For the Band

Although we categorize modern art as beginning after World War II, our view of the modern artist began in 16th century Italy—where the role of the artist changed dramatically—from a nameless artisan for hire to an artist whose signature and individual expression became a source of collectibility.

From An Artist Empowered:

Historically, art hasn’t been perceived as an act of independence or self-expression, either. The archetype for the ‘modern’ artist who is appreciated for his unique vision started to take shape about 500 years ago during the Renaissance (rebirth) in Italy, and most conspicuously under the patronage of the Medici: the ruling family of Florence.

Prior to this unique flowering of art and connoisseurship, artists didn’t create a ‘personal’ art that was for sale in galleries or auctioned off for large sums to avid collectors. Artists were cataloged as workers; and their art, rather than an artifact devoted solely to pure contemplation, served some utilitarian purpose.

Sensei

While there is continuing controversy over beauty and truth in art, it’s heartening to know that some artists have figured it out for themselves.

In his 1973 documentary Painters Painting, filmmaker Emile de Antonio interviewed many of the figures, including Barnett Newman, who, after the Second World War, had fueled the abstract expressionism movement in New York City.

Barnett: “Yes, because many years ago at a conference in Woodstock that was held with a panel consisting of philosophers—esthetes, really, professors of philosophy, professors of esthetics—and artists, I declared that even if they were right, and even if they could build a system, an esthetic system that they could claim explained the activity, the creative activity, it would be of no value, because esthetics for the artist was as meaningful as ornithology must be for the birds.”

Are We Alone

The possibility is both seductive and spectacular; speculating on it one way or another is grist for the popular mill.

I submit a more fundamental query: The question is not why are we here; the question is why are you here.

Answer this and then feel free to speculate to your heart’s content.

Salvador Dali’s Crucifixion

Spanish artist Salvador Dali, a leading Surrealist painter noted for his visions of dreamworlds in which commonplace objects are juxtaposed or deformed in a bizarre and irrational fashion, was born this day in 1904.

Some may say that Dali was arrogant. While I don’t hold arrogance in great esteem, at least, he had something to be arrogant about.

From An Artist Empowered:

Do not fake something you aren’t—a trap that befalls many an artist. As you will, I trust, come to appreciate, this book focuses on the soul self, which is on a mission that transcends any ego-based desire for self-fulfillment that can never satisfy.

Why?

Fulfillment of the self, like the birth of art, cannot be bought, sold, bequeathed, or traded like a commodity. It must be earned through tests of character, which is what this book is all about. To a casual observer, however, the uncompromising commitment of the transcendental self can be mistaken for an ego orchestrated trip. It will be up to you to discern this difference in others and perhaps more important, in your own self.

“Every morning when I awake, the greatest of joy is mine: that of being Salvador Dali.”

—Salvador Dali (egoist or egotist?)

Gauguin’s World

French painter Paul Gauguin, noted for his “primitive” expression of spiritual and emotional states in his work and his artistic experimentation, died this day in 1903.

Loving, collecting, and selling art before becoming an artist himself is the path taken by one of van Gogh’s contemporaries.

In 1879, at the age of thirty-one, Paul Gauguin was employed as a stockbroker’s agent in Paris earning a respectable yearly income of 30,000 francs (over $100,000 today). Gauguin, a Sunday painter in those days, spent his weekends studying with Camille Pissarro, a French Impressionist painter who suffered financial hardship in pursuing his faith in Impressionism while rejecting the aesthetic tenets conveyed by the Academie des Beaux-Arts.

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