Friday, September 27, 2019

NAÏVE ART (a creation of “paradise regained”).




Any attempt to define naïve painting seems only to add to the confusion so don’t be surprised if you are none the wiser after these few words.
Untutored a true naïve painter can never be “professionally” trained, however there are professional painters amongst the Naïves. The true naïve also have a talent that separates them from those who paint as a pastime or merely for fun. There are artist who could be said to paint in a pseudo-naive manner and in France they are referred to as “Les Pompiers”, not as firemen but in stylistic terms as being pretentious or pompous.
All naïve painter have their own vision of the world which in some way is uniquely different from that of any other. As children attempt to interoperate their surroundings for the first time their viewpoint can be regarded as uniquely theirs, and it is that very naivety which the mature viewer finds so appealing.  Naïve art cannot be taught and as such is a reflection on our own years of innocence.
The necessity to express is much stronger than the artist himself or as Rouseau put it “Ce n’est pas moi qui dessiner c’est ce truc au bout de ma main”. (It is not I that am drawing, it’s the thing at the end of my hand”.) The naïve painter could be said to be like a person possessed in the grip of a “thing” the nature of which he cannot “logically” understand. Naïve painting is timeless, the artist being continuously in search of “paradise lost”, a reconfiguration of all that life has robbed them of, a creation of “paradise regained”. It has been said that naïve painting is that painted with the “eyes of the soul”, a term used by Shakespeare and of biblical origin; “I have pondered upon all things with the eyes of my soul”
As folk art and traditional craftsmanship gave way to industrial methods of production so man ventured into the unknown. It is hardly surprising that from the melting pot of races that went into creating America came a long history of naïve art. The strength and charm of the naïve image is often one that transposes well into the stitched form and with that in mind this week I ran a short evening introductory stitching workshop for the Tolsta Youth Club. We started with a game of head body and tail to produce a wonderful array of strange beasts and then transferred these to calico either reproducing the entire image or simply the head. Although stitching can be seen a process of travelling up and down with a needle it is never easy to start with and a tangled and knotted mess can ensue which in itself can still be regarded as stitching. In order not to stifle creativity it is important that child don’t take on the adult trait of thinking they might get some wrong. The children were aged from 7 to 11 and learnt fast and managed to produce some delightful images. 

 

Tuesday, September 24, 2019

THE ETIQUETTE OF SMARTPHONE PHOTOGRAPHY.



In the not so distant past it would have been unheard of to take photographs of an artist’s work during an exhibition and one could have been sure of a negative response from the gallery owner however polite the request. If you couldn’t afford the original or a print then there would surely be a small reproduction in the catalogue or book. We have long since passed the period of being politely requested not to take photographs by museums and galleries as everyone carries their mobile phone at the ready. That old concept of politeness still abounds within the walls of my studio where visitors would not dream of taking photographs without first asking permission. All that changes when those same images are freely displayed in public because now they are public and free. So do I now assume that all art should be freely available and if so how am I the artist to make a living? This past week I ran two paid workshops and have another this coming week plus two talks, however that alone won’t cover expenses. And between exhibitions where am I supposed to store it all. The words of a friends daughter spring to mind when after my first ever exhibition she said “Stop now Tom before it’s too late”. Is the overcrowded studio crammed with past work what all artists have to contend with in later life? Our own physical abilities become restricted in harmony with the shrinking studio space as insulating layers of stacked canvases encroach and the only way out is to start repainting. Those lustful nudes of yester years will soon become the passion of pastures new.
 While sitting in on my exhibition in An Lanntair art centre I have been asked only a couple of times if it is OK to take photographs but that it usually to take a photo of me the artist, a man, stitching. So do they now want my sole as well? What is on the walls is widely assumed to be free for the taking. The taking of a photo is a process of possessing that image with no recompense to the artist. Once the excellent free image has been made using that smartphone there is no need to possess the original. If that image is then posted or shared on line then who is the owner. It would seem that just like music the visual arts are to be freely consumed. I imagine those happy snappers would consider that I should be flattered that they wish to point their phone in the general direction of my labours but unsurprisingly to me at least their image collecting leaves me cold. It could be said that I like those happy snappers am simply making images, but that is to oversimplify the process, painting a picture not only takes longer than pressing the button but also takes considerably more skill.
There is no way that the average person could afford to pay me for a year’s labour in stitching a stumpwork casket so in this hyper-connected world why shouldn’t they take a photo? Do they think to possibly share these images with friends? Maybe, but does that make it any more likely that I will have a sale? No, I have never sold any of my artwork over the internet or by photograph and what on earth is the purpose of a like? To me likes are just another loneliness indicator, used in the hopes that others may join in and confirm that you are not the only sad bastard on this planet who enjoys wandering around galleries with a smart phone.
       

Monday, September 9, 2019

LOOKING IS A CHOICE.


Looking is a choice but seeing requires the brain to engage.
It is generally assumed that we see with our eyes however these are simply receptors of light and it is the brain that is interpreting what is projected onto the retina. Unless the brain engages when the eyes are open and looking at an object then we will register very little detail. A casual glace, a quick peep or taking a butchers can be the starting point to seeing but in itself results in no lasting image that can be recalled at a later date. So when asked what was your favourite thing in the exhibition, and nothing springs to mind then you can be sure that while you ticked the box that said you had been there with your eyes open your brain was elsewhere. I can imagine in a few rare cases this could have occurred with my own “All that I do” exhibition. There is however so much to see that it is hard to imagine anyone not finding something that triggered their brain into making a closer inspection.
Although the space is very generous I soon discovered that even before the hanging began the nude and portrait paintings would not find a place, and that the other diverse images would need to be hung two or in some cases three high, more on the style of the mass hung Royal Academy Show. Hanging some pictures at a lower level meant that on Saturdays, when there are a lot of children in the art centre, there was also a level of excited delight as they eagerly pointed out pictures of animals before peering through the windows of the dolls houses. In some respects the younger children are the easiest to engage as they pounce on every new image with a freshness of spirit that us older seen it all folk find hard to rekindle. However during my Saturday attendance there were many who on realising that all that they were seeing came from the hands of just one man simply had to tell me how wonderful they thought it all was. I stopped counting the number of times people said it was one of the best exhibitions they had seen in An Lanntair and even as I popped out to get some lunch people who recognised me came up to congratulate me on the show. So I would say that was success enough. Red dots can also be a regarded as a measure of success and I am pleased to say there are a few even in these uncertain times. With most items in the £200-400 price bracket and ranging from under £40 up to £2800 there could be said to something for everyone. I was however still asked if I had postcards for sale, which rather shocked me as everyone seemed to be snapping away with their wonderfully silent smart phones. I suggested to one man that if he bought the picture he liked that he could make the postcards and in selling them by the thousand recouping his outlay and have the original plus a profit. I don’t do prints key rings or fridge magnets and will never be a commercial successful commodity arts like Jolomo.  
Just before leaving for home I spotted two young girls sitting beneath the six biblical stump work tapestries and it made me realise that there at their fingertips lay the irresistible seductive gateway to a world I will never be able to compete with. No going viral for me unless they happened to have photographed those needlework’s and uploaded them onto Snap Chat. Weird to think that images of my work are being shared on little hand held screens around the world, and even these words might be read by people I’ve never met or likely to meet.          

Monday, September 2, 2019

Saturday in Stornoway.


An interesting day at An Lanntair with plenty of people through. All sorts from the genuinely astounded through the intrigued and close looking to the handbag over the shoulder out shopping and casting an eye around but seeing nothing. From this last category thankfully I found only one; a well-dressed but rather arrogant looking woman with a timid mousy female friend in toe. They managed the full tour of the gallery and the arrogant taller of the two stood out immediately by the way she sauntered past the bulk of the exhibits without a second glance. They drew my attention initially as they came in laughing about some private joke or was that a reaction to seeing me sat in the old green painted tree trunk chair in the process of stitching. The feather bird pictures they simply did not see which to be fare has been the case for quite a few. Within most exhibitions there is usually a dead space which can often depend on which way you approach it and as the birds are place to the right of the first entrance people tend to turn left and are certainly drawn by the large centrally hung New Tolsta tweed map. So the birds are often side-lined or only appreciated when approached from the opposite direction. Even then many people don’t question why they look three dimensional and fail to look closely enough to detect that they are in fact made from real feathers, consequently we have yet to make a sale from that wall.

I told myself to calm down as the arrogant woman walk past the stumpwork embroidered box that had taken an entire year to create without a sideways glance. It simply didn’t register although the large shell overmantel mirror did merit a look, or was that her simply admiring her own reflection. I turned away to concentrate on my embroidery and told myself not to be so stupid to allow anyone so shallow to irritate me. This is only a tiny part of the price one pays for sitting in on your own exhibition. Thankfully the major part has been a total delight with an interested audience hold interesting conversations.
Towards the end of the afternoon I got into conversation with a group of young students and I was reminded how stimulating young adults can be when further education has triggered the enquiring mind and they’ve momentarily forgotten about their smart phones. They were full of insightful questions about art which pushed my thinking into new areas and approaches that made for excellent banter and a jovial exchange of reasoning. It made me realise how uplifting young people can be and how in my rather solitary existence I miss that interaction. Is this a sign of growing old?
The evening was rounded off perfectly when a friend bought me one of the last tickets to a full house performance of Stornoway Way. Three young women on stage the entire time depicted a stirringly witty and often profoundly sad display of what dangers there are for the young people raised on these islands. From their apparently idyllic upbringing they are thrust into a world that they are ill prepared for, where education has left them unqualified, religion represents the shackles and rigidity of parental failures, job prospects are limited and alcohol and drugs provides solace if not answers. A grim picture which can touch all of us even if it’s simply the fact that we somehow managed to escape that trap into adulthood. The laughter from the audience and myself was at times tinged with a sense of recognition, “that could so easily have been me”.