Art & Artists Today

To create bona fide genuine Art (not fads or fashion)... you have to put in real efforts... There aren't any shortcuts!
To be a bona fide artist in the real sense you must have a gift for drawing and a sense of colour. Unfortunately no art schools/colleges/universities or 'degrees' can install this in you... There's no transfer technology. No cut paste.
Art collages churn out thousands of BFA, MFA "Artists" every year... And we very well know how most of them end up or what they create...
As a result there are so many fake, pretentious artists and Art doing the rounds of the art world today... In the name of abstract, modern, conceptual etc and going beyond simple old school 'Representational Art', that is ...what's in front of us: 'Mother Nature' in all it's glory!
Especially in the contemporary Indian art scene. Most are first-rate frauds... Without any talent or skill... Only with their high profile connections, social networking skills, ability to hold wine glasses with fake pride in their fake English accent! They dress up in "designer clothes" and show up every week on social gatherings and make it to the Page 3 of mainstream media. They never really paint or draw... They can't afford to dirty their hands...


Many have conveniently gone into digital or video art... Basically computer aided Photoshop!! With advanced digital, off-set printers...you can take out prints on canvas or artists quality paper. You may camouflage by applying few strokes over it with freehand or apply varnish etc.. & low & behold..
Then they say it's their work of art.
I am writing all this to make genuine art lovers & collectors aware when they buy or view Art today.
 
Animesh Roy
15 January 2019
Poznan Poland.

Portrait of An Artist

What is Art and who is an Artist?

As a child these questions and answers would come and go in my head... It appeared from my surrounding that art or painting in particular is paint on a surface which depicts something which has an endearing quality... unlike in a photograph.
And one who was capable of creating this imagery was an artist. An artist to me was a magician... for he could create anything with his hand... images which looked startlingly familiar!!
Elders in the family would discus art and painting... they always mentioned artist had special talent... a gift you are born with... no amount of schooling, teaching would make you an artist. My father being a teacher would keep recounting that once while filling in for one of his colleague who was an art teacher... he sat with students during an art class...and once in while he would have to address their complain that so and so was copying from so-and so etc!! My father found it hilarious and explained that art can not be 'copied'... it is not a formula like in Chemistry, Mathematics.. or some answers form pages of History!! It is an aptitude, a skill... even to copy one would need loads of talent to do so!!
And I had it from the day I became aware of myself...
Though still very young I could draw and elders would be amazed at my skill.... In school(s) I always had a special privilege and was dotted by all... as I could paint and draw.. I was an asset. I could draw out a huge reproduction of a fish or cockroach for our biology teacher... before she took class or draw a complicated map or diagram for other teachers and subjects!! I could decorate notice boards and win art competition for my school. Having an elder brother many a time my teachers and classmates would not believe that I had painted it myself... "You didn't do that!! Your brother must have done it?" I could understand why my brother was needed for such a simple thing as drawing!! For me he could do which I would not dare to copy... putting my hand in electrical meter box and repair them... he had talent for all things scientific!!
In different schools that I went... I would quickly establish my importance due to this particular gift...
Everyone loved me... and my weak concentration in Chemistry and Mathematics was not punished!!
As a child it was my ability to create life like impressions of real image that drew all applause and awards... While others would struggle to get the pencil to draw a circle right... my painted apple would look temptingly juicy and real... just by a flick of my wrist!!
Then I went to art college...
There was an entrance exam for selection to this elite group!!
I was excited to be among the best and thought now on would be part of an art fraternity.... alas!!

Then came the realisation... the end of innocence... coming of age!!

Once in the art college I realised the ones who were there were not necessarily had any skill or aptitude for art or interest!!
Many had tried many things before and at last decide to try art as a profession!!

They were there for the money and glamour... Many girl students were there as they could get good husband and boys were there to get into the advertising world etc.

to be continued....

My Etsy & My DaWanda Shops

My Etsy
&
My DaWanda

Artist's Studio

Shops have finally opened!!
Now you can directly buy my works..
right from the artist's studio!!
Free Shipping Worldwide by EMS!!

http://en.dawanda.com/shop/Animesh-Roy

DaWanda - Products with Love

Oils in 9x9cm by Hiroshi Matsumoto

9x9 painting (9 cm x 9 cm / app. 4 x 4 inch) by Hiroshi Matsumoto

I stumbled across Hiroshi Matsumoto's Oils on Facebook* and am so happy to see someone painting so well, in Oils in a 9x9 painting (9 cm x 9 cm / app. 4 x 4 inch).

I too love oils and paint mostly in small sizes too...
But unfortunately in my home country (India) artists and collectors have completely forgotten the charm of oils and small sized works. The awareness is lacking. Acrylic has taken over.. and it's ugly colours are everywhere!!

Painting in large size is order of the day. Now size is everything as it fetches more money to the artists... and as for the buyer he is too happy to boast of a large work in his office or drawing room walls?!!

I have written about this in my blogs... But this trend continues... No one has the time to look at a painting anymore.

Oils have just vanished from contemporary Indian Art!! Just visit any online Indian art galleries and you will see Acrylic ruling the roost!!

Acrylic is a quick drying synthetic plastic paint.. and paintings can be executed within hours and sold the very next moment... Flushed with new found money the buyers and the painters both are in a frantic hurry. Unfortunately an acrylic (painting) can never have the quality of an Oil...

Acrylic is a flat, unnatural, muddy, dirty, and difficult to mix... fast drying colour.. there is no lustre, no hues.. Most often the painting can look lifeless, flat, 'hard', 'dirty' especially if applied in thin coats with lots of water. I used to paint in Acrylics too.. but I would use it directly from the tube in thick impasto.... it works OK in small sizes.. as one can work on it quickly without getting dry.. but when you try that on larger size work.. even the thick paint will dry off even before you had chance to think what your next stroke or colour should be or want to mix with other colures to creat a hue etc.!!

My humble wish and urge to Art lovers across the world..(and more so to my fellow Indians) please look at Oils, and at Acrylic.. you don't need prior knowledge or training... to spot the difference!! So before buying and investing your precious funds into Art... Take some time to look at the quality of the colours of the works. If no contemporary artists are around to look for works in Oils in India (!!!) maybe one can visit Museums. There were Indian artists till about 1990 who used oils... It is no co-incidence that the art boom in India in the early 2000 and the mass productions of paintings (Art?) in Acrylic happened at the same time!!

A well executed small sized painting in Oil can look like a 'Jewellery Box'... it can have that shimmering quality. Hiroshi's oils surely has that shimmering, translucent quality!!

As painter Hiroshi Matsumoto says:

"I love oil paint, it’s texture, viscosity, slow-drying time and smell...

I never know what it is going to be until it's complete."
 
you can see his works here:
 
http://www.hiroshimatsumoto.com/
 
*
https://www.facebook.com/hiroshimatsumoto#!/photo.php?fbid=211007668941640&set=a.177745932267814.33654.177743925601348&type=1&theater

Pride & Paranoia: 'It is all God's gift.. nothing is mine..'

Pride & Paranoia

Intelectual Property, Copyright Laws, Privacy & Personal Space and all such... @#!$%!!

On the social media... I saw this very agitated discussion among some Western artists about some simple hearted Asian tourists taking pictures of Artists en plein air....

(artists/paintings being photographed by onlookers while working en plein air etc.)

I was amused and hurt...

Is this about our 'king size ego', that some of us carry on our heads? This gigantic weight of our art-aptitude-talent on our slender shoulders?

Or is it about privacy, space etc.?

In both cases I have divergent views.

The idea of Chinese/Indonesian or Taiwanese "tourist" travelling thousands of miles to Europe or America then tracing down "artists" painting outdoors and shooting their works... mind you these aren’t even finished!! Taking these back to Asia and making prints and earning huge profits!! Wow!!

Non of us are such great artists that we have to guard our works from anyone!! And anyway the Chinese* have great artists in their country with a rich tradition of painting!! All the great arts of the world are free for all of us to see, download.. get high quality prints or we get them in posters or coffee-table books etc.

You have to take it all...with a smile en plein air !!

If we do get admires etc. when we work outdoors (I would count myself lucky and blessed) we should be gracious and let them take pictures of our works etc... non of us are so great and grand that we need to worry... the ones who do; should paint in padlocked basements.. and never show their works to anyone free except those who buy tickets and are searched thoroughly for any electronic devices.. just in case their precious, priceless work of art lands in “those Chinese hands”!!

I have seen many such “great” artists on the Internet and on Facebook.. who would put a big 'copyright © water-mark' on their works!! Thus making their already ugly, amateurish works more unbearable!! My suggestion to them.. this is a visual medium.. and if you don’t want us to see.. use padlocks, high security set-ups and tickets as suggested earlier!!

Don’t think so highly of your work.. be humble...as we in the Orient always say.. “it is all God's gift.. nothing is mine..” that’s why many of us don’t even sign our works unlike in the West!!

If Mona Lisa, Sunflowers (Van Gogh), Lilies (Monet) and the great Oriental Artists' works are all available freely (for viewing, downloading etc.); we should not be so petty!! Remember we all have the right to view art free...we pay only when we buy.. or have to visits a museum.. some Museum are also free and some have certain days kept free for viewing etc. Many museums allow cameras too...

If someone does 'copy' our works.. it is a great compliment!! All Masters' are copied and one great artist copy another great artists' work.. or bases their work on other artist's work.. it has been done by artists since ages.. I do it all the time.

*****

The Unknown Artist

When I got out of art college (early 1990) I use to sign my paintings in front, lower corner as just 'Roy'... paintings of that time 1986-92 would have this... then an Art College Professor pointed out "If you want to make a name etc. sign your full name, there are so many Roys around etc!!" I then started using my full signature ie 'Animesh Roy'... Post 1992-3 works would have my full name in front.

But I grew disillusioned by this urgent need to be recognised by our signature alone... and as I became aware and studied more of our traditions in Indian (and the oriental) art and culture I realised that in our traditional arts our artists do not sign at all... they remain humble, anonymous and would attribute all their skills and talent to Nature or God and their art as an act of devotion etc!! I have been inspired by this concept since then... and have stopped signing my name in front but I do sign (full name) all my paintings at the back/on the reverse side (for the record etc.)

My signature with other details on the reversed side of one of my works.

There are some contemporary artists who do not sign in front..over their painting. But I haven't met one yet. I am not against it but I see so many paintings spoilt by an ugly signature!! There are some who have used it very aesthetically like Claude Monet.. and some like van Gogh's are terrible!! Thankfully many of his works don't have his signatures!! Mine have been more of a protest.. while all rushed in with their 'style and signature' to earn name and fame... I wanted only my work to speak up.. and would boast: "In museums they put small plaques along side.. next to every work with all details..and there the art enthusiasts can see!!

I do get very surprised collectors.. who wonder why they don't see any signatures on my work?! Some walk away, some are very uncomfortable to invest.. on an artist without a name!!



Waterscape-VII
Oil on Canvas
198x188 cm
78x74 inches
Oct. 2009

"An artist needn't be a clergyman or a churchwarden, 

but he certainly must have a warm heart for his fellow men."

― Vincent Van Gogh

"I feel that there is nothing more truly artistic than to love people."

― Vincent Van Gogh

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

* Some 'Painters/Artists' were getting paranoid with Chinese tourists photographing their works etc. with the assumption that these tourists have actually have been sent to shoot pictures of plein-air artists' works and go back and make prints on a commercial scale etc.!! and thus make millions off their genius!!

Grand dad of Henri Cartier-Bresson!!

Here's one more anecdote...

Another incident came to my notice on one of these social networking sites, Facebook. Tragic-comic!!

Due to simplification in this digital age everyone now has a camera... They are cheap and no more cost of films, developing and printing charges!!

Also the cameras are now much simpler to use. Any dummy can shoot. So we have these multitudes of photographers and photographs on these social networking sites!! They upload... get many 'likes' and slowly many turn into this ego centric artiste!! Grand dad of Henri Cartier-Bresson!!

One such 'Bresson'.. though I know he has never heard of Henri Cartier-Bresson... who happens to live in one of India's most 'photogenic' places... turned to taking pictures!!

Armed with a professional expensive digital camera he started shooting his city.

Anyone staying in such a place could almost effortlessly capture beautiful scenes, he of course couldn't!! But still his pictures would appears out-of-this-world to foreigner, outsiders...to people who live in a different world. It is indeed a quaint place. So this 'artiste' started to get many 'likes' and slowly he was now a 'wel-known photographer'!! Looking at his work anyone could see he had no idea of colour, composition or any sense or sensibility! It may sound cruel but then in art one cant be accommodating!!

Anyway after some years of 'fame' on Facebook, he recently, grandly announced his retirement!! He told his 'fans' is going to stop uploading his daily pictures!!

The step is most distressing to him but he has no choice as his works are getting out of hand..!! He has no patient or time to put copyright/ water marks over his 'work'! etc'

I don't know the exact reasons... maybe he doesn't want anyone sharing his pictures (?) or thinks people are downloading and printing them in 'coffee-table' books or making prints/posters and earning millions from his art!!

Picture of a Goat or something

Here's one more...

On Facebook some year back I witness this...

There was this pack of mongrels (young-educated-Indians) some 50 or more... viciously attacking a retired Indian air force officer... a Wing Commander!! His crime? "Content theft*"!! For a website he runs for his travel website!! Some picture of a goat or something!! There were abuse and insult, ridicule and trash talk for him... from boys young enough to be his grandsons... A generation growing up on an education (Borrowed and Copied)) which teaches them their 'intelectual property', 'copyright laws', privacy and 'personal space' and all such nonsense but no real wisdom!!A young generation aping ideas and ethos (Western?) without a humane touch...There is no respect for our Defence personnel.. What-so-ever!!Can a nation like this ever be great?!!*He may have inadvertently put or "shared" without giving credits..I know how a 'retired air force fighter pilot' lives... Hand to mouth!!