CHERUB ANGEL PAINTING
I have had no formal training in art, I have developed my skill through my own personal studies. Over the years of constant painting I have developed an eye for color, design and harmony and I am still learning and growing as an artist. My favorite place when I was young was at the library. The art history books were the inspiration that really opened the window for me. I would sit and relish in the beautiful paintings of the master painters. I do remember though when the new chapter would start with modern art, I would close the book I felt it was the end of the book for me. I remember I was sad and angry that someone had put this in an art book. I thought are they trying to make a fool out of me, I didn't understand it and I didn't think I should have to read an explanation under the painting of what the artist intentions were, I always thought a person should be knocked over with the beauty in a painting with out the need for someone to translate what the artist was thinking. There has been a lot written and said about the modern movement, below are some that I have come across that are interesting:
'Art Historians speak of modern art as concerned primarily with the essential qualities of color and flatness and as exhibiting overtime a reduction of interest in the subject matter'.(Christopher L.C.E. Witcombe,'Roots of Modernism').
'From the moment that art ceases to be food that feeds the best minds, the artist can use his talents to perform all the tricks of the intellectual charlatan. Most people can today no longer expect to receive consolation and exaltation from art. The 'refined,' the rich, the professional 'do-nothings', the distillers of quintessence desire only the peculiar, the sensational, the eccentric, the scandalous in today's art. I myself, since the advent of Cubism, have fed these fellows what they wanted and satisfied these critics with all the ridiculous ideas that have passed through my mind. The less they understood them, the more they admired me. Through amusing myself with all these absurd farces, I became celebrated, and very rapidly. For a painter, celebrity means sales and consequent affluence. Today, as you know, I am celebrated, I am rich. But when I am alone, I do not have the effrontery to consider myself an artist at all, not in the grand old meaning of the word: Giotto, Titian, Rembrandt, Goya were great painters. I am only a public clown - a mountebank. I have understood my time and have exploited the imbecility, the vanity, the greed of my contemporaries. It is a bitter confession, this confession of mine, more painful than it may seem. But at least and at last it does have the merit of being honest'. (Pablo Picasso, 1952)
'A work of art is the unique result of a unique temperament. Its beauty comes from the fact that the author is what he is. It has nothing to do with the fact that other people want what they want. Indeed, the moment that an artist takes notice of what other people want, and tries to supply the demand, he ceases to be an artist, and becomes a dull or an amusing craftsman, an honest or dishonest tradesman. He has no further claim to be considered as an artist'.(Oscar Wilde 'The Soul of a man under Socialism',1891).
Now that I'm older I do realise that art is in the eye of the beholder and it will always be subjective to what appeals to each of us. Like music we enjoy many different styles but sometimes, something comes along that captures our heart and moves our soul and that is where true art lies within each of us.
'Art Historians speak of modern art as concerned primarily with the essential qualities of color and flatness and as exhibiting overtime a reduction of interest in the subject matter'.(Christopher L.C.E. Witcombe,'Roots of Modernism').
'From the moment that art ceases to be food that feeds the best minds, the artist can use his talents to perform all the tricks of the intellectual charlatan. Most people can today no longer expect to receive consolation and exaltation from art. The 'refined,' the rich, the professional 'do-nothings', the distillers of quintessence desire only the peculiar, the sensational, the eccentric, the scandalous in today's art. I myself, since the advent of Cubism, have fed these fellows what they wanted and satisfied these critics with all the ridiculous ideas that have passed through my mind. The less they understood them, the more they admired me. Through amusing myself with all these absurd farces, I became celebrated, and very rapidly. For a painter, celebrity means sales and consequent affluence. Today, as you know, I am celebrated, I am rich. But when I am alone, I do not have the effrontery to consider myself an artist at all, not in the grand old meaning of the word: Giotto, Titian, Rembrandt, Goya were great painters. I am only a public clown - a mountebank. I have understood my time and have exploited the imbecility, the vanity, the greed of my contemporaries. It is a bitter confession, this confession of mine, more painful than it may seem. But at least and at last it does have the merit of being honest'. (Pablo Picasso, 1952)
'A work of art is the unique result of a unique temperament. Its beauty comes from the fact that the author is what he is. It has nothing to do with the fact that other people want what they want. Indeed, the moment that an artist takes notice of what other people want, and tries to supply the demand, he ceases to be an artist, and becomes a dull or an amusing craftsman, an honest or dishonest tradesman. He has no further claim to be considered as an artist'.(Oscar Wilde 'The Soul of a man under Socialism',1891).
Now that I'm older I do realise that art is in the eye of the beholder and it will always be subjective to what appeals to each of us. Like music we enjoy many different styles but sometimes, something comes along that captures our heart and moves our soul and that is where true art lies within each of us.
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