period. And today, a young collector doesn’t need to spend millions of dollars on a van Gogh to earn the respect of peers. They show they are in touch with the contemporary art world by buying up works of new contemporary artists and appearing in the gallery social scene.
And while new collectors may be approaching the art market as if it were a marketing venture of capital investments, there is no guarantee that the payoff will be as lofty. The art market can be volatile. The collecting quirks and interests of contemporary art lovers drive the market. If a few collectors love ocean scenes, prices rise while less favored desert paintings remain bargains. Fluctuations can differ due to different collectors entering and leaving the art market at various times. The result is an artist may be “hot” for a few years and when prices plateau and rise again, another collecting generation seizes the artists’s worth. The art industry urges young people to buy for eprsonal enjoyment and not just a quick profit. The lifestyle of today’s new collectors is not about ball gowns and expensive jewelry. It is all about walking around your home in sweat pants talking with a friend on the cell phone about the contemporary art plastered on the walls that you look at and appreciate. It is about computers, blackberry’s, ipods, and ibooks. Most of all, it is about texting your friends for the next social gathering at a Chelsea art gallery opening on Thursday evening.
By: Donna Clovis
About the Author:
Read more on Chelsea Art: the New Thirty-something Block Party…
Filed under Visual Art by on Dec 26th, 2009.
What kind of lie does contemporary art support today?
What kind of truth are we realizing through the contemporary art?
Contemporary scene of visual art resembles the space filled with broken mirrors, where images reflect each other in the multidimensional sphere of media circus. The technique of cataloguing and classification, creation of categories, could serve as the key to the mapping and understanding of complexity of the multitude of approaches and streams that exists in today’s global art scene. Criteria for both, the creation and the selection are borrowed from random structures, and theoretically are questioning relevance of the evolution of art.
The initial categories for the whole system are those of matter and consciousness. They provide the trunk from which all the various branches of the other categories stem. All elements are so interconnected that, each can only be understood as an element of the whole. -Dialectical Materialism (A. Spirkin)
Determination of the significance of styles or tendencies, of the main art stream, groups or any other structures, will become irrelevant in near future. “Anything goes” was replaced by “And What?” With all the information and tools available today, everybody could become an artist. People of all professions are playing with new media. Does Garage Band make a musician, or graphic software a designer, or using digital camera a photographer? New technologies create a game where in competitive manner consequently everybody wants to win. Winning in art, means also experience “15 minutes of world-fame” and becoming a “superhero.” Consumer society deals with superficial substitution for happiness. Who is going to watch the game if everybody plays. Fortunately we can not play at the same time. Audience varies from small groups (family members and friends) to large social groups. In larger social communities, like national structures, demand for “heroes-artists” diminishes and culture is broken into small pieces of individualized performances of regional character. Researching tendencies of art scene behavior in context of contemporary philosophy of art we tend to accept a concept, that everybody is or could be an artist. The meaning, importance and consequences of such mind stream are very profound and have a great impact on cultural and social live. Why? It requires dropping the concept of conceptual thinking.
My artistic approach is created on such foundations. Not that I would be able to perform non-dualistic processes, but I am trying to pronounce a little speculative futuristic prognoses of the era after the end of art. Sooner or later this trend will be labeled as some kind of Unthinkable Art. Historically, realization of such path becomes a paradox to common sense (especially on collective level); however, similar trends are reflected in the air of the post-postmodern rain, and will soon appear on the sky as a rainbow.
Today’s curators are looking for unique and interesting angles to make their point across when using selective techniques for art shows. The usage of traditional approaches secures the system of art cycle, from creation to the distribution, and protects the capital of cultural bureau. Even the most alternative scenes (Technologies vs. Art, or other forums of so called “new media”) are not resolving the issue of foundation of the role of art on the contemporary global cultural platform, because they are based on the traditional curatorial, selective and preconceived mechanisms. What do I mean by that? I refer to the study of the designation processes of mind in relationship to the definition of what we labeled: The Art. As a reference to dialectic philosophies is an example of demonstration the potential of the idea pronounced by A.Danto, about art becoming philosophy. Such Ideas would need to be adopted, not only by artist themselves, but especially reformulated by structures that officially support the larger cultural platforms.
What are results of the conference that took place in Teheran in 2001? Art is still presented to the public in the manner of presentation from early 20 century. Structures that support such static views certainly do not elevate the public consciousness and awareness of issues of modern art world. The Artist Mark Kostabi makes allusion to the idea, of the art being a servant of market. Some curators are trilled by this statements. In the global picture of westernization, M. Kostabi’s phenomenon is becoming a guide – a hero, who is ideal combination of qualities, that contemporary artist should posses. It is also the best demonstration of lie that helps us to realize the truth about art of today.
Like a flashes of neon sign, art is reflected, from the pieces of mirrors everywhere.
Looks like a new quality of question have arisen since Arthur Danto published his ideas in book called “After the end of art, 1998. “Over a decade ago, Arthur Danto announced that art ended in the sixties. Ever since this declaration, he has been at the forefront of a radical critique of the nature of art in our time.” Art is becoming a philosophy.
I always believed in finding the answers in the space between, looking for the middle course. Neither postmodernism nor new media approaches are answers to the understanding of the positioning of the art of tomorrow. Postmodern world is a world of entertainment. It’s like an amusement park, where possibilities are endless and we feel overwhelmed for a while, but we have a need to relax from excess information and go back home.
Kostabi is one of those, who understood the art market, and because of his intelligence he penetrated the system, took advantage of it, so he can do whatever he wants. We pay for expensive tickets out of our pocket. I admire him because he realized the dream of every artist. Or is it not a dream of every artist to get recognized and sell art work all over the world?
If not, what is?
Is it still relevant to ask question, such as, what is Art? How do we deal with it? What is the nature of beauty? I would like to refere to the dialog between Einstein and Tagore from 1930.
EINSTEIN: There are two different conceptions about the nature of the universe – the world as a unity dependent on humanity, and the world as reality independent of the human factor.
TAGORE: When our universe is in harmony with man, the eternal, we know it as truth, we feel it as beauty.”
E: If there were no human beings any more, the Apollo Belvedere no longer would be beautiful?
T: No!
E: I agree with this conception of beauty, but not with regard to truth.
T: Why not? Truth is realized through men.
E: I cannot prove my conception is right, but that is my religion.
T: Beauty is in the ideal of perfect harmony, which is in the universal being; truth is the perfect comprehension of the universal mind. We individuals approach it through our own mistakes and blunders, through our accumulated experience, through our illumined consciousness. How otherwise can we know truth?
- by Dmitri Marianoff, published in NewYork Times, August 10, 1930
“Contemporary artists would never approach new horizons. One of the reasons of this failure seems to be the separation of artistic activity from speculative thinking.“
2001 Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art, International Conference on the Philosophy of Art.
What happened since the time of the conference? How to overcome speculative thinking, if it arises as a cultural result of values supported by society we live in?
How to identify or place individual art work into the world of already so complicated and diverse art scene, without compromising originality, respecting evolution in art? How do we deal with the fast passing, minute to minute changing tendencies of art? How the individual artist contributes to the art of its lifetime, and not just contributes to the 15 minutes type of history? What are the values, reasons of art of tomorrow? Is there analogy in art history to the situation of our era? What are the future forms of the visual exploration? What will the production of art going to be in near future, 10 years from now? What is the role of new media? Does artist have to be involved in the philosophy of art? Could individually created piece of art be created in isolation? If so, how are art processes structured on individual level and on the global level?
It is intriguing to think about becoming a pioneer of the new Era of Art. My motivation is to explore the field of possibilities. In have no interest in inherent aspect of art rather I am interested in the evolution of possibilities of artistic thinking. In 1999 I have graduated in Academy of Fine Arts in Bratislava, with installation inspired by I. Kabakov, where I exhibited my workspace with drawings and prints on floor and the white canvases, with intention to question the meaning of the art itself. White canvas was there to raise the question of reason for continuation of mark making and the End of art narratives. I have seen closed circle of possibilities. If anything was possible, and everything was an art; than nothing was an art anymore, so Art was Death. But as I realize today, that was just the beginning of my long journey to the realization of truth about art.
The Incredibles (2004) refreshed feelings about the End of Art.
“When everybody is a superhero than nobody is superhero”.
In order to continue in activities leading to product that is labeled as an art, I had to formulate and reconsider following facts:
1. Analysis of situation.
2. Underlying misconception of self and wrong motivations.
3. Formulating the solutions and strategies.
4. Continual fabrication and visual symbioses with reality.
1. ANALYSIS OF SITUATION
From the Teheran’s conference: Post-Modernism & Contemporary Art,
27 April – 1 May 2002
The Problems of Contemporary Art:
- Aesthetics in Contemporary Art
- The Fine Line between Artistic & Non-Artistic Work
- The Language & Expression of Contemporary Art
- Contemporary Literature & Art
- Contemporary Art & Technology
- Globalization & Contemporary Art
- Post-Modern Art: Features & Characteristics
- The End of Art
Post-Modernism & Trends of Contemporary Art:
- Minimalism
- Conceptual Art
- Land Art
- Video Art
- Body Art
- Anti-Art
- Local Art
- Feminism
- Post-Modern Architecture
Theoretical Origins of Post-Modern Art
Theoretical Principles of Modernism from the viewpoint of Modern Philosophers:
- Humanism
- Rationalism
- Subjectivism
- Nihilism
- Aesthetics
- Enlightenment
2. UNDERLYING MISCONCEPTION OF SELF AND MOTIVATION
I have slightly touched topics of traditional dilemmas of dualistic mind. The acceptation of dual aspect of things, leads to judgmental thinking, not only in art. Creation of categories is beginning of the tragedy of the era after the end of art. This is why Beauty and any other category could be defined, which leads to the continual labeling.
Definition of other reasons of misconception is based on juxtaposing Nietzche’s and Malraux’s models of art and processes of creation.
Nietzche
a. One seeks for oneself a less artistic public. The superstitious belief in the “genius”
b.One harangues the obscure instincts of the dissatisfied, ambitious, self-disguised spirits in a democratic age: importance of poses.
c. One transfers the procedures of one art to the other arts, confounds the objectives of art with those of knowledge or the church or racial interests (nationalism), or philosophy.
d.One flatters women, sufferers, the indignant, etc. False “intensification”.
Malraux Andre
Art is a display of universal creativity of individual. Through art work man was, and is, opposing and transcending limitations of his physique, his personal and social (historical) destiny. Malraux refuted to explain art works in relation to the biography of their creators, and was against this method in explaining motives and contents of art.
3. FORMULATING THE SOLUTION AND STRATEGY/ VISION-UTOPIA
a. Revival of Iconic Quality.
Because of the degenerated Era of Spiritual Values and the End of time of Old Gods; which migration and multicultural blend is responsible for, I am looking for Possibility of New Sacral Form. This is not a creation of transcendental art. It is a search for artistic form that allows the content to respect dialectic evolution of social wisdom, where an essence of sacral secrecy is highly respected. It is a new level of the sphere of new colors, shapes and structures. Renewal of art forms is based on reevaluation of sacral attributes from history and than elevating the forces of modern era which define motives and perspectives of redefined sacral forms. It is revival of existing symbols, on global level. It is not a creation of a new religion, but it is a new level of social consciousness. Form remains the same, mind is different. Technology, art and philosophy are integrated into continuous symbioses.
b. Role of the Artists, Galleries and Cultural Industry. Combination of Two Worlds. New Cultural Wisdom. Utopia.
This would be the end of “…marketing game governed by art dealers, Gallerists and publishers, who have to run the business of Cultural Industry.”
The society on global level would be governed by New Cultural Wisdom. Creation of art is not considered anymore as the act of creation. “The art will be spontaneous as breathing.” Artist is producing form, that is instantly and naturally blending into the environment, so the sub-consciousness is directed by wisdom that eliminates the dilemma of hierarchic model. Gallery space is no more required and the whole space is becoming a showcase. The whole space does not require the poses. It is an art of conscious depiction of picture plan, from retinal experience, or selection of the picture frame in consciousness and placing the required aesthetics upon it. Artists are fabricating art that is already blended into environment as natural portion of space and serves as perceptive potential for public depiction. Cultural Wisdom is defined by human consciousness that provides unlimited potential for defining the pictorial framing of reality, and its limits are limits of understanding the phenomenon of reality.
c. Clash of Civilizations. Global Culture. Meta-code, and New Artistic Religion.
We experience on global level formation of new cultural qualities that are based on cultural clashes. (Example: Global cultural experience is formed in LA house, with my Persian and Mexican friends listening to the Japanese techno music, eating Bulgarian cheese with Arabic bread, Russian pickles and drinking French wine while discussing Slovak culture, or latest fashion trends in London.) East meets west or south meets north processes are not completed yet and it is hard to predict the results from the cultural clashes. But we need to look at the presence as the formation of the universal space, where cultural identities will be redefined. This will result in temporary crisis of individual identities but eventually will lead to the identity of global consciousness.
Americanization of world can serve as model of globalization of globe with its positive and negative aspects. Migration to caves is limited. S.J.Lewy
4. CONTINUAL FABRICATION AND VISUAL SYMBIOSES
I would like to scratch the surface beyond the point of A. Danto’s philosophical questions about the end of art. Not that I would have “the guts” to elaborate on his ideas from philosophical perspective, but I just want to reflect on some fragments and articulate them strictly as an artistic vision.
“A philosophical question arises whenever we have two objects which seem in every relevant particular to be alike, but which belong to importantly different philosophical categories.
…and this is no less the case when seeking to account for the differences between works of art and mere real things which happen exactly to resemble them.
…for example, regards paintings as very complex perceptual objects. So they are, but since objects can be imagined perfectly congruent with those which are not art works, these must have equivalent complexity at the level of perception. After all, the problem arose in the first place because no perceptual difference could be imagined finally relevant. But neither can possession of so-called “aesthetic qualities’ serve, since it would be strange if a work of art were beautiful but something exactly like it though not a work of art were not. In fact it has been a major effort of the philosophy of art to de-aestheticize the concept of art. It was Marcel Duchamp, a far deeper artist than Warhol, who presented as “readymades” objects chosen for their lack of aesthetic qualities – grooming combs, hat racks, and, notoriously, pieces of lavatory plumbing. “Aesthetic delectation is the danger to be avoided,” Duchamp wrote of his most controversial work, Fountain, of 1917. It was precisely Duchamp’s great effort to make it clear that art is an intellectual activity, a conceptual enterprise and not merely something to which the senses and the feelings come into play. And this must be true of all art, even that most bent upon gratifying the eye or ear, and not just for those works which are regarded as especially “philosophical,” like Raphael’s School of Athens or Mann’s The Magic Mountain. Were someone to choreograph Plato’s Republic, that would not, simply because of its exalted content, be more philosophical than Coppelia or Petrouchka. In fact these might be more philosophical, employing as they do real dancers imitating dancing dolls imitating real dancers!
Where are the components for a theory of art to be found? I think a first step may be made in recognizing that works of art are representations, not necessarily in the old sense of resembling their subjects, but in the more extended sense that it is always legitimate to ask what they are about.
Now of course not all representational things are works of art, so the definition has only begun. I shall not take the next steps here. All I have wished to show is the way that the philosophy of art has deep questions to consider, questions of representation and reality, of structure, truth, and meaning. In considering these things, it moves from the periphery to the center of philosophy, and in so doing it curiously incorporates the two things that give rise to it. For when art attains the level of self-consciousness it has come to attain in our era, the distinction between art and philosophy becomes as problematic as the distinction between reality and art. And the degree to which the appreciation of art becomes a matter of applied philosophy can hardly be overestimated.” – A. DANTO
I believe that art should reach the level, where its own representation would be representation of the pure existence. What do I mean by pure existence? Ii is purification on the level of non creation. All creation is pregnant by its causes. Consequently purifying the causes of creation will purify the act of creation itself.
Global consciousness on the level of cultural wisdom will create the platform, where all representational things will become work of art. It would be consciousness and its possibility to frame the fragment of reality and apply the aesthetic quality upon it. The reality in cultural wisdom level is ultimately de-aestheticized. Marcel Duchamp’s idea of the danger of aesthetic delectation would be eliminated and his vision completed.
Every aspect of reality could become art, but Wisdom Culture does not allow the reality in dualistic (judgmental) sense to become the art neither on collective level, nor on any regional level. It would only exist as a potential view, on the level of one’s consciousness. However in later stages of development of wisdom culture, in the stage of ultimate equanimity, the nonjudgmental aesthetic experience of reality as ultimate art could be realized simultaneously in more than one person. Evolution of collective experience could follow. The result of such parallel experience manifests the evolution of human kind toward the subtle spiritual qualities and realization of inseparable quality of beauty from the existence itself. It is experience of highest aesthetics. This will lead to the formation of new social structure, where “shamans” will protect the global Sanctum.
The essence of the Sanctum is present in every aspect of reality, which holds the door to the potential creation, where the seed of the nature of beauty could be found.
By: Dali
About the Author:
Filed under Visual Art by on Dec 22nd, 2009.
Val has worked for the last 5 years as an artist and is creating some fantastic work for us all to enjoy. “My art is from my heart. I am inspired by the people who I meet in life and places I have been. I very much enjoy the process of creation and as a result my paintings and drawings are expressive and unique.”
We are always on the lookout for new artists who will inspire you to buy online art and in Val we are certain you will love the quality of her work. It is our goal to give our customers the opportunity to buy unique original art online, and from a trusted gallery, that is why we work very hard to ensure you have the best artists available to select from.
Val’s work has always been in high demand and this is something which we feel makes her stand out from the crowd in terms of her art. If you want to view her work in more detail then you can do so here Val Cannon Art.
Everyone at Inspired Art would like to make Val feel very welcome in our team and we hope our Inspired Art Club members are as happy with the introduction of Val Cannon’s work as we are.
Join the Inspired Art Club? Join The Club Members of the club receive regular updates on Inspired Art and the new artists we have onboard.
Written by – Lewis Rae
By: Inspired Art
About the Author:
Filed under Visual Art by on Dec 21st, 2009.
The Art Project is based out of Vancouver, BC and was created by two guys with a passion for art and the World Wide Web. The Art Project has created an environment with the artist in mind. It is a space where artists can set their own price, submit art pieces that they choose, and control many aspects of their own content without the hassle of building their own site. The Art Project is also a place where artists are not paying high art gallery fees which in turn allows buyers to get the best possible deal on amazing art, and the artist are compensated for their talent.
The Project:
The Art Project is a project that will let the artist display their work to the world. To aid the Art Project with marketing and promotions, we have teamed up with online marketing experts Fogg Industries to give artists the greatest internet exposure possible. This project was developed by artists for artists and is a place where an artist can be in full control of their art by choosing which art pieces to display, as well as how much they wish to charge per piece.
If you would like to sell art online at the The Art Project please see the submit section of our site. Or if you are looking to buy art online check us out too!
Why Choose The Art Project?
We have several unique programs:
1) Unique homepage gallery that features 3 artists per month.
2) Gallery Events
3) Partnership with Googles Picasa and Flickr.com for maximum online exposure
Also
- Over 30,000 website hits a month
- The artist decides the price that their art is listed for
- Great section for art collectors that want to sale their collections online
- Two unique and flexible payment plans Either cheap monthly rates or 20% commission* on sold art
- Partnerships with websites such as whole9, flickr.com, picasa.com, Artists in Canada, the Art Ads Network and Art in Canada guaranteeing maximum exposure
- Amazing organic Google search rankings, many of our artists and collections are on the first page of Google!
- Manually reviewed and updated ensuring that only high quality art is submitted onto the website.
- Buyer pays the shipping so the artist does not need to worry about extra shipping fees
- Easy submission and sign up
- Updated blogging
Thank you for using our site!
*The 20% commission only applies to online sales, art displayed in gallery events are subject to high commissions based on the gallery.
By: The Art Project
About the Author:
Filed under Visual Art by on Dec 20th, 2009.