The Art Of Viewing Art : A TED Workshop
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| Source: The New Yorker |
Often the art connoisseurs try to find meaning in art when none exists.
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I have learned about art by looking at it, buying it, reading about it (see above), taking classes, and practicing Ikebana (Japanese art of flower arrangement) every weekend for the last fifteen years.
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Why should society care about art? The slide above covers the main reasons. All art when it is created is created for the contemporary society. Often, it provides a commentary on the society at that time. Some art is meditative in nature i.e. it provides a space for self-reflection and makes you forget about your daily problems. There are times when we feel something by looking at a painting and that something can not be described in words. Furthermore, art connects us with the collective consciousness of the humanity.
What is beauty? Generally, beauty is defined as something aesthetically pleasing. To understand beauty, we have to understand God and love. Old Indian texts say that there is God in everything including you. Yoga is the integration of you and the God in you. Yog in Sanskrit means integration and Yoga means integration with self i.e. God in you. Similarly, love is the integration of self with another person. When you love someone you feel one with that person. And, beauty is integration of self with something. You lose the idea of self with God, love, and beauty. When you see a beautiful sunset, you get absorbed in it or become one with it. You become one with something and that is beauty.
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What is art is a topic for another workshop. It is a very subjective topic. A simple act of looking at a work of art is very complex.
Six core elements go into looking at art.
1) Who is the artist? What is her background? Why did she create this specific piece of art?
2) Generally, we look at art at museums, galleries, someone's house, etc. and someone decided to put it there. Who is the curator? What is her background? What story is she trying to tell?
3) What the art critics have written about the art work you are viewing influences how you view that piece of art. Even if you have not read any critique of the work, you might have heard things in the popular culture. For example, if you have heard that Picasso was a genius, you might look at all Picasso paintings differently. Art critics form general opinions about art.
4) Where are you viewing the art? How is the lighting? What is next to the art piece?
5) The art itself. What is it made of? How big is it? What is the subject-matter?
6) Finally, you. What is your background? What is your mood when you are looking at the piece? What is your familiarity with the artist?
1) Who is the artist? What is her background? Why did she create this specific piece of art?
2) Generally, we look at art at museums, galleries, someone's house, etc. and someone decided to put it there. Who is the curator? What is her background? What story is she trying to tell?
3) What the art critics have written about the art work you are viewing influences how you view that piece of art. Even if you have not read any critique of the work, you might have heard things in the popular culture. For example, if you have heard that Picasso was a genius, you might look at all Picasso paintings differently. Art critics form general opinions about art.
4) Where are you viewing the art? How is the lighting? What is next to the art piece?
5) The art itself. What is it made of? How big is it? What is the subject-matter?
6) Finally, you. What is your background? What is your mood when you are looking at the piece? What is your familiarity with the artist?
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When I was raising money for my startup, EVER, I added the picture above in the EVER pitch deck to show the investors that we have relationships in Hollywood. And, instead of the funding, most investors wanted to talk about my dinner with Heidi Klum. Today, Larry Gagosian is the Heidi Klum of the art world. If your art is shown in one of the Gagosian galleries, the value of your art suddenly goes up.
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| Source: Wikipedia |
We tend to look at the label of a painting before we look at the painting. My suggestion is to look at the painting and then use the label as a tool to understand the painting better. This will help you form your own opinion before you are influenced by all the information on the label. The label tells you a lot. In the label (from the de Young museum San Francisco) above, you see how the museum got the painting and there is an accession number at the bottom. You can use the accession number to learn more about the painting from the museum website or ask the museum to show you all the materials related to the painting if they don't have the records digitized.
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| Source: Stanford University |
This is the map used to train the docents at the Stanford's Cantor Art Center. Depending on how you are feeling at the moment of looking at the painting, you can choose to go in the direction that is appealing to you.
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Art is a wide field of study. My workshop's focus was western art.
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| Source: Barbara Bianchi |
The western art has a lot of movements in it i.e. during a time period most artists were focused on exploring a particular idea. My mother thinks that art she does not understand or is not aesthetically appealing is modern art. That might be true in some cases but modern art is restricted to most art created from ~1863 to ~1960s.
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To understand art, we have get some context and see where it comes from. The early examples go as far back as Paleolithic age when we did not have a structured language. Art was on the cave walls to communicate what animals were around and how to hunt them. The human form was painted smaller compared to the animals because the idea of self had not developed.
In the Bronze age, art was used to honor the ancestors and deities. Also, to store information in symbols (hieroglyphics) and to keep track of time as the formularized calendar was invented during that time period.
At the beginning of the classical greek period, Discobolus was the sculpture that idealized man and put him equal to the deity in size. Before that period, humans were represented in smaller form than the deity. Human figure and abilities were idealized.
After that, for about thousand years, the art was focused on spreading christianity and building large structures.
The Renaissance era is when a lot changed in the western world including art. First time art academies were created to teach art. The general elements of design were created and taught. Humanism gave prime importance to humans and rationality. A lot of new discoveries made in anatomy, hydraulics, chemistry, etc. The term artist was not used at the time. The field was segmented into architects, painters, sculptures, engineers, etc.
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The Baroque movement was funded by the Catholic church to establish superiority over the Protestants during the Thirty Years' War. The main idea was to awe the audience.
Neoclassical movement was about showing affluence by the rich and pursuing political agenda. Napoleon used art deftly to further his agenda for power.
Romanticism was about showing human fragility, imagination, and focusing on the individual. This was quite a shift from the previous movements.
We have to remember that most art was commissioned at the time i.e. a patron was paying the artist to paint something they wanted.
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So for we have covered everything until the beginning of modern art.
Before we get into modern art, let's look at what makes a painting.
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The point of the video is not to be intimidated by the art critics or art historians. If you are not seeing anything they are seeing, it is totally fine. You have to focus on forming your own opinion.
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To understand a painting we have will look six classic aspects of the painting one by one. They are all interconnected and influence each other.
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Composition is the backbone of a painting. An artist decides what to put in the painting and what to leave out. Where the different parts of the painting are placed so that it looks like a coherent whole. And, how the parts interact with each other to create an emotional impact. Size of the painting is part of the composition.
There are many types of composition an artist can pursue. The painting below shows Horizontal and vertical lines.
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You can clearly see how the parts of the painting are placed along horizontal and vertical lines. Piero being a mathematician used Euclid's golden ratio to create the geometrical arrangement in the painting.
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Space is the illusion of three dimensions on a two dimensional surface. An artist decides width and depth, interval and distance surrounding solid objects.
There are many types of techniques an artists can pursue to achieve space but the most common one is linear or single-viewpoint perspective. Following is an example:
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Linear perspective is close to how our eye sees the world. For example, objects that are far seem smaller than the ones closer to us. To achieve linear perspective, diagonal lines (orthogonals) are drawn to converge at a single point (vanishing point). In the painting above, see how the diagonal lines are converging on the top of the white horse and how objects are placed on these lines. Generally, the vanishing point is placed on a horizontal line about two thirds way up the painting. However, in the painting above, it kind of at the center of the painting. Parallel lines are drawn and they get smaller as they get close to the vanishing point. These are referred to as planes. Objects are placed on these planes in different angles and in diminishing size. This creates the illusion of space. Notice the weapons on the ground.
Other things to notice in the painting are in the blue circles. The people in the back are much smaller. Horses in front of each other. Both create an illusion of space. Furthermore, notice the little soldier on the ground on the bottom left side. His head and back appear shorter than they would be but the feet appear larger compared to the body size because they are closer to the eye. This is technique is called foreshortening.
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Form is the illusion of volume in a painting or a sense of solidity on a flat surface. In other words, people and objects in a painting seem to have weight.
There are many techniques to create form. We will look at Chiaroscuro and Sfumato. But first, let's look at a painting that is a wonderful example of form.
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Notice the baby's bottom resting on the mother's arm. It does feel like that she is carrying the weight of the child and a tension is created that the baby might fidget anytime. This creates a sense of reality.
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Chiaroscuro is a technique that uses contrast in light and shade in a painting. It was developed by Leonardo da Vinci who said, "shadows and lights are the most certain means by which the shape of any body comes to be known, because a color of equal lightness or darkness will not display any relief but gives the effect of a flat surface which, with all all its parts at equal distance, will seem equally distant from the brightness that illuminates it. Objects seen in light and shade will be displayed in greater relief than those which are wholly in light or in shade."
Sfumato, also developed by da Vinci, is a technique used in oil paintings to increase the tonal range where glazes are used between the layers of paint so that light is reflected through them. The sfumato paintings have a smoky quality because the edges of the areas of shadow are blurred.
In the painting above, notice the Virgin's right arm how graded the tones are, the lightest ones on the surface of the wrist and the upper arm then becoming darker as they move underneath the Christ Child. You can feel that the arm has weight. In the right shoulder and arm of the Christ Child you can see where the edges of the shadow are softened, so that you can feel his rounded chubby quality.
Light and shade are applied not just to the separate parts but to the overall arrangement of the whole group, which is in form of a pyramid sitting in space.
Notice the Virgin's hair. Is it really her hair or is St. Anne's body? Underneath the Virgin's right leg as far as the buttocks where it starts to blend into the dark draper of St. Anne. You notice that the edges of the forms vary and some are much sharper than others. Where the edges are soft, the eye is encouraged to travel round and this creates movement in the forms of the figures themselves.
In the face of St. Anne, the nose, eyebrows and chin are described firmly, but the sides of the mouth and cheeks are softened to give a feeling of mobility.
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Tone is the use of contrast between light and shade in a painting. The Italian term for tone is chiaroscuro. In the example earlier, we saw how tone can be used to create form. It can also enhance composition and space. However, just like the other five variables, tone can be the main basis of the painting.
Artists use tone in many different ways. Following is an example of tone used to create drama:
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Can you feel the drama? Notice how certain areas are lit up starkly and the rest are in varying degrees of shade. Notice the person in the green shirt is about get up. The person on the right is about to grab Christ. There is tension.
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Sir Isaac Newton, in 1704, proved in his book, Opticks, that all colors are contained within white light. Although my undergrad is in Electrical Engineering, I learned later in life that color is a function of light i.e. sunlight which has all the colors reflects on an object, let's say a leaf; and that leaf absorbs all the colors except green and that is why the leaf is green.
There are three primary colors - Red, Yellow, and Blue. And, four complimentary colors - Green, Orange, Indigo, and Yellow. All colors contrast with each other but the strongest contrasts are seen between primaries and complementaries. Contrast here is different than what we saw in chiaroscuro. In color, contrast refers to the degree of the brightness. Hue refers to the intrinsic color and whether or not it has reached its maximum level of brightness. Intensity refers to how the colors influence each other. The levels of brightness of a color are controlled more by what you put next to it than by its intrinsic hue.
There are many ways the artists use color in paintings. Let's look at how color is used to express emotion.
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In 1810, German poet, Goethe, published a theory about primaries and complementaries and their emotional connections. The main idea was that cool colors like blue and violet convey sadness and the warm colors like red, orange, yellow convey optimism. Van Gogh was indirectly influenced by Goethe's work.
Does the painting above invoke any emotion? Is it positive or negative? Even though the art critics think that the emotion is positive, how you feel is based on your history. Relationship of blue and yellow through to orange is dominant. Blue is used in the walls, the doors, the jug and ewer, the reflection in the mirror and the coats hanging on the walls at the back. Orange, gold and yellow appear in the bed and bedding and the picture frames, as well as the chairs and the table.
Van Gogh is popular among the masses because looking at his popular paintings generates positive emotions.
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This painting has a similar range of color as the previous one but the emotion generated is sad or negative. The subject matter influences that, of course.
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There is a debate in the art world about do you really need to know the subject-matter to appreciate a painting or should the painting speak for itself.
There are narrative subjects where the painting is telling a story. There are subjects that relate to communicating a message rather than a narrative. Sometimes, the artists is ambiguous and you have to make your own meaning. The other times the subject of a painting is no-subject (abstract) or poetry where it is made purely for enjoyment. There are many others.
Let's look at mythological subjects.
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The painting here tells the mythological story of the birth of venus.
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I find the detail in the painting fascinating. When I first saw it at the Uffizi, I stood there for two hours, just looking. I think the innocence on Venus's face fascinated me. The challenge for an artist is to create a child's innocence on a woman's face because she is just born. The painting shows the Venus being born out of a shell as a women.
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After Mona Lisa, The Birth of Venus and Primavera are the two most popular paintings in the western world.
Primavera had no official title, it was given by an art critic after Botticelli's death. In Italian, Primavera means spring. There is no actual myth depicted in the painting although mythical characters are present. This made the painting controversial.
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When I was new to understanding art, I found a way to memorize the six elements of a painting. You may want to create your own way to remember.
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Notice the fantastic integration of space and form. She is sitting on her hair. Notice the ocean in the back? The innocence on her face?
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From my collection...it makes me feel something beyond the six elements we discussed.
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Art used to be about hiding the art (brush strokes, etc.) and to create an illusion. Modern art made the art to be about art i.e. show the brush strokes, embrace the two dimensions, etc. Postmodern art rejected the idea that art is solely about art and analyzed society and culture with art.
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You can investigate the six elements we learned about. Think about why the artist chose a can and his shit (Composition)? Why he chose the label (Space)? Why he chose the specific font (Form)? Why did he sign (Tone)? Why is the label color yellow and the font color black (Color)? Is the subject matter really shit (Subject-Matter)? Form and Space only apply to the label here because it is a 3D object with weight.
When you have no context, you can think about what is the idea behind the art, is the artist trying to communicate a message, has he found a way to differentiate himself from other artists with his style, or is he creating something just to break the rules. Sometimes, none of this applies and the artist might just be playing with you.
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We will very briefly look at some of the art movements in the modern art period to get some context. Let's start with Realism which was a movement focused on painting peasants and their daily lives. The movement was started after the 1848 French Revolution in response to Romanticism where there things were idealized.
This painting is considered to be the beginning of modern art, mainly because you can see the brush strokes on the nude woman. And, the nude woman's gaze is asking a question. Here, the viewing becomes important compared with previous movements where the the art was telling a story.
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The main idea behind impressionism was to paint outside and capture the sunlight in a moment. Specifically, how the light was changing in that moment. To achieve that the artist's used small brush strokes and not well mixed colors. The focus was on visual effects rather than detail or form. They used color to invoke emotion, generally happy emotions.
The painting above gave the moment its name based on criticism of the painting by an art critic who said that it is not a painting but an impression of a painting.
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Expressionism came about in response to impressionism which the avant-garde artist thought was too positive. The Expressionist movement was all about emotion, mainly angst, and the paintings did not need a subject.
The idea was that the artist is communicating his emotion to the viewer through his artwork.
The painting above is one of the most popular Expressionist paintings. Can you feel the angst? The person, the landscape, the colors, and everything else in the painting is communicating the emotions contained in a scream.
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Post Impressionism was a response to Impressionism. It brought the form back in the painting. The Post Impressionist artist did not like that the Impressionists artists were solely focused on the light and ignored form. The method of how the painting is created and showing multiple perspectives became more important.
Of course, the name Post Impressionism came from an art critic.
Cezzane is considered the father of modern art by the artists. Notice the form of the fruits, the slanted table, the colors. The painting looks different from different angles.
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In the early 1900s, art became fundamentally different than the past. Why did that happen? There are many reasons. Following are the main ones:
1. Discovery of X-ray in 1895 gave us new insights into the structure and composition of the human body.
2. Affordability of camera made the idea of art capturing the world as it is, kind of useless.
3. Discovery of Quantum Physics by Max Planck challenged our understanding of the physical world.
4. Einstein's theory of relativity challenged our concept of time.
5. Freud published interpretation of dreams in 1899 and that questioned consciousness and popularized the idea of subconscious.
6. Marx's ideas were getting popular with the adoption of communism in Russia. It challenged the idea of capitalism.
7. First world war changed people's idea of rationality, identity became confusing. ~38M people died. Is it still victory with so many deaths? Everything was questioned.
This time of confusion and chaos gave the artists new ideas to explore with art.
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The idea behind Dadaism to make sense of the world. Do irrational things because rationality led to the first world war. And, ridicule the meaninglessness of the modern world.
Fountain is considered the most important work of art in the twentieth century by art critics. Because it redefined the art to be an idea and not a creation; art moved from interpretation of the visible to interpretation of the invisible.
The idea behind Dadaism to make sense of the world. Do irrational things because rationality led to the first world war. And, ridicule the meaninglessness of the modern world.
Fountain is considered the most important work of art in the twentieth century by art critics. Because it redefined the art to be an idea and not a creation; art moved from interpretation of the visible to interpretation of the invisible.
The urinal is placed sideways so it is practically unusable and hence a new thought is created about the object and that is art. The artist did not make the object, he chose it and gave it a new title. That is what's important.
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| Source: Wikipedia |
Mona Lisa became popular in the early twenty century because it was stolen from the Louvre and was missing for two years. So, its picture was all over the newspapers. In any art introduction workshop, one has to mention the Mona Lisa. I am showing the Duchamp's version.
The title of the painting, LHOOQ is a pun. When pronounced in French it sounds like "elle a chaud au cul" which translates to "she has a hot ass". Here, Duchamp takes a postcard modifies it and adds a title similar to what he did with the urinal. The message here was not to take art or Mona Lisa so seriously.
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In Cubism, objects are analyzed, broken up and reassembled in an abstract form which has multiple viewpoints of the same object. The artists don't try to create a three dimensional space, they are celebrating the limits of two dimensions by putting multiple viewpoints on it. This radically different idea still painted traditional subjects like nudes, portraits, and still life. The influence of African masks is visible in Picasso's paintings.
The title of the painting, LHOOQ is a pun. When pronounced in French it sounds like "elle a chaud au cul" which translates to "she has a hot ass". Here, Duchamp takes a postcard modifies it and adds a title similar to what he did with the urinal. The message here was not to take art or Mona Lisa so seriously.
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In Cubism, objects are analyzed, broken up and reassembled in an abstract form which has multiple viewpoints of the same object. The artists don't try to create a three dimensional space, they are celebrating the limits of two dimensions by putting multiple viewpoints on it. This radically different idea still painted traditional subjects like nudes, portraits, and still life. The influence of African masks is visible in Picasso's paintings.
The painting above is considered the second most important work of art, after Duchamp's Fountain, in twentieth century. Although, Picasso finished the painting in 1907, he did not show it to the public until 1916 and at that time it was declared immoral. Before showing to the public, he showed it to his fellow artists who did not like it either. In the painting, you can clearly see the elements of cubism I described earlier.
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The name for the movement comes from this painting because the viewer can see cubes in the background. Braque's peers misunderstood reverse perspective (objects push outward) as cubes. Notice that light and shade are no longer used to create natural form.
The painting is from 1908 and is currently at The Met in New York.
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Abstract art generally does not have descriptive titles. The movement was in response to trauma from the first world war. Abstract artists believed that art is higher than reality and has no relation to reality. Abstract art is spiritual or utopian in nature i.e. it rises above the trauma (reality). It makes me think of Buddhism.
Mondrian is probably the most popular Abstract artist. His art focused on primary colors - red, blue, and yellow; on primary values -black, white, and gray; on primary direction - horizontal and vertical. You can see that in the painting above.
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As the name suggests, Abstract Expressionism is the integration of Abstract and Expressionism ideas. A balance between emotional expression and healing with non-reality. It was developed, in New York, in the late 1940s after the second world war. Abstract Expressionism moved the center of western art world from Paris to New York.
Pollock popularized a new way of painting. Instead of painting with a brush, he laid the canvas on the floor and dripped the paint directly from the can. He could get on the canvas and see the canvas from all angles. Hence, become one with the canvas. The painting has to be spontaneous. The artist can not plan on what the final outcome would be. How the artist painted became more important than the final outcome. This style is also called action painting.
Pollock was an alcoholic and went through Jungian therapy. Jung's ideas were heavily focused on finding internal balance and harmony. That shows in the painting above.
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Contemporary art is generally considered to all art after the second world war. So the timeline is parallel to modern and postmodern art.
Now, we will look at a few pieces that are painted in the last five years.
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Christine has become my new favorite local contemporary artist.
In this painting she is making fun of the latest trend in the tech world i.e. ICOs (Initial Coin Offerings). To raise money in the cryptocurrency (think bitcoin) markets with ICO (think IPO - Initial Public Offering), startups write a whitepaper and share their vision with the public and raise money from the public. What comes out as a product based on the whitepaper is far from the vision.
The subtext here is about the art world. Art used to require skill (as shown under the whitepaper) and now a child's drawing is also considered art (as shown under Actual Product Release).
I have known David for around 20 years. He is an American artist who lives in France. David was against the Iraq war and the Patriot Act taking away civil liberties from all Americans bothered him.
David painted this piece after America's Shock and Awe operation in Iraq. He is pointing out that America looks for cheap and fast solutions to everything . Both the hand grenade and the hamburger are classic American exports and fit in your hand. Both can kill you. Although, one does it more slowly than the other. Cheap and fast might have become the American way but that is not always the best solution to the problem.
Mikey is a man of many talents. This painting is designed using a generative approach so the entire piece is designed mathematically before any painting is started. The design process uses a code to convert letter inputs into numerical design code. The painting represents, "Be Love Now".
The work is meant to be neurally and optically challenging. Look at it for a few seconds and you start seeing new patterns and colors.
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The name for the movement comes from this painting because the viewer can see cubes in the background. Braque's peers misunderstood reverse perspective (objects push outward) as cubes. Notice that light and shade are no longer used to create natural form.
The painting is from 1908 and is currently at The Met in New York.
---
Abstract art generally does not have descriptive titles. The movement was in response to trauma from the first world war. Abstract artists believed that art is higher than reality and has no relation to reality. Abstract art is spiritual or utopian in nature i.e. it rises above the trauma (reality). It makes me think of Buddhism.
Mondrian is probably the most popular Abstract artist. His art focused on primary colors - red, blue, and yellow; on primary values -black, white, and gray; on primary direction - horizontal and vertical. You can see that in the painting above.
---
As the name suggests, Abstract Expressionism is the integration of Abstract and Expressionism ideas. A balance between emotional expression and healing with non-reality. It was developed, in New York, in the late 1940s after the second world war. Abstract Expressionism moved the center of western art world from Paris to New York.
Pollock popularized a new way of painting. Instead of painting with a brush, he laid the canvas on the floor and dripped the paint directly from the can. He could get on the canvas and see the canvas from all angles. Hence, become one with the canvas. The painting has to be spontaneous. The artist can not plan on what the final outcome would be. How the artist painted became more important than the final outcome. This style is also called action painting.
Pollock was an alcoholic and went through Jungian therapy. Jung's ideas were heavily focused on finding internal balance and harmony. That shows in the painting above.
---
Contemporary art is generally considered to all art after the second world war. So the timeline is parallel to modern and postmodern art.
Now, we will look at a few pieces that are painted in the last five years.
---
Christine has become my new favorite local contemporary artist.
In this painting she is making fun of the latest trend in the tech world i.e. ICOs (Initial Coin Offerings). To raise money in the cryptocurrency (think bitcoin) markets with ICO (think IPO - Initial Public Offering), startups write a whitepaper and share their vision with the public and raise money from the public. What comes out as a product based on the whitepaper is far from the vision.
The subtext here is about the art world. Art used to require skill (as shown under the whitepaper) and now a child's drawing is also considered art (as shown under Actual Product Release).
I have known David for around 20 years. He is an American artist who lives in France. David was against the Iraq war and the Patriot Act taking away civil liberties from all Americans bothered him.
David painted this piece after America's Shock and Awe operation in Iraq. He is pointing out that America looks for cheap and fast solutions to everything . Both the hand grenade and the hamburger are classic American exports and fit in your hand. Both can kill you. Although, one does it more slowly than the other. Cheap and fast might have become the American way but that is not always the best solution to the problem.
Mikey is a man of many talents. This painting is designed using a generative approach so the entire piece is designed mathematically before any painting is started. The design process uses a code to convert letter inputs into numerical design code. The painting represents, "Be Love Now".
The work is meant to be neurally and optically challenging. Look at it for a few seconds and you start seeing new patterns and colors.
---
I like Banksy whose identity is still unknown. He works to bring attention to social issues. And, he has brought more legitimacy to graffitti.
The graffitti above is painted somewhere on the Israeli and Palestine border.
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The best way to explore art is to combine it with holidays.
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And the best place to do that is South of France. I have been going there every year for the last decade. The pictures you see are taken from an iPhone. No filter.
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This is St. Tropez. The light does shine differently in Cote d'azur.
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A place where you can dine with the history of art. There are original Picassos on the walls of La Colombe d'Or.
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Fondation Maeght was created by Aimé and Marguerite Maeght, a visionary couple of publishers and art dealers, who represented and were friends with some of the most important artists of the 20th century, including Joan Miró, Alexander Calder, Fernand Léger, Georges Braque, Alberto Giacometti, Marc Chagall and many others. A museum created by the living artists.
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A village where Picasso lived and many other artists visited. The art scene is still good there.
I saw the above painting at a gallery and spent three hours speaking with the curator. Notice what's in the fishbowl. Can you tell the message?
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You can visit Cezanne' studio where he painted in Aix.
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This workshop would not have been possible without invaluable contributions from Christine, Nancy, and Sidra. They generously shared their insights and time with me.
I have read many art books but the most influential have been the ones by Mary Acton.
Wishing you the very best in art exploration!
I like Banksy whose identity is still unknown. He works to bring attention to social issues. And, he has brought more legitimacy to graffitti.
The graffitti above is painted somewhere on the Israeli and Palestine border.
---
The best way to explore art is to combine it with holidays.
---
And the best place to do that is South of France. I have been going there every year for the last decade. The pictures you see are taken from an iPhone. No filter.
---
This is St. Tropez. The light does shine differently in Cote d'azur.
---
A place where you can dine with the history of art. There are original Picassos on the walls of La Colombe d'Or.
---
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A village where Picasso lived and many other artists visited. The art scene is still good there.
I saw the above painting at a gallery and spent three hours speaking with the curator. Notice what's in the fishbowl. Can you tell the message?
---
You can visit Cezanne' studio where he painted in Aix.
---
This workshop would not have been possible without invaluable contributions from Christine, Nancy, and Sidra. They generously shared their insights and time with me.
I have read many art books but the most influential have been the ones by Mary Acton.
Wishing you the very best in art exploration!
