August 12, 2022 Weekly Musings
Posted on August 12 2022
Announcements
Ms Pileated and Green Apples in a Wire Basket Invited into International Exhibition
Ms Pileated and Green Apples in a Wire Basket have been accepted into this year’s PWS Aqueous Open 2022 International.
The judge chose 84 works from the 146 entries that were received. Entries cam from 19 states and 5 countries.
The exhibition will be displayed at the Stifel Fine Arts Center along with online at www.pittsburghwatercolorsociety.com beginning September 8 through October 29, 2022.
Musings:
Space The Final Frontier
Featured Image: Space The Last Frontier
Space the Final Frontier. Science like art explores strange new worlds, it seeks out …. And boldly goes where no man/woman has gone before.
Incentives
Featured image: Ms Cardinal
Are your incentives to create centered around: 1. hope of a reward, financial gain, or, 2. fear of punishment by not creating an image/object realistic enough for it to be well received. What are good incentives for folks who want to call themselves artists and want to create?
The only incentives an artist needs, in my personal opinion, is the desire to create and the motivation to do so all by themselves, and then to actually do it.
Is Art a Moral Issue?
Featured image: Improve I
Does art need to be governed, controlled or constrained?
This question is like asking if our spirits, our souls and our passions need to be governed, controlled or constrained?
This question is a hard question to answer when you add the concept of freedom to the mix.
My rule of thumbs is that our souls, spirits and passions are ours and ours alone. They make us the unique individuals that we are. They give us our authenticity.
Although I agree with this, I can also say that I have noticed that sometimes our spirits, souls and passions seem to want to run wild. That is ok when it comes to self and art, but, because the passions of people many times do not want to play nicely and fairly with others, they become selfish and unreasonable.
The degree of constraint and the amount of constraint is where it gets confusing. Many artists want very little constraint and confuse it with freedom, rights, their visions and their ability to visually speak. To constrain vision, I believe like others, would be tragic. So where does vision run into problems and constraints? When it becomes a moral issue.
Moral issues are linked to good and bad and right and wrong. Visions aren’t moral issues. Visions are subjective. Moral issues are also subjective but are mostly based on values. Art isn’t a moral issue. Art is subjective. Art needs vision. Art is not based on values. If it is then there is no freedom in the work, no self and no authenticity in the work.
Continued #133 – Values and Principles in Art.
Art with Values and Principles
Featured image: Improv II
Freedom. I always try to create in a freedom mode of thought, a mode of thought that is free of outside power. This doesn’t happen easily, as my principles and values are my history, and it is hard to delete them when I enter my studio. The only way I can delete them, to any extent, is to recognize where their values and principles originate from.
According to Stephen R. Covey, “There are certain principles that transcend cultural differences and do not change over time. They determine the ultimate outcomes or consequences of behavior and actions, as much as gravity determines that something will fall when dropped.”
“Principles represent an objective reality that transcends cultures and individuals. Principles, including fairness, integrity, and honesty “A principle is a natural law like gravity. If you drop something, gravity controls. If I don’t tell you the truth, you won’t trust me; that’s a natural law,” according to Covey. “There are certain principles that transcend cultural differences and do not change over time. They determine the ultimate outcomes or consequences of behavior and actions, as much as gravity determines that something will fall when dropped.”
“Values, like morals on the other hand, are subjective, and change with changing times.” They are fluid and change frequently according to popular opinion and the way the wind blows.” Values are important in expressing our individual beliefs and opinions, and they can be used tactically to accomplish certain objectives based on our current circumstances, demands, and needs. Values can ultimately reflect or determine the current but potentially alterable goals that we have in our professional, family, and personal life,” Covey states.
Values are part of who we are as an individual, but because they are fluid and fluctuate, whoever controls and empowers values, controls the power behind these values. The power is not our own, it belongs to another. And that other, is robbing us of our authenticity and individuality if we don’t recognize that this is happening to us.
Principles, on the other hand, are not fluid, rarely change, and are not controlled by popular opinion. Principles allow an artist to be selfish with their time, and work and thus authentic, individualistic. This selfishness does not go so far to allow me to think that my little finger is more important than anything else in the world. Principles actually stop me from thinking that and acting in a self-centered way.
So, my history and my foundations are part of my work, as is the concept of freedom. Can I really enter my studio and be free in my process of making and creating? No and yes. Being able to recognize where the power source is within my foundations, and if they come from principles that transcend cultural trendy values then, yes, I can be free.
Continued with #134 A Particular Kind of Freedom
New Works:
Her Song- She Has Always Sang to the Tune of a Different Drummer
