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The humble paintbrushes....
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Message
Posted
.for centuries the tools of the greatest artists in the arts of painting in oils and watercolours; are they at risk of becoming victims of the internet painting mediums and airbrushes? Will they eventually go the way of the broom, the sweeping brush, and eventually the Ewbank (for those that remember such pre-historic weapons?) :hehe: I have, in the past dabbled with Paint" and Photoshop" but only for amusement (I worked for a large computer company) but love pencils, pens and paintbrushes notebooks and paper. Whilst it isn't likely to happen in my lifetime, I do worry that with all the oudorless, mess-less "touch a keyboard button and you have a masterpiece" mediums, that someday canvas, paper, brushes and paint may become victims of the paper-less office moguls. What thinkes thou? :hehe:
Posted
I don't think the art of painting will disappear but it will I suppose have to share the limelight somewhat with digital work in the future.
I've made no secret of the fact that I'm not a great digital art fan in general, some of it is acceptable to me but lately I see more work on the gallery that is simply photographs (often portraits) that are Photoshop enhanced with one or more of the available filters, yes, a touch of a button Jim. I am fully trained in Photoshop as my job demanded as art editor for a newspaper, so I do know how simple it all is once you understand the principles of the programme; I was experimenting with this kind of stuff many decades ago but I could never give up the feel of a paint brush or the smell of turps, not to mention exiting the studio after a few hours painting covered in oil paint, you just don't get that experience with digital!.
I expect that the great academicians like Bernard Dunstan who is topical on the forum at the moment after his recent death will eventually fade away, but there are still some great artist's out there so I'm not getting too depressed about it all just yet.
Posted
I don't think there's any danger of brushes and paint going out of fashion - I've no problem with digital media, I've seen some good work accomplished with the various art programmes that exist, I've played about a bit with the simpler ones, but while I don't see them as any kind of threat I've no real desire to use them instead of paint and brushes.
The only real threat to paint comes from elsewhere - from those who would regulate any 'toxic' colours out of existence: they're the buggers we need to keep an eye on, not those who use computer screens and software to produce pictures.
Posted
I don't think the paint brush will disappear and I see more painters today using traditional media but let's not say that digital art is 'just a touch of a button' . Many digital artists are just as talented as traditional and the the time they take to produce their work is quite similar but they don't have drying time! As to manipulated photographs, I think it has its place but neither is going to command the same price bracket as an oil painting.
Posted
I was fortunate to be able to go and see David Hockney's outstanding exhibition 'A Bigger Picture' at the RA back in 2006. Apart from his superb oils which consisted of many canvases joined to make one huge work (all done on location) he also had on display some lovely watercolour sketches and a fairly large selection of I-pad drawings.
These I-pad drawings were also made on location and of course from scratch; they demonstrated what can be achieved in digital format in the hands of a great artist. His drawing abilities have never been in doubt and his use and understanding of colour goes hand-in-hand with his other skills. What I don't see in the main is this type of digital drawing, what I see is photo manipulation which is a whole different ball game. One comment on such a work recently was 'what a great likeness', of course it's a great likeness, it's based on a photograph. I can actually see a use for the I-pad as a tool for producing interesting and useful reference sketches however, it's not for me.
Moving on to the subject of talent and comparing the two disciplines of both digital art versus traditional painting, impossible to do of course but I am always inspired by great artists' and their paintings, digital work never comes close.
Posted
In actual fact there haven't been that many comments on this somewhat controversial topic, and it was a good opening salvo by Jim. I would expect some other points to trickle through during the week as is the norm generally.
Anyway gwg, it's always good to hear from new members so keep contributing, there are many varied topics discussed on here, some of them controversial. It would be nice if you could sign off with your name rather than gwg, we are a friendly bunch most of the time.
Posted
I don't know that anyone is seriously disagreeing with you - Wally (also my late grandfather's name incidentally and completely irrelevantly). We know that talent, for want of a better word, is involved in creating digital images (or we do if we've tried making them) but some of us just don't want to use digital media, for a variety of reasons. I think the observation that digital media have yet to produce a work of art that could be considered great is a valid one; but then, none of us has seen every single image created this way. There are certainly some examples on the gallery here which are impressive - and some that are less so, but then you could say the same of conventional media. A snag may lie in the physical object - while you can create whatever lies within your abilities on screen, you then have the problem of producing an off-screen version - these don't always work too well, there are issues with the inks used in printing them and the necessarily mechanical means of reproducing them; the ink, unlike paint applied with brushes, has little or no physical substance: what we get is the design, rather than a hand-crafted artefact - and one that could be endlessly re-created; whereas we are more used to paintings as originals, as one-offs, that can be copied and turned into prints, but the commercial and aesthetic value of the print (the second arguably, the first definitely) will never equal that of the original.
You could argue of course that this democratizes art, takes it out of the hands of the galleries, makes it more readily available (in theory: probably digital artists are as protective of their work as conventional artists), but the question of the quality of the finished product, beyond the world of the screen, remains.
Posted
I'm baffled gwg, you made your point and other members put forward their point of view - that's how it works on here, so why all the 'oh dear' sighs as though we are all stupid for not agreeing with you. There will always be a division between members and that is what creates a lively debate, more than lively on occasions but this is the accepted norm, we can't all listen to your views and agree with everything that you say.
Anyway, as you quite rightly say, you won't persuade anyone here on this forum, we are not here to be persuaded, I'm certainly not so take it or leave it - I see that you have decided to leave it, your choice entirely and in my view for rather silly reasons.
Posted
Apples and pears, Wally/Cnute - you can compare them if you want to, but there's no real point: all you end up saying is that you prefer one over the other. We did get your point - we got it when others made it before you: but we're hardly in a position to address it, given we're not decisive voices in the art market - and it's that, plus a few critics and the occasional academic who depend on it for a living, that determines what's 'art' and what isn't, by putting a price-tag on it.
Some of us have made a pound or two from painting, but I don't think any of us are interested in the theoretical basis for determining what's artistically valid and what is not, and most of us wouldn't make the distinction you seem to deplore: we just do what we do, and some of us sometimes are fortunate enough to find that others appreciate it, and that's about as complex as it gets.
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