Art Rocks

Back within the early fifties, at the age of nine, I made a decision that, unquestionably, I'd become an artist, albeit I didn't exactly know what that meant and therefore the main painter I knew was my sweet grandma. I clumsily professed my certainty to my mom one late afternoon. 

She smiled and nodded, and carried on with whatever she was doing. I had no concept decision would reverberate with such polarity between anguish and elation throughout my life. But I've never regretted it. Not once in these sixty-four years. And as far as I can tell, this is often a standard occurrence and attitude of most artists.

In this world, it's impossible to calculate what percentage consider themselves painters, printmakers, or sculptors, expressing themselves during a plethora of mediums and 'isms,' but out of a worldwide population of quite six billion people, I can only assume, happily so, there are many, and that I believe, for the foremost part, permanently reason.

For the artist, it's never almost making the art. there's always the tricky part that comes first--the search, eventual discovery, then uncertainty, always followed by trial and error, and still more uncertainty. Persistence eventually enters into the dance. For myself, and that I suspect for many artists, the enjoyment is within the doing of it, once we've cleared the debris that limits our conviction. this is often where the 'verb' lives, the action. And nice it might be, after such a sophisticated birth, if that were all. But unfortunately, to pay the bills, buy touch food, get more art supplies, artists even have to sell their work. it isn't easy, because the selling a part of the method is cumbersome and typically awkward. It indeed was and has always been on my behalf.

In the early seventies, I used to be delighted once I first began exhibiting with galleries. I made art, and therefore the galleries sold it. Nice, I thought. I needed only to seem at my openings every eighteen months approximately. Over time I watched the worth of my art incrementally increase, often wondering what it had been that stirred the costs upward, far beyond the increase within the cost of living. I suppose one can attribute it not such a lot to any specific talent, which, just like the art itself, is very subjective, but rather a way of dedicated focus and private vision. and therefore the right gallery, of course. One can't argue that in some cases, it is the gallery that creates the artist and not a couple of galleries believe this. It happens often enough, but, when all is claimed and done, it's the artist who takes the broadest range of risks.

I moved full-time to Thailand in 1998 to try to do a documentary on and for the elephants. I made a decision to discontinue my gallery associations. After being here for a couple of years, the country and culture felt right. I made a decision to remain but continued making art. It's within the blood. But there's virtually no market during this isolated rural spot in Northern Thailand. So, now, at an age I wear as comfortably as I can, I've decided to reconnect my art to my homeland. Having been away goodbye, it is a little bit of a challenge jumping back to a world and market considerably more crowded and fractious; certainly, noisier.

Brick and mortar art galleries, I suppose, still remain the foremost viable avenue for the artist to introduce her or his work to the general public. For the foremost part, galleries are critically instrumental in defining the connection between artist and an economic market, and I have long held the opinion that without a gallery, especially one that features a solid reputation, it's impossible to determine and define a positive trajectory for the worth of one's art. Perhaps, like such a lot else, that's changing. We're seeing more and more online art galleries and secondary art sales platforms.

I'm during a steady trot trying to stay up with new online technology. the web, permanently or bad, is altering our understanding of reality. Like most artists, galleries have their own websites, listing all of their artists and pictures of their work. But I've long held the assumption that buyers of art got to be actually standing ahead of a piece of art, to feel it breathe, to urge a way of its texture, even smell it; a little question that's changing. I can easily imagine a scenario not too a few years distant when a gallery's on-site opening also includes live streaming in such how that online visitors can participate within the event also as make immediate online purchases for his or her collection. Perhaps it's already happening.

Technology is unavoidable. And while it continues to maneuver us into areas unimagined only a couple of years ago, art remains inside us--a consistent human heartbeat. It's a part of us, and whether it's visual, poetry, storytelling, dance, music, or photography, art remains a continuing parameter of our got to express the peak and width of our emotional spectrum. Like history, art may be a residue of act, binding us one to a different, a glue of remembrance from those who've preceded us for those living now, and for those that come after; it's our fingerprint of intent, a guide, if you'll, perpetually reminding us that we've choices.

Thanks for reading.