Eugene Korolev, Russian Digital Artist

Eugene Korolev, Russian Artist

This guy is fantastic. I love his subjects, his dreams, his colors. It’s good craziness, it’s frightening and funny, it’s great !

You’ll find plenty at : https://www.artstation.com/evgen

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This one is clickable :

Empire Of Decadence: The Superb Bizarre Artworks Of Eugene Korolev

Safer paths?

There’s been an interesting post on the marvelous Facebook of Humans of New York (which you should follow, it’s… humanist).

One guy was in NYC, in his mid-30, struggling to be an actor with no or little success, living paycheck to paycheck. The people’s answers under the post were interesting, picking paths for him (from “go on you’ll make it” to “wisdom says you should let go now”).

I chose an answer from a reasonable person, who chose a family life. Drawing a three branched tree :

1. People with a more safe and secure life, as a choice, staying anonymous.
2. People with dreams and passion, wishing for success (in entertainment).
3. People “mourning unfulfilled dreams” within an ordinary life : they were too afraid to try and dare.

With a conclusion : “Not all dreams work out” and people fall down. But also the maybeness of dreams become true – with the eternal behind-law which says approximatively “When the Gods want to punish you they fulfill your dreams”.

Of course, the actor was necklacing castings, with very little success. It looked like  lottery and gamble…

It becomes a game : What’s worse, to have an ordinary life complaining you should have been an artist, or to struggle for decades until nothing happens? What if you succeed, and it’s boring? What if my book is at least edited and no one buys it? Are there stages in these paths? What if you succeed and then fall into oblivion? What if you decide to move and act at mid-life? Or the contrary, disappear after success?

Oh oh, my three-branched tree became a tree!

Thanks for reading!

 

 

 

Joseba Eskubi, Spanish painter

Joseba Eskubi is a Spanish artist, who creates “soft, amorphic and organic forms”.

You’ll find the “Bacon thing” in his work, or find it a bit weird, but you’ll feel your brain searching, turning around with the idea of “what-is-it” boiling. His colors skills are great.

It stopped me. What do YOU think?

2019

 

Smart Simplicity vs Subtle Complexities

Today I ask for your help with a dual idea. Some artists with a long life and experience tend towards :

1. The essential : Simplicity. Refining. Paring down.
2. Smart subtleties : Not the simplicity, which is senseless, but secret and modest complexity.

 

Maybe 1. works for painters and other visual artists and 2. for writers and other ideas‘ artists? – another article to write.

Of course there are other ways of being mature, like “to dare more”, or “being decadent”.

 

Do you have examples? Poets, directors, photographers? Can you weave one and two without being paradoxical? Do we have to care for layers of creativity? What about the audience?

What about the contraries? It’s common that young creatives tend to give everything they have in their first big projects…

What do you think?

 

 

The Art of Unfinished Art

If you explore books, quotes, articles about Art, you always meet the concept of “finished/unfinished“.

And this is what you find :

ONE

A whole lot of “simple” authors who seem to have common sense and think Art is like a normal part of society. They all say that a piece of Art must be finished :

• “Never show unfinished work.” – R. Buckminster Fuller
• “Behind unfinished art cries an unfinished artist.” – Terri Guillemets
• “Finish the work, otherwise an unfinished work will finish you.” ― Amit Kalantri
• “I know the sag of the unfinished poem. And I know the release of the poem that is finished.” – Mary Oliver

This sounds very good, right? It’s very satisfying. Everything must be finished, otherwise the world goes to chaos…

TWO

Another whole lot of artists, of course, say the contrary. Suddenly it becomes interesting :

• “I always believed that my work should be unfinished in the sense that I encourage people to add their creativity to it, either conceptually or physically.” – Yoko Ono
• “When I’m playing, I’m never through. It’s unfinished. I like to find a place to leave for someone else to finish it. That’s where the high comes in.” – Miles Davis
• “Art is never finished, only abandoned.” – Leonardo da Vinci
• Put your energy into ‘finishing’ – and you’re missing your next great painting. (J.R. Baldini)
• In talking about the necessity to finish a thing, we said American painters finish a thing that looks unfinished, and the French, they finish it. I have seen Matisses that were more unfinished and yet more finished than any American painters. Matisse was obviously in a terrific emotion at the time and he was more unfinished than finished. (William Baziotes)
• I don’t like finished things, because finished is over, dead. (Norbert Bisky)
• To the impressionist, the work was finished, no matter how casual the execution, when the idea was completely realized on the canvas. (Richard J. Boyle)
• How do you complete a painting, really? There are paintings by so many different artists that are interesting precisely because they haven’t really been completed. (Peter Doig)

 

Many masterpieces are unfinished : symphonies and cathedrals, Proust “La Recherche”, but most of modernity artists and thinkers know that finishing a work is killing it, it masks the work, the soul…

I found dozens more quotes. Each one could lead to an article…

What do you think?

 

Thanks for reading!

Cf Non Finito : Inchoateness in Art

 

 

Bastien Vives, French comic book artist

Bastien Vives is a Type. I use his work here to talk about these artists, who are :

Fast. Talented. Minimalist.

Economy of means is fascinating. As you see, a hair (or a face) is made of a few lines. No need for eyes sometimes. It says something, it showsonly what is needed, it also shows also an attitude : let’s be fast, casual, and genuine.

I wonder who I’d put into this splendid basket : Musicians? Movie directors? Writers? Do you have an idea?

Thanks for reading!

 

One-Lined Ideas for Writers, Part II

The suites of transformations you need to express things, respecting the conditions your have to respect.

You write, you read what you just wrote, in a loop. A closed balanced between you and you. A pleasure can resonate.

Pull weapons out of other people’s work – to use you own resources.

Find the person you write for – even if this person does not really exist. Golem it.

Use what is made for use. Find a drawer : open it. Break what is fragile. Push what tilts.

Try what has never be done, but appears as possible.

Your work can always been gone back over. This is your job. Find your “until”.

Try a thousand ways to write an idea until you meet a favorable words figure.

Find a force. Find where to use it. Apply a force.

At one moment you are attracted by what is needed, by what goes forward to the goal.

You dream to write, you desire to write, you call. But it’s not to be confused with the state where you MAKE.

Our most precious states are unstable – the artist answers trying to stabilize them.

What you feel. What you do. What you want to make feel.

 

All these microseeds come from Paul Valéry‘s Poietis (Poïétique). They aren’t quotes, I kneaded them for your pleasure. Have fun.

One-Lined Ideas for Writers, Part I

Thanks for reading!

Juan Martínez Bengoechea, #painter

It’s about people in the 1920s, doing things you don’t understand, or posing like in front of an imaginary photograph. My eyebrows are moving up, that’s it! I kind of like the movement it triggers in my mind : a wonder, most of the time…

http://juanmartinezbengoechea.com/

Have a great day!

Jean-Pascal

 

Alex Coxville, Canadian painter

Alex Coxville (1920-2013) was a Canadian painter. I like him because of the uncertain mood we often find in his work. It’s troubling but harmlessly. It’s quiet but strange. It’s daily, but like in a dream – notice his use on “there’s no shadow”. And I love his way to choose a funny point of view, hiding things we would like to see…

 

Here are 10 paintings :

 

You’re great / You’re not great anymore : has your talent evaporated?

Break-ups are interesting – for this little dial.

When your lover is your lover, he (or she) admires what you do. And who you are, obviously.

You’re a great poet, a “great photographer”, a great musician, a great lecturer. “You’re great my love!”. “I love your work to much!”.

That’s cool, that’s common, that’s very invigorating : you have talent!

But after the break-up you’re not. You’re not “anymore”.

Blehhh!

You’re not that good anymore. You’re not a good photographer. You music is boring. You poems, lame. Shame on you, now! It seems that exes are exes.

Well, so what? Where’s the truth, Brady?

Your mind wonders. Your brain thinks. Your engine engines :

• Maybe you “suddenly” are not good anymore really. You lost it!
• Maybe he/she changed his/her mind.
• Maybe he/she was fake from the beginning : you’ve never been good! Bim!
• Maybe you stayed talented, gifted, but he/she won’t admit it. Pride.
• Maybe you’re good, but he/she’s not interested now.
• Maybe he/she found better. It’s relativism. You’re good but less good than.
• Maybe he/she HAS to stay silent. Because.

 

What do you think? What happened?

Thanks for reading!

 

from Instagram: http://ift.tt/2gL8YjG

Poumeyrol, French painter

Jean-Marie Poumeyrol was born in 1946. This French painter is said to be a “fantastic realist” (which probably must makes him smile). Symbols. Erotica. Lands. Boats…

I like him a lot for a couple or reasons : it’s gorgeous, but also enigmatic. Some paintings are like… games, riddles. You need time to see things, guess what’s happening (whose shoes are they, in the first picture?), etc…

But as usual with great artists, photographers, poets, painters : words are very, very weak to explain. So :

 

Socrates has a question for you

I read one day that Socrates asked to a master of ballet :

“Who are you and… how do you know?“.

There are many questions you can ask to someone you’re interested in, where do you come from? or what happened in your life? or what’s new? or what are you working on? or tell me what’s difficult? or what did you learn? or who is important in your life?, etc, but :

How do you “know” means a lot. How do you increase your knowledge? What is your package, your bond to reality, your system, your measures? Do you read? Do you watch things, people, actions? Do you think? Do you remember? In what way? What do you seek? What is the nature or the knowledges you pile up in your brain? Do you have models? How is it cleared up? What for? Are you curious, where, how, and why? What are you weary of? Senses? Interpretations? Where could we be mistaken, why? Do you need to understand or to change something?

It could seem pointless, but I don’t think it is. Because these questions ask about this :

What is your out/in interface with the world, and how does it work?

Just an example : memory. We all know that our memory is not perfect, and THAT is interesting : it doesn’t work properly, this is why we can work, interpret, metathink, analyse, retry, write, rethink, etc…

You’re a photographer : how do you know? You have your technical skills, right? And then? How do you know what to photograph? How do you know when to trigger? How do you know if the frame or the light is OK? How do you… make progress?

Now play this game with others :

Tool : How do you KNOW?

…when you’re a poet, a photographer, a teacher, a priest, a spouse, a journalist, a blogger, a writer, an architect.

And yesss, haecceity : you can be all of them, right?

Thanks for reading!

Let us enrich ourselves with our mutual differences.

Paul Valéry

 

 

Mikhail Vrubel, Russian Painter

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikhail_Vrubel

Vrubel (1856-1910) was a Russian Painter.

You can Google Image his name or “Михаи́л Алекса́ндрович Вру́бель” to find his work. It’s haunting, like made of scales, and it’s a perfect example, for me, or strangeization. 

When you encounter his work, there’s a chance your brain begins to… like… address his case. It’s a very good indication, for me!

After the picture of his Seated Demon, there’s a fragment of the right part, like it?

Thanks for reading!

Reasons why some people reject modern #Art

Nathalie Heinich is a French sociologist. She studied the reasons why people disliked modern art. Here’s a part of her list. What will you do about it?

Values in the domain of modern art rejection :

• It’s disgusting, unpleasant
• It’s not beautiful
• It’s not art
• It’s meaningless
• A child could do the same
• It’s made to get noticed
• It’s made to make money
• Lack of inspiration
• It’s not serious
• It’s dangerous
• It’s obstructing the pathway
• It’s useless
• It’s unpopular, incomprehensible
• It’s racist, sexist, obscene, cruel

Thanks for reading!

Instagram : lena_rx

Fruitful Constraints & Creativity

It’s an old tool many artists know : many constraints are fruitful. Mainly because a constraint is a problem calling for a solution, therefore you have to move, to be creative.

All jobs and activities have constraints : budget, environment, other people, time, space, your skills, your tools.

If it’s too loose, though, you feel a freedom, which can be messy. You can not catch anything. Stuck. You maybe need to tight something up, to find “your” freedom within a new frame.

Brian Eno invented the Oblique Strategies (mainly for musicians) as a card game. You pick a card and you have to obey (sometimes it’s terrible!). Some directors are well known to tell the actors to follow precisely something (the dialogs, or the places they have to move on the set, etc) before shooting. Some digital artists sometimes go out in a park with a pencil and a notebook. A photographer can go outside with the limit of 20 pictures taken, not much. And G. Perec wrote an entire book without the letter “e”.

Constraints are fruitful. You probably have many disposable levers for these. A poet can obey : write something in alexandrine; without any letter “p”, in less than 5 minutes. You may have to present a project in ONE minute only, and… with no words. What are your levers?

You can pull a lever to Zero, it’s the Total Constraint. For example, you’re a photographer and you go out without any camera. Just your eye. You’ll feel the need, you’ll feel your brain simmering. As you can only watch and… think, you’ll maybe have bursts of ideas (instead of taking pictures).

Of course it’s an example of “Amor Fati”, being content with what happens to you, even if it seems bad. Embracing fate : every constraint, if you can’t avoid it, should (and will have to) be danced with.

Thanks for reading!

Instagram : f_pilvi

Aaron Nakahara’s Digital Art

I’m just an ignorant in this field, but I often wander on DeviantArt to discover digital artists. There are masters, there are thousands of interesting artists. And sometimes, in the middle of bunches of good ones,  your eyebrows never stop to get up. Like “Heyyyy”…

Aaron Nakahara – Cobaltplasma is one of them.

There’s a good path to follow to begin : explore his favorites in Deviant Art : http://cobaltplasma.deviantart.com/gallery/. You’ll find artists with a talent for : faces, drama, landscapes, darkness or colors, space, energy or perspective. This “door” could be enough to explore the whole website : explore their favorites’ too, and you have your own pathway into this, out of “popular” things, etc.

Him? I like his freedom and the part of casualness you smell in his fast sketches. His sense of exaggeration is amazing! His lines…

He writes a little text under some of his drawings, I invite you to read them.

It makes me wonder : will this guy become a master in finished pieces, or in his “30 mn” sketches?

Thanks for reading!

http://www.denjin108.com/

https://www.artstation.com/artist/cobaltplasma

https://www.instagram.com/cobaltplasma

When a poet laughs of a painting (in relief!)

William Carlos Williams, recalling his first viewing of Marcel Duchamp’s Nude Descending a Staircase : “I burst out laughing from the relief it brought me! I felt as if an enormous weight had been lifted from my spirit for which I was infinitely grateful”.

Art advance can open paths for other arts. If you’re interested you’ll study the links between WC Williams and Duchamp. BUT you even don’t have to, to activate some ideas.

Duchamp’s abstraction is about decomposing the movement, of course, but there’s also a game with the title. If the title was “XY-56”, your mind wouldn’t have been engaged the same way, right? What would be the same in poetry? What can this bring to a poet? A game with a title? A decomposing symbol/word/frame process? A sense of freedom, and daring?

Tool :

Whenever you feel stuck or not, it could be interesting to explore “other fields”. Maybe if you’re a musician you should study avant-garde architecture, and if you blog, maybe you could read about strangeization? You’re a manager? Why wouldn’t you read anthropology, then?

Thanks for reading!

Umberto Eco & the Open Work

Umberto Eco wrote an entire book about the idea of Open Work. I just present you here this idea, as a seed, that a “work” has an openness.

A work “appears” like this or like that, but has a number of ways of being read (seen, viewed, watched, decoded, interpreted, appreciated, contemplated, analyzed). This seems obvious for the sheet music, the score, or for a play, right?

1. There’s maybe an “obvious” openness, a prescribed way to read a work, but it can be a little more vague, like a set of possibilities – until complete crypticness : find what you can, if you dare to do it, then.
2. Some elements are often chosen by the artist to let the audience appropriate the work their way, but not “that” their way. Symbolic novels are obviously made for this purpose (Kafka is an example given by Eco).
3. Opened or not, some people do what they want with a piece of work. It’s a whole decision, it requires culture, or tools, or ways of finding things.
4. Some works, this way, can be enriched by a clever spectator, who would be delighted by elements, details, structures… the artist himself ignore!
5. In classical music or theater, there’s a place between the work (the score) and the audience. The players (or the actors) have a big role about “how they see it”. But after that level, the audience will also interpret things…
6. We probably want to find bonds between the work we study and our own searches, flaws, experiences…
7. Add yours in the comments, please?

 

Tool : If you work out of the “artistic field”, in blogging, marketing, conversation, fashion, coaching, I’m sure you consider many parameters. You can make a list, right? Timeline, colours, variety, energy, waits, etc, there are many levers to pull. But have you considered the “openness” of what you propose?

 

Thanks for reading!

“Nommer un objet c’est supprimer les trois quarts de la jouissance du poème, qui est faite du bonheur de deviner peu a peu : le suggérer . . . voila le rêve”

“To name an object is to suppress three-fourths of the enjoyment of the poem, which is composed of the pleasure of guessing little by little: to suggest . . . there is the dream”

Mallarmé

Instagram : jacopo.rigotti

Andrew Haines, painter

Andrew Haines has a talent for light, or for shadows… I keep watching his work in a awe.

What is his secret… to make these banal places so… what’s the word, here?

This “realism” has the capacity of making of feel “as if” you were there, right? I can almost feel the air, the wind…

Isn’t it the power of poetry?

 

www.andrewhainespaintings.com

https://www.instagram.com/andrewhainespaintings/

Clark Gallery

 

 

Break Ups & Taking Things into Consideration

This winter I’ve been invited for lunch by a couple, I spent a delicious day talking with them and other friends, and the lady of the house lent me a CD of the music composed by… her ex-husband.

I was amazed by that, because divorced people have a nasty tendency to hate everything linked to their ex-lover – they love solemn dramas, probably.

If your love has a talent (for photography, poetry, writing, composing, lecturing or singing), why the hell this person would become a Dumb Zero once the love story is over??? Mmhh?

“Taking things into consideration” is a simple good tool (we say “Faire la part des choses” in French, “to make portions of things” which makes sense, I think) :

Take the pie, cut the love off : the person stays the same! Magic!

“Listen to this CD, tell me if you like it!”, with a big smile : her ex was good in this area. And well, he stayed a good composer…

Or… if you said to your crush he/she’s a good photographer, and you really don’t think he/she is, it means that… oh no, no no no no no no : that’s impossible, right?

Thanks for reading!