Banksy the bitter

If you haven't seen British guerilla artist Banksy's work, you need to. Not because it's the most spectacular thing you've seen, EVER, but because it's worth forming an opinion about. Especially if you are an artist because his work is controversial. Banksy is about making a statement, in a big way. In my opinion he has moved past making statements for any purpose other than just for the sake of making a statement, the shock factor. That leads me to question the extent that we go as artists to say something. His works range from political statements to statements that poke fun of artists and the art world and as you flip through his newest book you begin to wonder, is there anything this guy isn't against? You can't help but love him, but its hard not to hate him. Mostly because he's probably already done a piece thats making fun of you. Personally I don't like the guy, I definitely don't want to like him... its the people who are always mad about something and hate everything that rarely ever really say anything at all. He comes across as bitter, really bitter.
It will be interesting to see how rebellious artist's like Banksy influence society over the next few years.

DaVinci

After having visited the Louvre... I decided I hated the Louvre. Advice for future travelers-- don't go on Sunday when it's free. There is something sacred that is lost when there are people crawling all over every crevice of the building, and I do think that art is supposed to be sacred. We were bossed around and herded like cattle through lines and stairways, can't sit there, no room to stand there. You can't stand, sit, think or breath. I was in utter disgust, but I just looked at the chaos spinning around me and knew that this wasn't the purpose. I felt like hiding my ignominious face because it seemed like the masters of old were going to come with wrath on all who participated in making their pieces debacles, strewn so far from their original purpose. Poor DaVinci, surely if the old phrase were possible, he would be turning flips in his grave, or laughing at us.
Then I was forced to think about what I think the purpose of art is... I don't have a full answer yet, that isn't the point of this. But my feelings for art did change, I suddenly was disgusted not just with the general populace for showing up to this massive palace full of worthy and beautiful paintings and sculptures just to see La Jaconde (Mona Lisa) but also with the world of art in general because there was something very unworthy about the setting that I was in. Is this what it has come to?
It helped me focus my thoughts and my creating towards what the purpose of my art is, whereas for the most part I created for the sake of creating. That's not to say my art doesn't have a purpose or that this was my inaugural thought on the topic but it redirected my focus. So even if I still hate the Louvre and chose to skip the Mona Lisa room I do think it was worth the experience of showing up. (even though we didn't stay long.)

modernart

OK, I realize that for about a week this has been an incomplete blog. I don't know what happened but I'm just getting around to fixing it.

My thoughts on Modern art-

We went to the Tate Modern in London this past weekend and the most interesting thing there was the conversations I overheard. Well, the conversations I eavesdropped on.
First I find it funny how many people I overheard growl in frighteningly bitter tones how much they detested the whole of it and the fact that it was even called art, THIS wasn't art. Silly, I bet they've never held a brush.
Regardless, I realize that many of those were probably either, like many people in our group, forced to be there and therefore bitter to begin with, or present only because it was an art museum. People are supposed to visit art museums when traveling the world. So here they were, fulfilling their duty as mighty tourists of the world to see it all and do it all... and grace this gallery with their presence.
Those opinions I most definitely didn't choose to listen on, as it gives me a headache to be in the presence of loud ignorance for too long and most were stated at an uncomfortably loud decibel level anyway.
I found it to be amusing, which is good because the other reaction could have turned me to swell to monstrous proportions, grow fangs and eat them whole. It's a natural reaction.

However, it was the others that saved me.
I feel like there are many good conversations to overhear in a normal art gallery, talk of light and post impressionism, all interesting and worthy, but it is the type of people in the Modern art galleries that are really worthy of note. (at least the people who aren't there with Rick Steves)

It was in the Rothko room (hardly any light) sitting on a bench trying to frame the piece like a person taking a mental picture to get rid of the rest of the world as I hear the child sitting next to me-

"Is it a ghost mum?"
[laughing] "No dear, it isn't a ghost."

me[with the realization of horror and confusion]

-but isn't it?

To Thee, "Two Crabs", I sing.

Crabs. this week the topic is crabs. Crabs are my new favorite (or flavor of the week if you will)
I found myself overflowing with praise of Van Gogh's painting Two Crabs at the National Gallery in London two weeks ago. Never heard of it? It's because it hasn't been over exposed. I dig Van Gogh's use of colors in this painting. So vivid, so saturated. Unlike most of his gouache-like hues, baby blue, baby pink, baby yellow, it's my worst nightmare. He uses them well, I have no right to complain.
Regardless there's joy in my heart just thinking about it. Second to Carravaggio, which I went in prepared to be captivated by, Two Crabs has won a spot for the National Gallery in my heart. I want to touch it.
I came across a bronze (I think) crab in the Ashmolean as I perambulated it's room of Acquisitions last week, and thats really when I declared my new love for crabs. Crabs are really quite intriguing usually very colorful, makes a great subject for a painting, I don't know why more people haven't taken hold of the idea. I have. Expect big things from me, and expect crustaceans.

This picture does damage to the hues' actual vibrance. No justice is served.



I spent my time in the Ashmolean last week studying a painting located in one of the rooms on the upper level titled "Head of an Old Man" by Giovanni Francesco Barbieri. I found it interesting because it encompassed two of my main infatuations right now.
Firstly, the subject of the painting is an older man with a large untamed beard. In my photography endeavors and as I consider the art of photojournalism I find myself constantly wishing I had the gumption to as the old men I see to let me take their portrait. I find the wrinkles to be beautiful and the age to be a conceptual idea relating to wisdom, and if a beard is involved, the larger, the bushier, and the more colors it has the more fascinating I find it. I feel like age is a subject I'm drawn to, especially in my photography, but I feel the main reason is that I miss my granddads.

Secondly, (both of these things happen to be relating to my recent involvement in photography, specifically portraiture.) I have been inspired to begin to try working in the catagory of Expressive Portraits. This painting is very expressive and is so successful in capturing the emotion through the man's pose and expression. His aged hand rests on his breast and his eyes are gazing upward causing a wrinkle in his brow. There is also heavy emphasis on shadow and light, another of my favorite styles. This painting is the painted materialization of my ideas for my next series of portraits. If only I had time to work on it.

blog 2- After the National Gallery

I was very thankful that I had the chance to go to the museums in London on Friday. I realize that it is a blessing and I at least, if no one else, was very blessed by it. I have found that the longer I have studied art the more my outlook on certain aspects of art have changed. It actually takes me less time to get through a gallery than it might have a few years ago because it seems like before I felt as though I had to, whether I really liked a piece or not, spend a certain amount of time in front of it analyzing it and trying to make myself like it, because I'm supposed to. As I've developed my own personal style and personal preferences I have begun to understand more about what there is to appreciate in art, regardless of whether I'm moved by it or not. As I went through the gallery I was able to appreciate a greater amount of art while spending the most time on pieces that I found personally moving. I found that while others awed over a painting because it was a Seurat, or a Monet I was able to discern why I was (or wasn't) drawn to it and I was able to appreciate it at face value instead of the value of namesake. So I guess that what I am saying is that I don't like art as much (or as much art) since I've come to understand what it is to be an artist. (I say understand because I will indefinitely consider myself not as an artist, but an artisan. We're nowhere near finished and may, in fact, never be.)
I am trying hard not to consider it dismal that we spend our class period in the Ashmolean, who's collections will quickly become dated, instead of having the good fortune of spending our days in the National Gallery. Not to discredit the Ashmolean because I've already found an appreciation for its contents, but it is the National Gallery's lure of limitlessness of that is so enticing.
I would leave England a much better person if that were the case.
Not that it's impossible without it, the hope is that it's not.

Histoire D'art, but I'm still convinced that's wrong.

Since this is a journal I feel like its only right for me to start out by telling you the reader, the lined page, pen and ink, the curious neighbor, a little about how I'm feeling before we start. I feel a bit like a butterfly today... yes, I think thats right... a butterfly.

this week is probably not going to be that interesting (to you as my loving audience) because things are just getting started and I finally got my new (exciting, beautiful, majestic, full of wonders yet to be imagined) sketch book with the intention of journaling as we study, as amazing epiphanies about art come to me (which of course is regularly) as I sketch and as I work through the fact that i have very few paramount thoughts about art history at the moment. However, I do feel as though this will be the personal journal that ends up next to all of the DaVinci sketches because we can all already see how substantial my thoughts really are.
On to art history-
I am excited (such a boring word, excited) about our study the beginnings of photography, for one. Many hours in my childhood were spent flipping through photographs of distant exotic lands, and more over exotic people that were taken by the woman who caught and convinced my parents to help them direct a medical mission in Africa twelve years ago. A woman who by my standards has been everywhere and done everything, and more importantly taken a pictures of everything and everyone she encountered (as a hobby even). And as my parents sat for hours and planned and I sat and looked through the faces of Tibetians and the children of Nicaragua and tour guides of Mozambique
along with the pictures in the plethora (seemingly endless plethora even) of National Geographic magazines in our house (almost assuredly dating back to the beginning of the last century) and here in lies the reason that my emotional center, sometimes called the heart, becomes so full of joy everytime I see an old photo. Im not exaggerating for exaggerations sake either, this is really how it makes me feel, and I really remember it being so distant and magical and I really do thank the people who actually knew how to take a photograph without the life-support of photoshop in each photos imminent future.
The recent obsession with photography and the instant gratification I feel as an artist when I can so easily create with modern technology is matched (even if it has lately overshadowed) by my appreciation for the realistic (photo-like) pieces and brilliant use of chiaroscuro of artists like Caravaggio. My satisfaction in photography often comes when I can relay, often by sheer luck, my conceptual ideas I would much rather convey in a painting but fall, sadly inadequate. I feel moved by Impressionists and later influential painters like Turner, with his powerful use of color and beautiful brush strokes but I am convicted by Rembrandt.

Also to be noted would be my new found appreciation (for the difficult process) of classical greek and figure sculptures. I created my first (what i would call) real sculpture this past semester. (one of the desires of my heart) I lied when I before (another blog) said that I've never crossed anything off of my list of life-goals before the tambourine, because though my sculpture was lacking and time crunched, it was real, and viable and sufficient enough to allow me to die happy if that were the case... although i would be equally as satisfied if I got to live and perfect my skills. I'm just saying.