Do Blogs Plus Art Plus People Equal Art People?

Most people don't think they're "art" people. Maybe that includes you. For sure it includes lots of people who find me through other blogs, fellow bloggers who read my stuff, or people who wander in to pick up fun stuff like Mardi Gras artistamps - or whatever.

But I hope people who think they know nothing about art - or care nothing about art - will accept my excuse -  to talk about it anyhow.

The story starts as my son has deployed out of his base in Europe for a NATO exercise. So what about that led to this piece of art - Shades of the Tropics - that's so much unlike things you normally find in my blog?

His call yesterday to talk about father's day which will happen while he's with a bunch of planes in a hot third world country -  plus this week's Illustration Friday topic: 'Jungle' - somehow layered on each other in my mind. Voila -  Shades of the Tropics happened.

    click on the image for a larger view

Most of what comes out of my brain has a certain fixation on layers - segments - pieces of a larger 'thing" weaving through it. Through a couple of decades of art making that feel is nearly always present . . . but it's also always evolving too.

My hope is that you can get a sense - even if it is an on-screen one - of the kind of washes and layering of color and design that are typical of my larger pieces.

The idea is to create a feel for the subject of topic rather than a photographic reproduction. Instead of a picture of a jungle, this is a representation - an expression - that conveys a certain feel.

 

Especially after you've seen a lot of my work you recognize a kind of 'sense of susan' - even in small pieces like some of  the more painterly of the artistamps and more in the art at the Cafepress Gallery.

I  hear from people who suddenly find a connection between one thing and another.Like the sometimes obscure links between the stories I tell and what's happening in the world - and even the imagery of the art.

Or they say that the ribbons in a first stamp that caught their eye and something else - like the layers in Leaves of Change or various other pieces, whatever or wherever is interesting.

It's great to get their emails, for sure.

Then again, there are people in my online audience who are turned off by one end of the spectrum of my work or my words or my images. That's OK too.

Painter Renior said "art is about emotion, if art needs to be explained it is no longer art" 

Art Times Raymond Steiner suggests:

"Shouldn’t today’s artists be showing/telling us something other than where we’ve been"

I guess I'm telling you where I've been - and where I am today. I'd like to give you a picture of an artist as a more complete - more diverse - person. After all, I might be the only one you ever "meet". . .
      and I'm glad to have a conversation or answer your questions.

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This Post Links Links to Selective Amnesia  Point Five, A Tic in the Mind's Eye, STALCU, Big Dog

Comments

[teresa]

suaan, i really enjoy your art; and the ones that don't give a clear picture are my favorites cause i use my own imagination to see the image and i relate more to those than i do to ones where the image is clear and precise

[Richard]

Hi Susan,

I'm one of those who doesn't consider himself a traditional art person. The closest I come to artistry is the occasional bit of poetry.

Renoir illustrates why people get upset with artists. Yes, art is emotional, but it is also a form of communication. If a piece of art has to be explained to allow the viewer to get a sense of the tonality it is trying to convey, the failure is in the artist, not the viewer. The artist is the one trying to communicate something.