Art for arts sake

It costs money to produce art even in a hobby sense more than cents go into the purchase of required materials. Having sold several paintings on eBay it can be quite disheartening to post off something that at raw costs took some $20 odd to put together BEFORE the hours were put into the creation itself at a measly .99cents plus postage!

Worse, of course, are the times when the listing hasn't received a bid and you just know if the people who look at the photos actually saw the piece they would bid madly! (Perhaps they wouldn't and it is only in my own mind that the work is good!)

I try hard not to deceive myself though, and will often reject something only to have others tell me they like it...probably not enough to bid on it if I listed it at auction!

Actually I gave a watercolour away only a few days back because when I told the recipient I wasn't signing it because I wasn't happy with it she asked if she could have it regardless.

I couldn't do the same with oils due to the material costs - if I hate something I have done I can give it a wash off with turps and starts over, saving the stretchers (not cheap!) and the canvas. Sometimes this will mean re coating the canvas to white before painting again but better than wasting the materials altogether!

It is no wonder artists are generally poor! It can be so very hard to get decent prices unless you are the type who can be bothered doing the competition thing and strutting your stuff alongside hundreds of others to be critiqued by toffee nosed gits who can't paint but are listened to by those with the deep pockets!

That's not my way -- if I have to leave home and put on a show bugger it I will give it away!

I suppose that makes me a tad reclusive and a little anti social but I don't care. I prefer my own taste in art anyway and can't believe what some people get away with in the market.

One canvas in particular - impressively large (not the sort you can do on an easel) jet black with a flick of white across one corner. Sold easily because it was a very usable home decor piece - suited the buyers lounge suite! I hated it because although it was a saleable piece and therefore worth doing there was no depth to the work, no hours of labouring - and probably done on a prefab canvas too!

Artist producing this type of work are in reality laughing at the customers gullibility because if the piece is something you can do at home in less than an hour then it isn't good art and yet the prices for this sort of thing is sky high.

Good art will draw you in, make you wonder how something was achieved, or leave you with the desire to gaze longer -- to me that black and white piece was just that sprayed black background with a brush flick of white - no effort, no wonderment - no desire to gaze.(perhaps a little in shock that it was worth so very much more than the small piece I had just finished that took some months to complete!).

Not having a separate studio I can't even hope to paint canvas as large - I wish I could, then I might find a good market for the stuff I produce.

I write also - but that's another story .....later!