Category: purposes and ponderances

February 25, 2014

I painted a red fish. So there’s that.

“Red Fish” painting by BZTAT

My usual forte is paintings of dogs or cats or some other sort of pet. Fish can be pets, but truthfully, this one is not. It is simply a red fish in the sea that I took a notion to paint. I am not sure why.

“One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish”? I dunno. A series could follow, but it is not pressing.

A red herring? Perhaps. I could be distracting you from some truth to be disclosed later on.

But for now, let’s just go with, I painted a red fish, and that’s all there is to it.

(The painting is for sale if you are interested. Contact me for the details.)

January 12, 2014

I have a secret.

I must, right? I am an artist, and artists create things that no one else can create. We have insights and methods that are outside the reach of others, and we do things that inspire comments like, ” I wish I could paint like that!”

There has to be a secret if others cannot grasp it, yes?

The funny thing is, I don’t feel like I have a secret. What I do is just what I do, and I just go about doing it every day, enjoying the process most of the time. Sometimes the process is a struggle and not exactly enjoyable, but I do it in pursuit of an outcome that is ultimately satisfying.

Some of what I do is a matter of skill that has been carefully honed over the years. It is not so secret. Many of my processes are easily analyzed and revealed.

Other aspects to my process, though, are more conceptual and intuitive. They are less obvious and more oblique to the casual eye. I guess that these aspects are what intrigue people the most. They are also what make my work uniquely mine.

My point in musing about all of this is to let you know that none of my artistic “secrets” are intentionally guarded as such. I don’t purposefully create a mystique about my creative process and prevent others from trying to duplicate it. I am secure in my ability and my unique perceptions, so I do not fear that others will copy and achieve identical results.

That is the real secret.

Each person has their own personal identity that ultimately shines through in their art, so even purposefully attempted copies of another’s work reveals something about the actual artist and not the one imitated.

I like to help others discover their creative selves, and I enjoy sharing about my own experiences to facilitate that process for people. I am very open to sharing my techniques and processes in the hopes that others will use them as a way to explore their creativity and try new things.

So if there was one “secret” that I could reveal to help you in that process, what would it be?

Ask away in the comments here. Future blog posts will take up your questions and hopefully help reveal the secrets to your own creative potential!

Life is an Adventure!

BZTAT

January 11, 2014

Posted on Medium.com: I’m Becoming a Cranky Art Fuddy Duddy.

This article originally appeared on medium.com. See the article in it’s entirety here.

Anyone can revolt. It is more difficult silently to obey our own inner promptings, and to spend our lives finding sincere and fitting means of expression for our temperament and our gifts. ~ Georges Rouault

A couple of my friends recently went to the acclaimed Art Basel show in Miami, FL. Ever the social media virtuosos that they are, they posted photos of some of the most shocking and bizarre artworks that they witnessed there on their Facebook pages. I wanted to hurl. Perhaps that was the reaction the artists wanted.

I am happy to see my non-artist friends exploring the arts. I have to wonder, though, if it really enhances their cultural awareness to be exposed to the most banal aspects of human expression marketed as the “ Modern and contemporary art world’s premier platform for bringing together artists and their patrons in a way that is both engaging and personal.”

I went to art school in the 1980’s and was taught to be open to a variety of expressive forms and methods. I learned to excoriate Victorian attitudes that stifled artistic freedom, and I heralded groundbreaking artists who “broke the rules.” I was taught to appreciate anything that broke with tradition and was “non-representational”.

But lately, I find myself wondering, have we gone too far?

Read the rest of the article at Medium.com.