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Article you might find of interest re art school teaching
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Message
Posted
http://www.scotsman.com/lifestyle/new-artists-neglect-hard-graft-says-ken-currie-1-3000863
This may be a slightly odd heading under which to post this, but as it's not been used for 2 months I thought at least it wouldn't get in the way of other postings.
I don't know much about this artist's work, but I do think he has a point.
http://www.isleofwightlandscapes.net
http://www.wightpaint.blogspot.co.uk
Posted
Have to agree with the sentiments he states, in the main anyway although I am happy to accept developments of art beyond representational painting etc. Brings back memories from my callow youth days of an old Scot called Fyffe Robertson on the BBC 'Tonight' programme discussing the development of what he dubbed 'Phart' (Phoney Art).
Posted
We do live in an age of self gratification and an eagerness to have everything here and now. Not just in the art world but in a lot of areas of society.
If you don't know the basic principals of both drawing and painting then how can you be an artist? I did do a very short time in art school a million years ago before getting my "proper" job. I was taught DRAWING with a capital D . We drew life models and I still think it's the best way to become observant , we drew small pieces of plants and various objects...we LOOKED With a capital L . We were critiqued and told how we should have done it.
I was made to leave by my father before serious painting happened. But I was taught about colours and tonal values and I think taught well.
Not the old master school or making our own paints , painting on cave walls , but an apprenticeship on how it all works. With the basics, creativity can then take over.
Since then everything I now know is through listening to other artists, going to gallery's and finding out for myself.
I still will not use anyone else's photographs though if I need to know the colour of some obscure plant from Timbuctoo I will find a reference .
Despite having many years break that background is still there and I'm grateful for how the old fashioned art schools operated .
If I want to stick a few yoghurt pots in formaldehyde ok I'll do it but I won't call it art.
Syd I'm also a mucky pup and have a very ancient covered in paint smock .its been washed twice in 25 years but it's kept more or less the rest of me pure!
When I get to that big art studio (either up or down) my kids have said they will frame it .
Posted
I don't like smearing myself in paint either, and if I do it's inadvertent - we all have accidents at some time or other: elbow on a tube of paint, sitting on a palette, shaking a clogged up pen that suddenly becomes all too unclogged, and the old one of drinking the paint water and rinsing your brush in the coffee: I've done most of those. But they were all accidents.
Lucian Freud was a particularly mucky pup - smeared paint all over his apron, mixed colours on the walls of his studio; and Francis Bacon was, apparently, worse: it's said his studio resembled the corporation tip. Whether you call it single-minded or just sloppy is perhaps a matter of personality and preference.
Anyway, it's the writer's argument rather than his hygiene and housekeeping I though had a point: I didn't say I agree with all of it. One of our number does make his own paint, or at least he makes lead whites which are otherwise hard to get: I don't know that he would otherwise. And of course another has made her own paint and is marketing it (are you doing well out there?). I've never had the inclination or the room - and I don't know of anyone who makes their own brushes: I know of a few artists who have brushes made for them and colours mixed for them by the big manufacturers so they can then flog them as "signature" products, but I don't think that's quite the same thing as getting back down to arty basics: more a kick to the income stream.
Anyway, must go - got to paint the walls of my cave.
http://www.isleofwightlandscapes.net
http://www.wightpaint.blogspot.co.uk
Posted
All too often I've read articles by artists who went to art school with great expectations and left early feeling really disillusioned. My husband worked in London near St. Martins Art College and he used to see a lot of the work of the students when they opened their portfolios on the bus - his opinion was unprintable. But of course that didn't mean it was rubbish, only that he didn't like it. However what was clear to him was that all their work was the same, no variety whatsoever! By the way, the only thing that keeps my painting apron together is the thick paint and yes I do have kitchen paper to hand, but when I am "in the zone" I reach for the nearest thing - my pinny.
Posted
I have been out of art school for 15 years or thereabouts. Not sure it changed as much in my homeland (might be wrong). Calling whole World is defo nonsense though. Can not imagine that art schools in many parts of World changed that much, but perhaps he considers the only World worth anything the one where he can sell?
I do not doubt that in Britain, USA and similarly inclined countries where everything has been pushed into different gear with technology are seeing change in art education. I find some of the work I see from academies in some places rather shocking, but that is because I am stickler and need everything neat and tidy, even if it is a pile of PC parts.
As to them all wanting fame and money straight away- who in this young generation doesn´t? Most kids at 18 want to have salary like banker without any education or experience. They demand and expect. They are all like that (oh dear somebody is going to tell me that their son/daughter or grandson/granddaughter are not at all like it, but will admit all their friends are - I am sure). It is the time we live in, things are too easy ;-).
So, I am going to make myself some instant coffee with soya milk (I do live in modern era too) and will be thinking about how I should grind my own coffee, scrape sugar and forget about such posh things as soya milk :-D
Posted
Adele, do not get me wrong. They want and expect much because we live in era when everything is out there for the young of the "West". We would be the same if we grew up in the time of plenty. It is not being stupid or naive, it is not knowing otherwise. I am sure all parents meant well and it is indeed natural for a good parent to give all they can to their offspring especially if coming from much more straightened circumstances. Problem here is however that it can never stay "pink" forever and they are more unready than any generation has ever been perhaps.
Sylvia- if apprenticeships is coming back- Thanks doG! Lets hope there are enough knowledgeable people still willing to teach them well. Although I have believed it was still quite common in Scotland, wasn´t aware it wasn´t mainly English issue