The Internet has provided opportunity for learning never experienced in the past! No longer do schools need volumes of books or shelves of audio visual equipment. All one needs is an Internet connection and the time to watch videos and read stories on every conceivable subject!
There are huge benefits and huge pitfalls in this age of mass marketing and communication and in my area of expertise-the arts-everyone has become an artist! Now that's not a bad thing. In fact today's kids and adults have the tools to learn all kinds of art forms unavailable to my generation of artists :-). I was delighted to get the cardboard packaged in my dadd's shirts from the cleaners (yes they came folded!) Now there are art toys that do all the drawing for the kids. Becoming an artists used to mean practicing over and over to become good at a subject (lol-horses come to mind with me) but now there is very little of that. Children (and adults) do not develop "the eye". In a class environment, kids can create wonders!
But what I am seeing today in adult artists are copyists. Few are "seeing" their subjects. Most have learned the technique of copying and pasting with their computers and printers and so longer seem to have a "hands on" approach to painting. Have they actually walked in the woods to see that landscape? Watched the clouds and the weather roll in? Handled that dog or horse? Or more importantly, drawn "from life?"
When you compare art that is copied to art that is created from knowledge and goes beyond copying, then you are seeing a true artist at work :-). Think about that the next time you might be thinking of investing in a portrait. You really often do get what you pay for :-)
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| A few dog portraits |
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| A few horse portraits |
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| People and their pets |
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| Often it is the moment and the feeling! |
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