Tuesday, April 24, 2007

1.4_ A brief on the nature of subjectivity


1.4  A brief on the nature of subjectivity
Freedom of expression, to hold any opinion, and act on those opinions, is an invaluable liberty for an artist.  The idea of being an artist became an American pop fashion, like the clothing style an individual chooses to wear.  It is not a mystery as to how this happened.  Subjectivity without discipline fueled within a materialistic mass marketed society of vanity, naturally and quietly created this era.  The fifth intellectual dark-age; where our current generation are all aspiring artists, and all of these emerging somethings keep trying and keep failing to have their big moment.  They were showed fame, and it was kept from them, creating this untalented generation of dreamers.  Do not take my words for that of a fool.  There are countless known and unknown master artists in every corner of the States; for every master there are thousands of fools living lies.

Minneapolis is the city of the arts.  Living here, it seems as if everyone is an emerging something, where by removing the validity of the term emerging as a result of its commonality.  We live in the era of the American artist, the creative class, a group of dreamers in perpetual poverty.  As a result of this generation, subjectivity, diversity, and individuality has become the norm.  Being different, unique, and standing out, has become more important than the honesty in knowing ones’ self and what one is capable of.  For the artist all of this just happens and s/he becomes himself/herself with ease.  For the pretender, the mask they adorn creates a similar emotional crisis just as that of schizophrenia.  In order to understand this disease of individuality driven materialism we live with, we must first understand free will, and with that we start with the idea, causes, needs, inaction, and action of the subjectivity of making decisions.

Subjectivity is the unjustified personal opinions commonly based on perspective, particularly feelings, beliefs, and desires in direct conflict of proofs and justified belief.  Subjectivity addresses a unique view of experiencing reality available to individuals where the causes of experience are objective and without ownership, but the perspective of these experiences are subjective and commonly owned, i.e. my feelings about my events are my idea and my identity.

Subjectivity in conjunction with the arts is a practical necessity.  Subjectivity is essential to the world of art, albeit, the ideas of those that value individualism without a sense of being or a personally defined idea of what one is truly capable of fall prey to the modern materialistic cycle of individualism.  Thereby forgetting the ideas of self-cultivation, that at first inspired their subjective world view, we are thereby ceasing to know truth in their personal behavior; and with it the momentary ability to judge and know right from wrong.  There is no true subjective but through culture, tradition, and generation.  The ideas of good and bad are presented for us.  The enemies of the subjective can not understand the desire to be different, is not to be different.

The artist that is simply not honest with one's being uses the idea of subjective to mask their inadequacies in originality and talent.  That artist creating works of art to be recognized as an individual of importance by their work, as a result they invent an icon of themselves as a character style, each trying to out-do the other artist pop renditions of the human melodrama.  This individual invents their identity, continually recreating themselves to become what they wish to be, regardless of past and present truth.  This is the result of any subjective competitive media.  As the competitive nature of the arts use their identifying mark and projected sense of being, becomes anarchy at first, and then a universal that the individual believes all must adhere to.   

This critique is without an honest look at these shared opinions.  As a result of this indecisive subjectivity this artist becomes the intellectual opinion on their current state as an ism or school of art simply by an established majority.  Without an isolated voice, this generation of artists has thereby become speechless, developing into art for the sake of art- without purpose outside of a waning child's ego or adults neurosis.  Hence, todays subjective established materialistic artistic philosophies granted this generations artist's identities.  It can be likened to the death of cubism as Picasso’s innovations were copied by hundreds of artists and are still mimicked today as people intellectually catch up to Picasso. 

There are pioneers within this generation of artists, and like Picasso, multitudes of the unimaginative follow their wake mimicking only the basic level of rendered aesthetic.  This artist is full of egotistical fantasy and momentary self discovery, and poisons himself and the arts with every stone wheel they claim to invent. The death of expressionism is a direct result of the copy cat, which for some reason people continue to figure out for the first time and keep regurgitating its emotional fever on the canvas over and over again.  

Each generation has its voice as that voice can be considered a purely subjective viewpoint where the previous generation can not relate to the new.  Conclusively, I can state that only the honesty of the artist's works truly maters.  For if the artist creates works that are true to their thoughts, honest with their own tastes and internal dialogue, and although a subjective voice, it is their own to identify with.  



Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Artwork of the month by Paul Signac

Paul Signac is a simple painter, chiseling subject matter that was popular and commonplace in his time.  As was his life and his paintings - commonplace.  He married, left her later, shacked up with a woman, painted some, and died.

I have always liked this painting.  I enjoy the seemingly random color placement of his work.

Paul Signac
French, 1863-1935
"Blessing of the Tuna Fleet at Groix"
1923, oil on canvas


Go see this at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts...
...it is worth a few moments of investigation.


Monday, April 9, 2007

Studio #6 - 2437 Lyndale Attic Studio

My sixth studio in Minneapolis was absolutely one of my best.  I completed two series of works, formulated my thesis "The Aesthetics of Composition in Abstract Oil Painting" as the foundation for my future works, and established connections in the art world that have proven to be a great benefit to my career as an artist.

After returning to Minneapolis, I moved into an art house with three other guys:  Brad, Chris, and Calvin.  As before, the entire house was dedicated to the arts (a 5 bedroom, with a huge dining room and living room).  We had a music studio downstairs, a painting studio in the attic, and an entire house full of art.  As always, there are impassioned stories here; things that happened both theatrical and passionate, and worthy of any bards tale.  It was a great time in my life as an artist and the paintings I completed there are some of my absolute favorite.

After I had completed my series of Bullfight works, I recognized that now I knew how to paint what I could imagine.  I was lacking a deeper understanding of color and I needed to understand each color as individual compositions.  Knowing technically how to control oil paint launched me into a several year color study to gain an understanding of color and each colors relationships to itself and other colors.  It was a self-imposed study, but it was invaluable to my work today.

I also started my working relationship with LUX Art & Design.  I had an exhibit up of four of my new color compositions at a cafe called Barbette, and the owners of LUX were in town and saw my work there and loved it.  I exhibited often at Barbette, aka Cafe Wyrd.  (And thanks Andrew for the kind words about my work, it helped).  They came to my studio the next day and immediately told me what they were doing and asked if I would like to be one of their artists.  A few months and a contract later and I was represented on the west coast by LUX Art & Design.  I still maintain my relationship with them to this day.



This is what the place looked like before I built walls, insulated, and put up sheet-rock.  Whoever was there before me simply stapled old beer boxes to the walls and then spray painted it all grey.  It was cold and smelled like old wood.  I reinstalled, sheet-rocked, and built walls to accommodate my needs as an artist. 








All of these photos are of my work in progress.  At any given time in this studio, I had no less than seven paintings going at the same time.  My production levels were fantastic.

I had enough space to be able to view my work on the easel at a very comfortable distance.


I heated the place with that tiny electric heater.  It's 1500 watts would always short out the house if anyone else used something electric in the bathroom below me, or turned on the music equipment in the basement.  I had to keep it off most of the time, which made for cold winters. 

I am not sure what happened to that painting.  I know it sold, but to who?


The space was perfect for shooting photos of my work.




That is a stack of 60" x 36" acrylic gessoed canvases.  I was burning through canvases faster than I drink coffee.  My production level was high, and my finial paintings were great.

I was able to have two easels, my drafting table, a computer station, and a small living space.  The studio portion of the house I lived in was 850 square feet, plenty of space to paint and live.


Here are some photos of me while I was working on BitTorrent #1 in this studio.  I didn't complete the work here, but I was able to start my formative series I had been studying and working toward.








It was a fun piece, and still very explorative, albeit it was the starting point of my thesis in practical application.




We took these photos after I had completed Rabbititus #15 "Neutral Colors," as I was so proud of the completed work I wanted to take photos in front of it.


I know that I made the right decision to move back to Minneapolis, as the results of my time in this studio produced my true emergence as a professional artist.


Wednesday, April 4, 2007

Studies for a figurative

I am working on a nude figurative for a client this week.  These are a few of the ink improvisation studies I have been playing around with.  















I am still undecided...
...I am just going to have to improve some until I find what I want.