The role of art and artists has altered over time. The ancient world is full of monuments to power, records of the doings of civilisations and individuals, and examples of the transmission and perpetuation of culture
For a week I’ve manned an exhibition of my work at Port Adelaide and had only a handful of people call in. If I had to categorise them the majority were local artists intent on sharing their practice via pictures on their mobile phone. I’ve seen water colours,...
There is an assumption that you have to be mad to want to an artist and if you succeed then the evidence of madness is obvious.
There is no doubt that the art of the last century or so has reflected massive social change and that both the technology used to create art and the subject matter would be unrecognisable to Ruskin.
Much has been written about the idea of originality in art but in the end just what does ‘originality’ mean? Before the 20th century it wasn’t a term much considered. Artist studios were places where apprentices went to learn from the master and with the advent of Art Schools, nothing much changed. The cult of originality is a 20th century obsession and yet it ignores or neglects that much great art was produced within the western tradition using traditional techniques.
The narrator hypothesises that all artists owe allegiance to a moral contract