Alas the mailer seems to have stripped off the attachment, I would have liked to see it.
Locally figure work seems to be enjoying a bit of a resurgence. A decade or so ago you almost never saw it in local galleries, and open studio sessions had a hard time attracting people. It's still minor in the galleries - and too much is photographically based - but at least it is there, and the open studio sessions are generally full, I've wondered why it fell so far out of favour. So much of our basic wiring is geared towards interpreting the human form - particularly the face - which makes figure and portrait work great for everything from basic exercise to expression and communication. It sort of brings to mind though another question I think about at times - so much of young people's lives is now spent watching either actors or computerized animation, where natural gesture has been replaced with the artificial, and real interaction no longer exists. How does that affect their interpretation of gesture in real life (or traditional art)? Cheers; Chris On Mon, Jun 11, 2012 at 7:15 PM, William Conger <[email protected]> wrote: > I think Cheerskep errs when he says that artists who are cerebral and early-on > good with drawing, anatomy, perspective rarely go on to great achievement in the > visual arts. My experience is the opposite, but modified by conditions having > to do with 'great achievement' and the generational changes in how and what > artists are taught. > > We don't really know what great achievement is as it has to be contextualized > and doing that in the visual arts means a lot of other people besides the artist > are involved. They are the art world experts: dealers, curators, critics, > collectors, etc., plus a healthy dose of good luck and having the work seen in > the right place at the right time. Despite all the triumphal talk about artists > and individual onlookers having the say-so 'greatness or achievement' as > recognition always involves those others. Of course anybody can make the claim > of 'high achievement' but it will remain unverified until those others weigh > in. > > Most artists up to my generation at least were trained or at least well-exposed > to the basic drawing skills. They got the message that if they were any good > they could draw competently, I mean do convincing work in figure drawing, > perspective, and the like -- working from life, as it was known. Most > youngsters who begin art early -- before 10 yrs. -- usually test themselves and > recognize their own abilities by drawing from life. By the way, I've never seen > a 10 yr. old budding conceptual artist. Also, kids, again, around age 10, > don't do 'abstract' work without being prompted. Nowadays, the influential art > schools like Cal-Arts don't teach "to the wrist" and thus are not training young > artists to draw from life. That school does not offer life drawing or figure > drawing and neither do many other schools require it as a basic skill anymore. > Skills, the wrist-work, are not emphasized in art schools anymore, except in > the so-called commercial schools (art schools specifically centered on > traditional skills). > > So, it's kinda funny that the cerebral artists today are primarily those who > eschew any of the old studio skills. They are "post studio' and "de-skilled" > while the traditional skill-oriented schools eschew the 'conceptual' focus and > maintain technical excellence as the marker of good art. > > Artists like me are the odd ones today. I make very "cerebral abstract art" > having to do with ideas about narrative and history and figural metaphor > involving language and formalist art history (what did I leave out?) but I > sometimes like to 'go back to nature'. I've attached an image of a very recent > self portrait. > > Getting back to 'great achievement' I recommend Sarah Thornton's book, Seven > Days in The Art World (2008). Here's a quick read, a page turner, actually, > that provides an excellent overview of how the global art world really operates > and how far removed it is from the everyman's notion of art and culture. The > book is a bit dated even though it's only been out a few years because things > move so fast but overall, it speaks truth, the fascinating, horrible, lusty > truth..."Woe to Those who Enter Here"....almost like entering a Dante-esque > Hell. > > WC > > > ----- Original Message ---- > From: "[email protected]" <[email protected]> > To: [email protected] > Sent: Mon, June 11, 2012 2:06:20 PM > Subject: Re: No Subject > > In a message dated 6/10/12 9:26:25 PM, [email protected] writes: > > >> I once took an aptitude in art test as a teenager. It consisted of >> facing pages >> of Kandinsky-esque designs and I was to choose the best design on each set >> of >> pages. My score was percentile 3. I was told that 97% of people taking >> the >> test scored better than I did. I replied that all of the designs were bad >> and >> that the test was a flop. I also knew right away that I had an art career >> ahead. >> wc >> >> I've seen many, many aptitude tests, and I've never seen one that I felt > could be a useful test/predictor of worthiness in poetry or fiction. Two of > the three things such "tests" can't test are creativity and sensibility. (The > third is long-term memory, which in fact also very often plays a role in > creative verbal achievement.) > > I imagine the same obtains when it comes to visual creativity. It's > notorious that those who get ultra-scores on "IQ tests" tend to be good at > "drawing" -- because they early on learn the cerebral stuff like anatomy, > proportions, and perspective. But they seldom go on to great achievement in > visual > arts. That's probably why William is so good an artist. Thank god he's never > been cerebral. (Heh-heh! I mekbeegjuk, William. I think you're cerebral as > hell.) > > [demime 1.01d removed an attachment of type image/jpeg which had a name of IMG_0896.JPG]
