Potboilers

Your best work will not be produced via commission. Your best work will come from your own vision, undiluted by anyone else's input, and achieved from long uninterrupted hours at your easel. That said, we illustrators thrive on the crazy adrenaline rush of assignments that come at us in a flurry and fly out of our studios just as quickly, leaving us wild-eyed and tired with some money in our pockets. The commissioned project can give us a sense of accomplishment and pride but cannot in the long run sustain us or boost us to the next level of individual skill or personal idea formulation. Assuming that you desire a fulfilling art career in which you get to lavish your attention and manual skills on ideas and projects that you love, then you may want to rethink what projects you take on.

A career made of fast, short projects or uninspiring commissioned work will *never* allow an artist to really hone any rigorous painting or drawing skills other than perhaps how to cut corners for speed. Duh, right? Fast short projects can occasionally be a good exercise for making the illustrator to have to think quickly, sometimes producing clever results. However, this too can eventually go awry since those initially clever solutions can become gimmicky or produce cookie-cutter responses. We see this happening in a lot of the F+SF industry; when artists are asked to design, rough out, and execute a project in color within a few days, many of the solutions become formulaic. Much of the children's science and educational industry is geared towards this kind of production as well. Schedules are often so tight that artists adopt "styles" from whatever is trending in any given season. Fine artists, too, occasionally take on uninspiring commissions for quick income and do so to their own detriment when they allow the patron to dictate the outcome.

Young illustrators looking for quick entry into the industry, the promise of "getting one's feet wet", "exposure", or the feeling of "paying your dues" are always tempted by potboilers. Female illustrators are even more susceptible to falling into the potboiler trap and never getting out. The social reality of women's lives is that mothers' and caretakers' time doesn't often include long uninterrupted hours for big projects; small assignments can be completed in very short bursts and can tolerate incessant interruptions. In an industry like F+SF where rigorous painting and drawing skills are more valued and monetized, the potboiler trap may be greatly implicated as to why there are fewer women illustrators in this genre.

Almost all artists see potboilers as a pathway to "bigger and better things." What is this "bigger and better" thing? And can't we just skip right to it?

Potboilers don't pay all that well so the bar for quality is set a bit lower; the company isn't taking any real economic risks with these works. Depending on how fast you work, you may be able to crank out a dozen or more of these in a month's time in order to pay the bills. Month after month and year after year you may have your bills paid, but will you really satisfied with a career built on throwaway commissions? If you're not spending an equal amount of time on your own personal projects, then your *career* is eroding your artistic desire and you will eventually lose your artistic integrity.

I will say it again: short, fast, throwaway projects will *never* bump you up to the level of the "big players." Why? Because quick and dirty commissioned work is not the same thing as honing your skills or developing a sustained lifetime practice in art. Ask yourself: why did you get into this in the first place?

Better commissions pay more, have lengthier turnaround time, and offer the artist more say in the conceptual process. By paying the artist more, the company is taking more risk and investing in the artists' vision.These are rare commissions and seasoned illustrators are more likely to secure them. If you aren't able to get these commissions right now because you need to build up your "artistic vision capital" within the industry, then the bigger and better thing is having your own "fine art", personal work to do. It is better to spend your time working on your own ideas. stories, and developing a rigorous practice than to waste your time and effort on crappy commission work.

It is the luxury of time spent on a project that an artist needs most of all. Time to conceptualize an idea and plan out a series of images that best carry that idea. Time to grex and mull over the drawings and make revisions if necessary. Time to plan the color and value structure. Time to luxuriate in the medium. It is quality studio time only that will produce excellence in the artist.

If Other Professions Were Paid Like Artists

Art by Melanie Gillman

The Hawkeye Intiative

One of the most socially important memes out there is perhaps the genderflip, and one of the FUNNIEST collections of this strategy is contained in the site, The Hawkeye Initiative. The blog's premise is that in order to identify sexism in the comic book/ graphic novel industry, all one has to do is to flip the gender of the image portrayed. So, if a female superhero's "Strong Female Pose" looks a little suspicious, you can bet that if you put male superhero, Hawkeye, in her place its inherent sexism will be exposed...

      

                         Here, Avengelyne gets the Hawkeye treatment from artist Deimos-Remus on Deviantart.com. 
                                                                        "Owww... got to get to the chiropractor..."

What's really cool about this site is that it allows comic book lovers of all stripes to create their own artwork in response to the ridiculousness of what the industry is publishing, and upload that content (along with the original example) and add it to the site. In this way, it is a curated collection of images that exposes and isolates the sexism embedded and naturalized in the images, and educates the community of comic book viewers to what is really happening within the genre.When the viewer can bring her new awareness to her reading of these stories she can then commit to buying the comic books that already offer better representations of its female characters, and use her purchasing power to demand the industry to produce less-demeaning alternatives. It also offers the aspiring artist a lot of insight into how to authentically empower her own female characters.


              

"Enter now... oof... I think my hip just went out...." (Gambit & The Externals/ Tony Daniels)

And more silly stuff. We humans are a funny lot. 

"Wait! Don't shoot muh package..."  (Jose Malaga/ Jeffrey Dean)

You Don't Know How I Feel

If you are a female, having a career within the art world means that you will be confronted with several issues with which your male counterparts won't necessarily have to contend. To women working in the narrower field of illustration and the F+SF genre in particular, some of these issues are more glaring and others less obtrusive, but all still meriting our attention. Since inception in 1985, an anonymous band of feminist artists called The Guerilla Girls, have been bringing these issues to the fore with its sharp and funny insight into the corporate art institutions' sexist, racist, and corrupt practices and policies, The group has illuminated for over a generation what remains unfair and patently ridiculous about corporate arts culture.

Several of the issues that the group has identified are: unequal representation in museums and national shows, the almost complete lack of representation for artists of color, the fetishization / glamorization of violence against women, unequal pay in the marketplace (women artists earn only *1/3* of what male artists do), having to choose between a career and parenthood, being seen only as another's protege, reinforced hetero-normative values, having your work labeled as "feminine", and so on.

Ingres creepy extra-vertebrated creature gets a reboot.

Are any of these issues personally familiar to you?  You will have, as a female artist, person of color, or different sexual orientation, undoubtedly bumped up against some aspects of this culture at some point in your career. Many other illustrators who've worked in the publishing industry for any length of time will recognize many parallels in their own working sphere.

When we examine more closely the specific experiences of women illustrators working in the F+SF field, we find that many of these issues are simultaneously nullified and amplified.

Of the many artist friends with whom I've conversed about these issues admit to mostly having difficulties with spousal support of their career. Artists who are also parents are expected to automatically shoulder the domestic and child care duties in addition to busy careers, particularly if the spouse with whom s/he shares a household  is a higher wage earner.  Some aspiring young artists feel that they are inevitably faced with a choice of career vs motherhood, and decide to forego the latter entirely. Though partnered, these artists are still expected to attend to the daily household chores. Laundry, cleaning, shopping, cooking, etc., take a substantial chunk of time, time that could be spent on one's career.

And let's be honest for a moment: for a man, choosing a career in art it is thought to be his "calling." He is considered a professional artist. His wife becomes the high priestess in service to his mission, both of them working hard to ensure that he "makes it big" someday. But the reverse commitment is rarely true. A woman's choice to have an art career is not often heralded with equal enthusiasm and may be dismissed as only a dabbler, a dilettante. Oh dearie me, an art career? Well, you need to get married so someone can support your hobby. Yes, this double-standard really exists.

Persistent issues of fewer work hours, lack of domestic support, and general lack of emotional support of women's artistic endeavors are tied insidiously into the issue of lower pay. But add to this the industry's insult by way of "ghettoization' of women's creative work, and you have a perfect system that makes it incredibly more difficult for women to successfully establish themselves as professional creatives. That the publishing industry labels women's work as "feminine" and perceives it as a liability is a well-known fact. It is why many female authors choose male pen names and often write about male heroes and protagonists instead of female ones.

Some may say that the more disturbing aspect of swimming in these testosterone-filled waters, where the industry's profits come mostly from the discretionary money of white males 14-40,  is feeling that one must cave in to creating the work that the industry wants. Because gratuitous violence, aggrandizement of war, and gratuitous female nudity (masturbation melons?) is the bulk of we see in the comic book industry /F+SF, many of us conform to this industry standard by offering up the same kind of work, a general regurgitation of the sanctioned stories within the accepted formulas that has been in force since the genre was born.

Well, what's wrong with it? You might decide that it's perfectly okay to reinforce the status quo and perpetuate the sexualization of violence, misrepresentation (or entire lack of representation) of women and other people on the margins, the romanticization of specific gender roles, etc. You can do this by creating work that is exactly like what has been published for several generations in the western market.

Or you can do something more fun. You can subvert it. Use the form and turn it on its head.

Several contemporary realist painters offer some insight into how this might be done. In an earlier post, I mentioned the work of contemporary fantastic painter, Odd Nerdrum. I offer his work as an example of a classical, Renaissance-style painter who is not a romanticist. John Currin's another one. His beautifully rendered work, while amusing, is deeply disturbing in its candor. And Lisa Yuskavage's seductively grotesque work "one-ups masculinity" by amplifying the female body in all the right places, adding that touch of a soft romantic glow in the colors and value structure, yet the combination of her style and the content leaves the viewer feeling more than a little queasy about one's suddenly realized assumptions.

These painters have taken the traditional form of romanticist realist painting and subject matter (formal portraits, the fantastic-heroic, and sexuality) and have used it to subvert that which it was originally used to aggrandize. Their combinations of fantasy and realism help to drive home their message of the myth and how it depersonalizes. They insist that we take an uncomfortably close look at the ways in which we have fetishized ourselves.

Now that more women than ever are working as illustrators and artists, we have a big opportunity here to change the industry from the inside out. We are on the cusp of a big paradigm shift. Ours is one of the few industries in which its practitioners have actual first-person control over the ways in which we can represent ourselves and tell our stories. It's a huge advantage and we should make the best of it while we can and set some higher, better standards. Are you on board?

The 99

Like superheroes and comics? How about multicultural ones? What if they're Muslim? In a world where certain ideologies are often twisted so that they are perceived as representative of one narrow and intolerant viewpoint, here's one astonishing and ambitious effort to change that.  Using the comic book platform, Naif Al-Mutawa's goal is to create a new moral framework within Islam for confronting evil. With his story of The 99, he and his team hope to "smash stereotypes and battle extremism" while entertaining its readers with stories of hope and positive moral lessons. Here, in this TED talk, Al-Mutawa explains his creative mission, drawing several comparisons to the creators of Superman:

http://www.ted.com/talks/naif_al_mutawa_superheroes_inspired_by_islam.html

Fighting the lack of multi-cultural representation within the comic book world industry since 2010...

 From TED:

Widad the Loving, Bari the Healer, Mumita the Destroyer and friends, all working together to fight evil -- the virtues of Islam are embodied in the characters of the thrilling new comic The 99. Naif Al-Mutawa, a clinical psychologist by training, created the characters with a team of artists and writers to showcase traditional, tolerant and enlightened Muslim values in the guise of good old-fashioned superheroes, ordinary mortals who acquire special powers and crisscross the globe on missions.

In a crossover comic series with the Justice League in 2010, The 99 were saving the world alongside all-American heroes like Superman, Batman, and a fully-clothed Wonder Woman. Al-Mutawa's creative team also launched an animated cartoon series on the US cable channel, The Hub.

Seeing that this is a comic inspired by Islam, you're not likely to see any representative LGBT characters-- but then, it's taken DC a while to out Batwoman. However, this is still quite an interesting and inspiring project that holds promise to be a good force in the world. 

A Portfolio Strategy

If you're an aspiring illustrator and need to create a portfolio or you're tired of the one you've got and need to entirely revamp it, here's a tried-and-true strategy for building a portfolio fairly quickly within a year's time. This method also works for building a body of work for an upcoming gallery show:

1. Make a list of 100 wonderful image ideas. This list should be a fairly direct reflection of your aesthetics  and influences and what you want to look at. Love landscapes and natural places? Make a list of all the real and imagined places you'd like to "see" in paint. Love mythology and spirituality? Make a list of all the interesting deities and or arcana that you think would be cool to visualize. Love pirates and mermaids? ... You get it.

In doing this exercise, your content, if you didn't already know what it was, will begin to emerge through the subject matter. This is your theme, and more often than not it is a mashup of several things. For example, you may enjoy painting sweeping landscapes *and* women on horseback. This means that you are either interested in the Southwestern genre of painting or, changing a few of the details, perhaps the historical or fantasy genre. How realistically you paint, how much historical accuracy you engage in, can determine the philosophical direction in which you go.

2. Cherry-pick the best ideas and begin making sketches / drawings. Do this until you have at least 50 drawings. Some ideas will turn out to be duds and other, more innocuous ideas, may turn out to be spectacular. Keep drawing. Don't worry about anatomical accuracy yet. Don't use reference. At this stage you are only designing the idea and getting it directly out of your head and onto paper. You can go back later and grex over all the specifics and details. Work on standard 8 x 10 paper or similar-- not too big-- a sketchbook size. (If you're working on old-fashioned paper, be sure you love the feel of it. Suggestion: smooth vellum is awesome.) It may take you six months to work this out.

Yes, this will be the most difficult part of this process for most, but it gets easier once you begin to identify the creative elements that "move you" to make art in the first place. 50 drawings is really not such a crazy idea. You will need this many drawings in this mode of thinking - and perhaps more-- to get comfortable with who you are as an artist and what makes you tick. (If you're not a "linear" thinker and prefer value patches, then by all means, make small b&w studies in a different medium; the method will still work.)

3. Then, you will cherry-pick the top 10- 15 drawings to execute in color. Depending on the degree of finish that you gave the drawings, you may have to tighten them up. At this stage, bolt down any specifics for the painting, like value structure, anatomy, perspective, etc., so that your "blueprint" will be as effective as you need it. Refer often to artists whose color / facture work inspires and educates you.

That's it. Plan a year for this process, 6 months if you're fast. It works.
Have fun creating!

The Chameleon

You're traveling with a fairly new friend in an unknown part of the country, through backwoods and small towns, and you stop for gas. It's the first time you've spent any extended period of time with this friend outside of the city for any reason and it is going pretty well.

350 miles later, you pull into a small station for a stretch break and fuel, and you head to the loo. When you return, you find that while you were gone she has been engaged in an extended conversation with the station owner who has pumped the gas and wiped the windshield. The weird thing, see, is that all of a sudden she has a thick country drawl that you've never heard before.

Ok, so maybe you admire the Chameleon's ability to "manipulate" people like this.  Perhaps you approve of the fact that they know how to "blend in" and make others comfortable by being like them. Perhaps you even ARE one of these chameleons.

The problem with the talented Mr. Ripley's strategy, apart from the fact that she cultivates a separate personality for each person she encounters, is that you don't really know the real person either because she has a "facet" for you too. You're just one more person in her conception of a particular "people model" that she emulates.

The bigger problem is that she may not even know who she is.

Unfortunately, this social chameleon model seems to have a counterpart in the art world: it is the artist who bends and flexes with what she thinks the industry wants. There are those who will say, "But, wait! The artist needs to acknowledge and fit into what the industry is doing! The artist must bend to the desires of the audience or they will never sell / be hired for anything!"

Is this true, or is it pandering? And is it even possible to be sui generis in an age whereby digital images of everyone's work constantly bombards us from all corners of social media?

The aspiring artist wants to be the greatest thing to hit the genre, and in her effort will latch on to what she thinks is the hottest trend that the industry is currently hawking. (Mermaids, anyone?) She will try to reproduce what her favorite artist(s) is doing and so becomes a copy-cat. However, the industry is rife with copycats, all trying on the "new thing," but, in the end they all end up, ironically, losing whatever uniqueness that may have allowed their work to stand out in the first place.  The work becomes just an echo of someone else's.

Start out by doing something different. Challenge the industry with your conceptions of what it -- and the world-- should look like.

A Case for College

You've already heard the argument that college is a waste of time and money for aspiring artists, but I would like to make the case for going to college. College--not art school.

Elsewhere in the blogosphere, some have proposed alternative educational methods and materials to achieve the technical skills necessary to work in the illustration field. For the cost of a few thousands of dollars, you can buy art books, seminars, classes with the "masters" and summer mentoring; they declare that an illustrator in the biz can be self-taught and fairly proficient after a period of dedicated work towards a professional portfolio. There are, indeed, a few big name illustrators who are self-taught and are living proof that this method can work. But, is this proof of the method itself, or is their success more a testament to their unique creative brilliance and sophistication? I would wager that even they would say that mere technical proficiency is not enough. It is not a guarantee of success even if you work your ass off.

So why would any aspiring artist go to college, spend all that moolah when she can get similar technical instruction on her own for a fraction of the cost of a brick and mortar school?

Because technical instruction isn't the same as developing a philosophy for a viable art practice.

(For the sake of full disclosure, I *do* indeed teach at a college, and so you may think my bias is economically driven, but that is absolutely nowhere near the reason for my argument.)

I was a self-taught illustrator for almost a decade before I decided to go back to school at 30. Part of not attending college sooner wasn't for lack of interest but more a lack of funds and time-- and, admittedly, some of it was bias against the "institution" of college. In that time, I had absorbed the art books, developed the technical skills, and had a ton of experience under my belt, but after almost ten years in the industry, doing the same work over and over again, it was obvious why I was so unhappy. With my practice no longer emotionally sustainable, college offered me an opportunity to study something new so I could get out of illustration purgatory.

So, my plan was to go to school, absorb all of the technical stuff for a job in another field, and begin to map out a new direction, maybe start at the bottom again somewhere in a lab...

And then the unexpected happened.

The introverted, socially oblivious, and ridiculously naive person that I was discovered that my real, actual life was more than just mastering a technical skill set and committing to memory random bits of esoteric trivia. Life is about being able to generate new and interesting ideas. Life, Art is critical thinking.

I devoured Philosophy, Ecology, History, Genetics, Feminist theory, and other disciplines, and these were intriguing to me merely for their own sake. But it suddenly dawned on me that these courses were the missing pieces of my art practice. Feminist theory specifically, helped me to develop the personal lens through which I was able to see how these seemingly disparate "other" kinds of study were crucial to making art. This discovery of the principle of integration is what changed my perspective about remaining as an artist; it is what allowed me to find my artistic "voice."

Besides developing the philosophical aspect of my work, It was the social experience that taught me more about what artistic skill levels I'd need to cultivate overall to move out of my stagnation and to reincarnate my art career. I found a whole host of interesting non-artists with whom I could associate: future scientists, musicians, actors, my professors, business students, accountants, nurses, all of whom shared their different and interesting thoughts and perspectives with me. Swimming in this milieu taught me more about human communication (verbal and non-verbal), the power of stories, and basic interconnectedness than I ever could have gotten in my own introverted bubble.

The technical fast-track, short-term quick-fix may put you in a career as an illustrator, but it takes more than that to create a sustainable art practice.

Is Fantasy Escapism?

I was at a women's symposium in Penn State in 2011, and after my talk, one of the lecture attendees asserted that F+SF is just plain "escapism." "Why," she asked, should we as feminists consider this [F+SF genre] as serious? What does it do for us except provide young people (read: males) with a means for fantasizing about sex? It is just a means for escaping reality!" Thus, to her, F+SF was a bad thing to be avoided and dismissed.

Recently, a young artist friend of mine writing to me expressed the opposite sentiment and illuminated for us the great utility of the genre: fantasy literature and art provided her a means of mental escape during a violent and ugly childhood. However, her current definition of the genre's use still extends mainly to cover what we might consider the typical-beautiful -- the light-filled, innocent, colorful images that populate children's books and fairy tales. That her use of it didn't go so far to include the genre's typical-horror (such as the work of popular HR Giger, designer of the Aliens trilogy) means that F+SF, like any art, is experienced through the subjectivity of one's own life.

These views are not unanticipated. To the first woman's complaint, I point in the direction of my friend's statement: the genre does indeed provide a place for escape from "the real world." As Jack Zipes has written in his book, Fairy Tales and the Art of Subversion, the fantasy genre has long been the place whereby the storyteller (writer) and listeners (readers) generate a certain psychic outcome for a reality that seems to lack justice. In early western Europe's era of feudal rule, where law and justice was a random occurrence, life was hard and bleak. Obtaining a just outcome for a wrongdoing was often not possible, so redress was sought by other means. Fairy tales and fantasy satisfied the need to feel that the world was right somehow and that life was worth living.

The main thing that I pointed out to the woman at the conference was that the genre provides an imagined space for safe existence. In addition to providing a child an emotional escape to a better family life that was full of love instead of pain, the F+SF genre was also home to the early underground LGBT movement: the mass market Pulp Fiction paperback genre during the 40s and 50s is yet another perfect example of the way in which this genre functions to allow that element which doesn't exist; for the unnamed, it is a place to be.

If we extend these rights to all seekers of the unimagined, then we must admit the less attractive underbelly of F+SF also lives there. All of this too, has a function, which I've discussed elsewhere on this blog.

The woman at the conference saw F+SF as just a haven for the unexamined privilege of a ruling class. While her assessment is absolutely right, the face of it is rapidly changing as the digital world democratizes the medium. This also means that there are more audience members, thus more eyes on monitoring the edges of the social contract and contributions made within all aspects of speculative fiction.

One last thought: imagining a better world for people doesn't mean you need to sugar-coat it. Children, in particular, deserve to know the truth of our world so that they can negotiate their way through it and out of harm's way. Safety of the escape doesn't mean that one turns one's back on the truth; it just means that one has to find ways to deal with it, let it out, find coping mechanisms for the ugliness. It means to find ways to not succumb to the darkness, but confront it, identify it, name it, and show it in all of its terrible aspects. This is how we can, as a social species, take evil's power away and reclaim it for the good.

Finally "Making It"

Those of us who enter any field of the arts recognize the phrase "making it." This is usually centered around the idea that once you gain a certain momentum in your work, that you've "made it." In the illustration field, it's about "breaking in," which means getting freelance work in the publishing industry.

For most aspiring artists, it's about being able to quit the boring day job and working full time at one's art. Others put a price tag on the achievement; making X dollars per year is the goal. For some it's all about recognition from one's peers and winning certain industry accolades. How do you define it?

I had a revelation recently that defines it yet another way. What if "making it" has nothing at all with the industry? What if it's purely about one's own satisfaction? What if it's only about the doing?

My own trajectory of "breaking into the field" long ago included a speedy 3-day transition from my day job as a house cleaner when I promptly got 2 books upon submitting my work to publishers (my first of many self promotional forays). Working in the children's science and educational market under the auspices of a well-known NYC agent, I began to define "making it" as not just being able pay my regular bills, but to have a "comfortable" life, ie. economic padding beyond an emergency fund.  After a decade of trying to get ahead, I became unhappy with my meager income, so I worked even harder; I hustled taking on more and more projects, really anything my agent set me (minus work from overtly religious institutions). I worked smarter, streamlining my technical skills even more, shortening the amount of seat time with time-saving strategies in design and facture.

Still, it wasn't enough.

I began to see that much of my frustration was borne of boredom with the science market. After 1000 or so paintings of Monarch butterflies, 1000s of paintings of the same big African Safari / Arctic/ Jungle fauna, 100s of images of the same species of flower under one's belt, one finds that one has painted them in every permutation possible --and then one begins to question the sanity of an industry that only uses certain commodifiable species over and over to generate its consumer base. It became imperative for me to get out.

According to my standards, I was no longer "making it" and this played havoc with my self-esteem. I felt like I was a failure. But at what? I was voluntarily leaving behind 20 years of clients and a solid reputation, but decided to strike out and try to "break into" another part of the illustration industry.

So, starting over....

Three years later, after having transitioned into to the F+SF genre, I am happier with my subject matter;  I am rejuvenated spiritually and my illustration practice is sustainable again. Teaching part-time at a local college, too, provides me with an important academic outlet that was missing. The additional income as an adjunct prof relieves the pressure on having to sell my soul; I can be choosy about what projects I accept as a freelancer. The bigger struggle, however, has been to redefine what it means for me to be "making it." No longer can I tie it to money or being completely self-employed, because teaching is something that I truly love and now wouldn't want to give that up. Neither can I tie it to recognition because I've walked away from those clients who used to ask for me by name. For me, real success-- making it-- has become the freedom to pick and choose the projects that I want to do. It means having the time to produce my own self-generated work in which my voice and my ideas are clearly represented.

How freeing.

Not surprisingly, "making it" has nothing to do with money, industry recognition, etc. It never has. It has to do with making the work. Yes, that's right. Every day that you get up and do your work is making it. When you come home from your day job, shut the door to your studio and get to work, that is making it.  When you produce something that you love, that is making it.

When it comes down to what you really get from art, you will find that there is no other substitute.

Odd Nerdrum

If you're an F+SF artist and you're not yet familiar with the great Scandinavian figure painter and fine artist, Odd Nerdrum, you're missing out on something great.  Nerdrum's work has a great affinity for the painting style the quality of timelessness that is contained in the works of Rembrandt, Civilius, Caravaggio, and Goya, and yet it is contemporary work.

 Self Portrait With Melting Eyes

"If you compare yourself with others, you lose - I am the hero in my own life." ~Odd Nerdrum, 1983.

Nerdrum's early work has a Modern/ Postmodern sensibility in that it deals with contemporary issues and modern settings, but that is where the work's art historical context ends. Because his work maintains painting as its modality, it aligns itself more closely with the spiritual and ideological underpinnings of Renaissance painters, employing such dramatic chiaroscuro lighting techniques of Caravaggio. His later work flirts with the artistic symbolist sensibilities of William Blake. However, telling the story of the human condition remains the insistent content of the work:

The Murder of Andreas Baader, 1977.

There is a turning point in his work whereby Nerdrum finds his particular voice.  Homey Scandinavian themes with Vikings now abound, and yet with this kitschy subject matter he has put his finger on a general aspect of humanity. He's tapped into the uncanny: a strange yet familiar feeling; scenes of twisted humans interacting with one another. Timelessness. These smells and human groupings are familiar to us.

The Water Protectors, 1985

"On the surface we are all profound and noble, but inside we are cruel and simple." ~Odd Nerdrum, 2007.

Here he humanizes and personalizes the simple mythology of Narcissus with a sweeping design that is simple and compelling:

Sole Morte, 1987

Nerdrum works with live models, friends, relatives, and often himself, which lends the images a certain continuity of form; these characters come from the same filtered, imagined universe. Here is another unusual and arresting composition, again using the power of three:

Man Bitten By A Snake, 1992

More of Odd Nerdrum's work can be found here http://nerdrummuseum.com/paintings/.

[Ed. note: several image links were broken and so this page was updated on 21 Oct 2016.] 

Art's Intent

Fine art practitioners and corresponding institutions have for a long time given the field of Illustration a bad rap. I mean, any of us who have spent any time in an art school or program has heard all too often the ridiculous idea that because illustration is "commercial" it's a form of "selling out." Aside from the fact that this is partly true because illustration often relies upon big industry like publishing to exist, here I would like to point out that any art that makes its living on the corporate pocketbooks (I'm looking at you, Richard Serra and your Wagnerian rolled-steel projects) is an acknowledgement that art requires some kind of commercial backing. And while it is exceedingly rare, there are those artists indeed, who *never* seek private funding and just make art through non-profits or purely for their own pleasure.

Why is one considered "selling out" but the other not? If we examine this bias more closely, we might begin to tease out the reason. I think it is found in the fact that meaning in Art is gotten not only from whatever intention the artist gives it, but from the un-intentional aspects that are embedded within the work, aspects of which the artist might not even be aware.

We can see how intention functions in a work of art as that of which the artist is conscious. It is all of the elements that an artist has studied and uses to carefully craft an image. The illustrator, very consciously, uses pictorial strategies to proscribe all aspects of an image, the color theory, the value structure/ lighting, the design, the characters, subject matter, environment, the perspective, all the drama, etc.. This is done in order to elicit a certain psychological or ideological response from the viewer who is typically of a certain demographic to whom the product is aimed. Successful solutions for a particular illustration job can end up being very much in demand so as to produce cookie-cutter variations if its end-product  adorns mass-market products, such as book covers. Of course, at this juncture we could and should point out that some fine art fits this description. The work of a certain "painter of light" is a good example of an artist in the fine art industry who has developed a very profitable "pop" formula. There are numerous examples of formula to be found in landscape, abstract, portrait, pet, and other kinds of genre art, which are successfully mass-marketed.

Let's also acknowledge here that illustrators who take commissions from commercial publishing companies are not creating "personal work." Illustrators are almost always being asked to create images to fit a particular text, which means that the subject matter is a given and it is the job of the artist to find an "elegant solution" upon which both client and artist can agree. This "intentional," planned aspect of art it is much more prominent a feature in illustration or other forms of commercial art. Submitting something other than what the art director wants is almost universally frowned upon.

But then something wonderful and mysterious can happen in Art.

The artist can plan out a work of art-- but if the artwork has even a little room to breathe, the piece will surprise us by asserting something *it* intends to say. Because the artist can never escape her ideology and values, nor can she scrub them from the practice of her work, the real meaning-- the true intent of the work-- is indelibly stamped into it whether the artist meant it or not. The artist can consciously build into it everything that seems to be pertinent to the idea-- however, the real meaning will be embedded into the piece despite the artist's conscious intent.

When I first heard about this idea it really baked my noodle. It seems a bit of a contradiction to say that even though the artist can be very deliberate to consciously corral all of the decisions pertaining to the subject matter in a work, the real content will be what is read by the audience.

There are many ways in which the true and underlying meaning of the piece is clearly read by an audience. How? Facture, the way the marks and effects are applied to the object, matters. Media matters. An oil painter is saying something quite different about how she sees the world than say, does someone who uses a video camera. The nuance of gesture, expression, or perspective / proportional shifts within the subject matter can suggest or add a particular meaning that the artist didn't originally intend but is there anyway. The way light and colors are selected and juxtaposed can drive an odd feeling that otherwise permeates the piece.  There is no way of telling what will give a work of art its overall effect until it is finished and seen by an audience that is not the initial audience of one (the artist).

Unintentionality is given primacy as the main aspect of art that makes it a very effective tool of human communication; it is what drives us to create. When our emotional and subconscious selves participate in the creation of our work, we end up with something that more closely approximates our original intent. The more successful illustrator will find that the trick is to find the publishing venues that trust her, that allow a little breathing room and some creative liberty for the artist to stretch a bit so that her artistic voice can rise above the din of the logistical requirements.

Read more about intentionality and unintentionality in art in Jan Mukarovsky's text, Structure, Sign, and Function: Selected Essays.  Ed. and trans. Peter Steiner and John Burbank.  New Haven: Yale UP, 1978. 

Fables and other Social Constructions

In 2010, I mounted my thesis show, Fables, at MICA. The premise of the thesis is that we humans use the power of stories and mythology to create our world; and more specifically, we use stories to construct gender:

MICA, 15 March 10

Fables, 2010. Thesis Show

Most people take their gender for granted, but we are all products of its hand-- perhaps even prior to being born; for as soon as our nascent bodies are perceived by our social network, we are designated specific clothing, room colors, and toys. We are taught how to act, to be, and to think according to the social codes of a specific culture that assigns us our gender. At a young age, we are given specific narratives to absorb as examples of experience, stories and images which have definite impact on our developing intellectual and emotional selves. For young people, this can influence the way we internalize stereotypical ideas of femininity and masculinity, beauty, body image, work, play, and love. For those for whom the gender stereotypes do not fit, the result is varying degrees of gender dysphoria.

(closeup of first several images on left)

This body of work is an exploration of the way we visually convey stories. I try to overturn accepted meaning, question assumptions, for the sole purpose of unraveling the mythology of gender as it is currently naturalized. Here, I am plundering the rich and freighted lexicon of stories that we have amassed in the western tradition by identifying the locus of power within the story and inverting it. Gender role switching, acknowledging hidden and unpaid work, making visible marginalized groups, and casting a spotlight on women's difficult choices concerning child-rearing, are a few of the ways in which my work functions to raise awareness of the hazards of being female in our society.  In this work I am also exploring a critique of the storytelling genres that have been used for the dissemination of such mythological tales, as these are tightly woven into the ideological underpinnings of folktales and the societies that created them. My experience as an illustrator and predilection for storytelling greatly abets my current ambitions.

Today, as I'm reassessing my trajectory as it is currently placed within the illustration field, I'm finding that I'm on a similar pathway and am continuing to question how gender and other social norms are constructed via our mythologies and stories, particularly within the F+SF genre-- a perfect contemporary platform which speaks to the average person who is immersed in our tech culture. Currently, I'm exploring a tangent concerning technology and how that affects our definition of what it means to be a human, a critical element of my studies during my second and third year at MICA. With this lens, I can explore issues of transhumanism, how we're becoming our technology, and how IT is becoming more like us.

It is my intention to be part of those who are building a worldview that offers an alternative way of thinking about how one can function as a human in a society. Changing any aspect of culture requires a shared desire on the part of the viewer to engage the work in a dialogue that sparks recognition and identification. A feminist praxis can contribute to the growing disruption of the status quo to create a window into a future where cultural and social change is imagined, sought, and inexorable.

(closeup of several images in middle)

Figure Sculpting

In late winter I had the great privilege of taking a sculpture workshop (clay modeling) with none other than world-renowned sculptor, Alex Hromcych, of the Reading/ Philadelphia area. Held in the gorgeous timber-modern studios of Montgomery County Community College in Blue Bell PA, we had a ton of great space to work and work we did.

Front 3/4 right view

I missed the first two days of the workshop because of other freelance illustration obligations, but when I finally caught up with them, here is what came of it: The torso (and base) is hollow and the legs are solid. The method by which to obtain this lighter-weight construction is simple, as it requires only that the clay be flattened by pounding it with a paddle into a 1" thick sheet and rolled into a tube. It is then attached to a similarly constructed, flat slab of similar thickness for the base.  After that, Alex's only rule was: "Look three minutes; sculpt one."

Back view

The piece is about 16" tall and 10" +/-wide on either side.

Mr. Hromcych also demonstrated other sculptural techniques; he constructed a small 18" bas relief and a 12" bust using the same slab-and-cylinder technique.

Front view

Our excellent model, David Sanfilippo, works in colleges all over PA and MD, and is a serious expert on Classical poses; with his physique and fitness he's the *ultimate* artist's model. (And he's an all-around helluva guy and a pleasure to work with --he's got great stories and is funny as hell). I have always used drawing or painting media to create figure studies during any figure sessions because it's fast and it's what I'm most comfortable working in. However, I'd definitely recommend to the 2-D artist to take any and every chance offered to sculpt the figure; I learned that it expands and further develops one's sense of the space and volume that a body inhabits.

WisCon

Billed as the biggest feminist F+SF writers' convention, WisCon is one of the most interesting --and perhaps one of the longest running (37 years!)-- conventions out there for the creative writer or artist.  If you have ever felt that your work just doesn't fit the standard model of F+SF genre, you need to look into this event.

In another article on this blog, I have written about the importance of making work that speaks to one's authentic experience as an artist and to not just make work to fit an industry. This is a more difficult road, of course, and one that is ultimately more rewarding. Making work to fit what one thinks the industry wants, just to make money and without any regard to one's own inner voice dilutes the message and we end up with a resented, hollow career. Instead, we can and should make the work that best represents us and our "voice", and allow the industry make room for it. Those interested in hiring us for the unique thing that we offer will find us. That said, those of us making work "on the margins" sometimes find a guard posted at the door: the mainstream publishing industry and its marketed demographic actively polices its aesthetic, indirectly silencing that which doesn't quite fit into the box.

So, conundrum. Where can the non-standard creative go to find community and like-minded people who support them spiritually? Where can we go to find the publishing industry heads who make things happen and can offer economic opportunities that are in alignment with our ethics and aesthetic values? Where can we find other creatives with whom to collaborate on serious imaginative projects? Look no further, WisCon is the place.

Capped at 1000 members, WisCon is a small conference. And $40 is a cheap attendance fee, but the con is run entirely by volunteers, all of whom *are* the members. The conference is a writer's conference, and as such, the 80-or-so discussion panels and seminars offered by academics and professionals in the genre over the course of four days are geared towards writers and other literary types, academics, and enthusiasts. The intense atmosphere and sparklingly erudite content delivered was most definitely worth the forty bucks.

Do I hear you mumbling under your breath and wringing your hands? What? The word feminist in the title? Pfft.  Fear not, for there are plenty of dudes in attendance; they have their offspring strapped onto them just like their female counterparts do. All this means is that the people who enjoy what WisCon has to offer understand that to be a feminist simply means to liberated from society's tired old misogynistic, racist stereotypes and egregiously harmful ideas. People there are happy to mingle with and appreciate all kinds of people-- young and old, with or without kids, brown, blue or green hair, tats, kilts, khakis, gays and lesbians, cisgender and transgender folks, steampunkers and superheroes. There are believers side by side with non-believers (the majority, actually) all gleefully discussing such things as the time-shift merits of the series, Fringe, or the consent issues Octavia Butler raises in her Xenogenesis Trilogy --and any other cultural offerings that address class, race, gender, identity, sexual orientation, age, environmental responsibility, and differing abilities.

Did I mention kids? Yes, people can bring their kids to the conference. Children have their own age-appropriate programming in separate suites with experienced facilitators so that member parents can attend the day programming. Other events include: an opening dessert party, a book dealers / publishers' ballroom, a bake sale, a clothing swap, an Art Show, a closing banquet, the Genderfloomp dance party, and much much more.

The beauty of the conference is that it is a place whereby feminist writers and academics who love the genre can foster and cultivate the next generation of writers (and artists). Those who love the genre purely from a reader's point of view can rub elbows with them and discuss the issues about which they care deeply. Through the seminars, creatives are encouraged and reminded to think of their privileged role as having the potential to influence culture, to create a whole new society of ethical and responsible people through stories and imagined places.The seminars suggest ways for creatives to marry their ethics to their aesthetics and to build a genre that fits them and is inclusive. Therefore, the overarching intent of the conference is not just to celebrate the beauty and strangeness -- and difference-- within the F+SF world, but to dream other, better possibilities into existence.

Pricing Your Work

How does an artist price her/ his work? I get this question a lot, specifically pertaining to the market prices for illustration work. If you don't have an agent who knows the ins and outs of what is happening with the market fees for the illustration genre, and you're billing clients on your own, I suggest you get a copy of the most recent Ethical Guide to Pricing by the Graphic Arts Guild. They put out a new volume every year to keep up with the current pricing trends. Even so, you should learn that you can negotiate with clients to bump up the fees once you become more established.

For artists selling their work within any fine art venue (including conferences), the answer is a bit more complex. If you don't live in New York or some other fashionable big city where art is a serious commodity, prices that you can expect for your work will be a lot lower. And prices will be different in the US than in Europe, so be prepared to do a little homework before you put your tag on it. If you're working within a gallery setting, the owner will more than likely be able to offer you some guidance if you need help.

I want to thank collector and art sales guru, Jane Frank, for taking the time to write to me and for her generous advice on the subject of pricing and haggling. (Some of her thoughts on negotiating are loosely transcribed into the latter portion of this entry.)

Artists usually have *some* idea of what they want for a work of art, but let's face it, most artists tend to value the work from a place of sentimentality and that's precisely where there's room for haggling. Sentimental value may be as good a method as any in determining what the market will bear. If the work is of some quality and price is too low, the work will be quickly snatched up. Yet even a low price won't move "poor" quality work*. Where the work is of good quality but priced too high, there exists an opportunity for both parties.  "Ugh!" you say; "I  hate to have to haggle for my work!" Many artists, indeed, prefer not to discuss it at all, having a rigid take-it-or-leave-it stance. But with the right mindset, you can make a sale where you might not have otherwise, for a price that is still reasonable to both you and the buyer.  I was happy to learn that this negotiating process can include fun banter --and no personal insults pertaining to the messy birth of camels on beds. It goes something like this:

Let's say that the art in question is priced at $400.

Buyer: "I don't want to pay your price. Can you do better, or is your price firm?"
Neutral Artist response: "What did you have in mind?"
Motivated Artist: "Make me a fair offer, and it's yours."
Very Motivated Artist: "Make me an offer I can't refuse."

Artist's Banter: If you want more info before committing, add - "Are you really serious about buying?" or   "Are you ready to buy now? / Is there some price that would make you buy it now, on the spot?"  

Jane says: You can prolong this agony as long as you like, but bear in mind, some buyers hate negotiating, and others love it and will keep you at it all day

Timid Buyer (or one just never wanting to pay retail): "I'm not sure", or "I don't know; whatever you can do." (ie. no offer)
Aggressive Buyer: "How about $250?" (40%)
Very Aggressive Buyer: "How about $200?" (half)   

Yikes. What to do next?

Buyer's Banter: The buyer is sidestepping making an offer because then they could see what the artist would do, gauging how much the artist cared about the piece, prolonging the negotiations in the hope of learning more.

Assuming you are not accepting the $250 or $200: 

Artist response to Timid Buyer:  "I'll go as low as $360." (10%). If he's bought other pieces before, or buying more than one, $340, (15%)
To Aggressive Buyer: "Let's split the difference ($325)."
To Very Aggressive Buyer with whom you don't mind going another round: "Oh dear, that's harsh; you're killing me; wow, I wish I could," etc., etc. "How about $350?"

Jane says, NOTICE: The next natural step up for buyer is $250, and you are back to $325 on the last step, or the 'split'  If you do mind going another round, you can call it quits now and "split the difference;" you get $300.  Notice that you end up with less by capitulating one round short.  An aggressive buyer is counting on the artist to be a 'wimp', and not go all the way for fear of losing the sale. 

Jane's Point #1: Remember to never negotiate with yourself. You have no idea what the buyer's best offer would be and you're pricing blindly when you automatically lower your price to what you think the buyer would be willing to pay. Only lower your price after you've wrangled an offer from the other side first, and only to 10%.  No more than that: they haven't earned it, or worked for it. You will almost always have a better chance of successfully completing a sale, or come away with more from a sale, if you force a buyer to make an offer.  But even at the worst extreme, it gives you the power to either accept, counter, or walk away.  While volunteering to lower the price without an offer gets you nowhere, especially when half of the time, the buyer will say "Hmm, ok; I'll think about it."  

Jane's Point #2: Don't be intimidated by a slick negotiator who tells you stories about what they paid for other artists' work. Your art is your own unique product and cannot be compared price-wise.  Your job is to get the buyer to pay more than he wanted to pay, all the while selling the work for less than you wanted to accept.  That indefinable, exact place of pain and pleasure-- less than you thought you would get and more than you thought they would pay-- is where you want to be, every time you negotiate. 

Great advice! Thanks again, Ms. Frank! Try out these negotiating tips next time you're at a conference or show, then write to me and let me know how well it worked.


*"Quality" standards for works of art and the subsequent valuation placed upon them are entirely dependent on the buyer / collector / genre and venue. Really. 

The Brand Cage

Several times a year, I put my work in solo or multi-artist shows. It keeps me on my toes as an incentive for generating new work outside of my commissioned illustration work.  Almost without fail, somebody asks me how long it took for me to make "X" piece of art. I usually first ask whether they are a student or serious painter, but I can usually already tell. This bean-counter has a certain look about their face.  I can see their  brain gearing up to crunch the numbers to determine whether the price I have set is in accordance to their preconceived notions about what they think artists should make per hour or per image; it's an amount that is usually stacked against what they themselves make.

My usual response is that it took me 40 years.

In an excellent e-flux article (online art journal) about the political economy of art, contributor, Anton Vidokle, at one point writes about James Abbot McNeil Whistler's libel suit against John Ruskin. Ruskin took Whistler to task in an 1878 review, claiming that Whistler's price for his painting, Nocturne in Black and Gold, was too high a price to ask for a painting that looked so hastily done. Ruskin's argument is that art should be cheap and only reflect the actual time it took to make it. He was suggesting that artists be paid a labor wage for their work based upon an outdated mode of art production, the Guild structure. Asked by the lawyers in the libel suit why he was charging that amount for his painting, Whistler's response was singularly apt: he said that his price reflected the knowledge he had gained over a lifetime of study and practice.

Previous generations of artists who worked as craftsmen within the old European Guild structure relied upon patrons and sponsors to legitimize the work and determine its value. Whistler's libel suit was but one sign of a  paradigm shift away from this hierarchical structure under which artists have traditionally labored.  Bohemian artists of all kinds, no longer bound to the labor wage construct of the Guild declared a divorce from the bourgeois status quo. Artists began their own collectives and their own shows, and often held down other non-art-related jobs that paid the bills. Freed economically and ideologically from the institution of the salon, too, artists could then begin to experiment with style and content in a way that they couldn't before.

There is a modern counterpart happening in today's illustration field. The huge industry that is Publishing is faltering and shifting hard under the weight of the digital onslaught, and fees for art have gone way down.  To compete with dwindling opportunities, some artists have scrambled to "brand" themselves as quickly as they can so that they look professional, as marketable, ready to hawk their product at the most competitive fees possible. With their 30-second elevator pitches memorized, brand-ready students fresh out of art programs are chomping at the bit at a chance to work for a labor wage.  Do you think the "brand" as a business model is the milieu for inspiration and creativity? Do Andy Warhol or Jeff Koons spring to mind? Branding just makes it harder for artists to become untied from the corporate art industries upon which they have had to rely for their livelihoods.

However, in the next ten years the Publishing Industry (or what it was traditionally) will be gone, but the recent "branding" strategy that the Market has pushed many artists and small publishing houses into doing will remain. We can observe that the branding spree has created very segregated genres within the illustration field (ie. the very specific look of the children's market), but we can observe this very same phenomenon within the fine art markets too. I can't tell you how often I have gone to a conference or show only to think that I've seen all of the work before. The markets have their own "look" to them, and artists think that they must tailor their work to fit the market trends and not the other way around. Sadly, this is indeed, the case when it comes to these institutions: conform or be cast out. We have abandoned the bohemian mode in favor of professionalism, marketability, easy categorization, and consumability.

This branding is troubling. Once there in that pigeonhole, if you want to stretch your wings, there's no way out except via a major overhaul. Imagine having a brilliant insight into your work that dramatically changes your style or content overnight. Then what? Do you take five years to gradually shift your work so that it better reflects your ideas? The markets's tight genre structure means that you will still lose those clients/ buyers whether you do it quickly or over a period of time.

Refraining from branding just means that your cage isn't as tight. Perhaps it's time to ask whether the structure itself is at all conducive to real creativity.

Nothing New Under The Sun

We've all heard it before: You must be Unique! You must be Original! If someone doesn't actually say it to our face that we're not being unique or original, we still feel the admonishment internally. Some are more blunt: I showed some recent work to some students and one slyly asked whether I was worried that what I was doing wasn't completely "unique." It's what's drilled into our artists's brains: If we can't be totally unique and original, then we're slackers, failures.

Well, I've got news for you. There are no new ideas. Really. Images can't be created that have no other contextual source. Just try doing it. What we as humans visually ingest on this planet, and can dream about, has been filtered through a brain and a consciousness that has a common DNA structure and origin. However, what can be quite new are innovative juxtapositions and connections that hadn't been made before.

You may be decried as a plagiarist if you copy someone else's style directly, but this is only something to worry about if you're selling your work "professionally" as an illustrator or fine artist.  Stealing from one artist may be considered plagiarism; however, stealing from many is considered art. This method of synthesizing influences is what makes a style unique. Therefore, a student should feel free to copy, copy, and then copy some more. Take everything that inspires you and run with it. Your style will be generated where your ambitions collide with your skill level and this changes and shifts over a lifetime. So many young artists fret about "not yet having a style." You should worry more about not having any ideas.

But what about the "professional" artist?  You have probably already seen these two images together: Michelangelo's Prophet Isaiah from the Sistine Chapel ceiling (1508-1512), and Norman Rockwell's Rosie the Riveter (May 1943 issue) for The Saturday Evening Post:

Dude looks like a lady...

Make me a sandwich...?

So what did Rockwell actually "steal?" The pose, and fairly directly. However, Rockwell improved upon Isaiah's posture (see the tilted shoulders? the defiant chin?) and added believability and a solidity to Rosie's anatomy that wasn't there in the "flattened" medium of the fresco. Rockwell's Rosie has the same nobility and stature as the saint, but casting the figure into this modern context changes everything. Rockwell has completely stolen it and made it his own. It is Rockwell's idea that transforms it.

So does an artist ever stop "stealing" from other artists? Not really. If you want to continue to grow and make your practice sustainable, you will need to keep experimenting with new styles, foreign designs, and taking risks with new ways of thinking. So don't just borrow and skim ideas. You will really need to try them on and perhaps buy them. And then don't be afraid to break them.

Hey, just so you know, I was partially inspired to write this blog entry from the writer and artist, Austin Kleon. Buy his amazing book, Steal Like An Artist and get inspired.  (:

Illustrators Unite: Art PACT

As you know-- or maybe you don't really know-- illustrators / artists are prevented by law from forming a union. That's right. Because we're considered individual contractors (ie "working under a contractual agreement", we are considered as being discrete business entities --just like the local chocolate Factory or the local shoe manufacturer, and as such, cannot form a union or it would be considered a monopoly. Hmph. Silly isn't it? Workers that *can* form unions are employees of any sector of industry; illustrators are not considered employees unless they are salaried directly by an employer.

What you may also know, is that artists working in the illustration industry have, for a few generations now, been getting royally screwed on fees. That's right: fees for illustration work haven't undergone any significant increases in about 30 years. ...Longer actually.

At the last IlluXCon in 2012, a few illustrators held a panel discussion on the current dismal outlook of the industry, and determined that illustrators must take matters into our own hands if we want to see improvements in the working conditions of our industry. (Hear the full discussion here, on Drawn Today.) Art PACT is a "guild" of sorts, and any and every professional or budding artist working in the industry is encouraged to join and throw his or her voice into determining how we can help shape the industry to meeting our needs for fair and living wages. This is for each of us, a right and a responsibility.

Right now, Art PACT is currently only a page on Facebook, but the nascent organization has plans to create a website and begin to garner more support in the artist community.  Some interesting ideas include building an online rating system to allow artists to anonymously rate publishers according to their fees, payment regularity, art director friendliness, and other general work conditions. It will be both a forum for illustrators and a resource for their publishing clients to know what are the expectations within this field.

Intensity's Overflow

A good friend of mine asked me to comment on the following quote:

Imagination and artistic passion must stem or at least be easier to retrieve from our subconscious mind. The subconscious mind contains the runoff of emotions that are so passionate that although our brain produces them, they are inappropriate to express within normal social limitations. Perhaps the brains of true creative geniuses produce more emotions than most individuals or they merely suppress more emotions. However these so called geniuses definitely do have the gift of expressing these emotions. --"Creativity, the Subconscious, and Daydreaming" by Melissa Hoba 

I've often thought about why some people are driven to art. And I've thought about why art has permeated the culture like it has since the dawn of humankind. There's something about it that just can't be ignored or expunged. Artists will make art whether they make a living from it or not. Funny that the media can change (digital/ high tech) and the definition of art can change (ranging from traditional, modern, contemporary, to allographic), but the way in which it functions within the human psyche is still the same.

Yes, CREATIVITY: poetry, visual art, music, dance, are definitely a "spilling over" of the emotional experience-- it's the avenue for us to express that for which we have no words.  Our human experience is unique for each individual, yet, there's something similar in the way we function as humans that allows us to use art as a medium to reach any other person(s) as our audience. I think, for some, art may be sought and valued in the same way others might seek a religious or experience. Some would say that that experience (whatever that may be) is our connection to the sublime and allows us to contemplate our existence as something which has more value than just material consequence. Art imparts meaning, an inter-connection with others, and deepens our definition of what it means to live as a human.  It's quite a unique thing.

Additionally, I think every human being possesses the capability to create art and to be creative, so in the above quote, the word "genius" bothers me. Since art is the spilling over of similar emotions that we humans mainly seem to share, it is possible to for everyone to express themselves-- especially in this day and age where leisure time for such pursuits is more common. However, as it is with all things human, because some feel more intensely than others, some will be driven more than others to make art, so not all humans will make art. All can, however, think creatively, or be encouraged to do so, and it can be taught. 

Art also gives us a space to express taboo subjects. It's a perfect way to live vicariously through the characters which "speak" within a story.  This "make believe" place has been-- and remains-- the one place by which people can express that which oppresses them when they have no other psychic outlet. It's a safety release valve for society-- people can see themselves "doing" and "being" that which is currently impossible. It's a way to dream the future into being. It's a way to seek redress for injustice where no justice currently exists.  In other words, if your life experience is full of pain and anger based upon real social or personal injustice, your art is a way to create another virtual reality in which you can escape to live within a facsimile of normalcy. This other function of art that allows us to imagine other realities makes me wonder if the current rash of violence in our world could be channeled and defused if art as a serious subject was again available in all schools. Just a thought. (Of course, not all artists use their art to release negative emotions-- some use it to express joy and love, curiosity and fascination about the world, etc.)

As an educator, teaching students how to think creatively is my main pursuit. The strategies of drawing include far more than just the way paint and color functions, or how line and mark is applied; there's an entire philosophy of Being to take into consideration. We can encourage our students to think about their own unique stories and draw upon them for inspiration. We can encourage them to think beyond the literal image-- to pull from their subconscious-- that mark, that gesture, that symbol, that color, which imparts meaning to the image beyond merely recording. The sharing of our experiences and emotions through Art is the glue that holds society together-- it's a tenuous prospect....

Feeding the Beast

After we create a piece of artwork, we release it into the world and don't really give it any more thought than: How can we do it better next time? Does it stack up well within the industry standard? Does it fulfill the client's needs? etc. Unless we are hiding our work in a broom closet, any creative endeavor that sees publication acquires a life of its own. Not only does it take on meaning dependent upon the interpretation of any specific audience, but the work itself, whether intended or not, takes on a role in shaping culture.

Have you thought much about how the work that you do affects other people's perceptions and values?

The recent violent events in Connecticut prompted many to pontificate on the tragedy and their solutions for it. Much of the conversation revolves around the obvious-- America's access to certain kinds of weapons-- but other nuanced conversations suggest that we must begin to address the deeper issues of mental health and a preoccupation with violence. Some, like Jackson Katz,  suggest that our cultural construction of masculinity is badly skewed and needs to be addressed. Others suggest that these problems come from a "morally lax" society, ie. suggesting that parents (read: women) are neglecting their kids when they place them in daycare centers (instead of being stay-at-home caretakers). Others still, have suggested that violent TV programs, movies, video games, music, etc. are all to blame, and the creators of such (read: artists, writers)  blamed for glamorizing violence and death.

Really? Can we suggest that art and visual media could possibly cultivate violence and sustain a person's destructive attitudes about themselves and others? Can art and media create a ridiculous sense of masculinity or femininity? Can you say fashion magazines? You still don't believe me, do you?

And this:  DC Comics' recent decision to hire openly anti-gay Orson Scott Card to write the next issues of Superman has prompted many writers and artists to take to the blogosphere in protest and avowed boycott. Some will suggest that just because the man has certain personal beliefs doesn't necessarily mean that those beliefs will translate into his work. However, others have cited that his ideology definitely bleeds into his writing elsewhere, so why wouldn't he use it as a personal platform to bash gays? So, if you were a comic book artist would you take this job if it meant depicting Superman acting as a bigoted jerk? Would you take a job that went against your own personal values because of the cash it put into your pocket?

How aware are we as artists of the effect of our work on culture/ society? Are we creating imagery that is physically violent, or sexist? And do we care about its effects? Are we perpetuating old stereotypes? Are we using our unique gift to incite hatred and divisiveness?  Some will argue that it's all about a paycheck; nobody really cares; it'll all blow over; violence in a game/ TV/ book doesn't necessarily perpetuate violence in the user. Are you sure?