Reasoned Consideration

I love this 2009 music video, one of my favorites - I think it deserves more credit and more views. https://youtu.be/WG7vXOTbeuQ On the surface, if one doesn't pay close attention, it seems like just a vibey, chill song with a nice beat ... but at the same time portrays several fairly deep topics one doesn't normally see covered in a music video ... it's also sort of almost affectionately showing characters portraying the real people sort of bleakly and stoically and emotionlessly and uncomplainingly every day doing the dirty, underpaid and underappreciated work of coal mining and of electricity generation which is a crucial backbone of all other economic activity, and showing how some of these parts of the economy work and interconnect between each other and between people ... in a cool chill music video. This is real art. There's an almost dual nature to the music video: One can either just chill and superficially enjoy the music, or think more about the deeper issues...

I'll be exhibiting four new paintings at the Members Exhibition of the Arts Association of Bellville, opening Wednesday 2 March 18:30 and running until 19 March (public library building, Carl Van Aswegen St, Bellville, Cape Town -33.9019889,18.6265181). Please stop by and have a look if you're around. (If any interested buyers, or if you want any more info etc., please contact me via this form .)

I'll be submitting these two small oil paintings for the fundraising exhibition " Tiny Treasures II " ( more info ) at Art.b community gallery in Bellville (Cape Town) (8 - 29 July 2015) (stop by and have a look if you're in the area!) Nude by Window - Oil on canvas 20x20cm Woman on Couch - Oil on canvas ( click here for painting process video )

Durban beach sand art bulldozed “Durban Metro Police have removed dozens of unlicensed sand sculptors from the beachfront today ...  the move is part of ongoing efforts to ensure that only traders with permits are allowed on the beach-front ...  Those wishing to make sand sculptures are required to pay a monthly permit fee ” So you now need a "permit" to create sand sculptures on Durban's public beaches (presumably if you expect someone might tip you), and poor people trying to earn a living are having their livelihoods bulldozed by the government. Meanwhile, taxpayers foot the bill for expending police resources on this, instead of on real crime. It should seem like common sense to say, but provided you aren't interfering with anyone else, you should have a natural right to create a sand sculpture on a public beach. And if a passerby wants to give you a bit of spare change, that too is his/her natural right - neither party should have to ask anyone's "p...

A brief response to the following point in this comment on this blog: "Artists in the Dada movement purposely countered the established traditions of aesthetically pleasing art because of its irrelevance and bourgeois classicist association. It was the art of the rich who were sheltered from the horrors of war" Consider a graph such as this one : ("Damien Hirst's Spot Prices"), and tell me that modern/contemporary art still represents the common man today, and not the rich. Also, thanks to numerous economic and technological advances, beautiful art IS now within the reach of even lower economic classes. The historical situation has changed - in some senses, reversed. Related: How Contemporary Art Lost Its Glamour : "Suddenly, the press dares to criticise contemporary art. A number of coinciding events seem to have focussed a new, less reverential attitude towards the spin of the art world  ...  Hirst's auction took £70.5 million on the day that ...

Who would have thought, modern/contemporary art training institutions are having some difficulty explaining why they are relevant : "What's the point of art school? ... As changes to the school curriculum and university funding undermine the arts education system, industry experts gather at Central Saint Martin's art school to discuss what the future holds for arts students ... Catastrophic cuts to funding, a drop in applications to university arts courses and the exclusion of the creative arts from the new EBacc performance measure mean now is a difficult time for the arts sector" And yet I think the examples on the article page speak for themselves (and note, contrary to what you might think, these were posted in defense of contemporary art education, with not a trace of irony or apparent self-reflection). "Nowhere Else Could I Do This for Credit" , says the artist, while pondering why the 'contemporary art world' is struggling to explain...

" Pixels Floating on the Art World’s Margins ": This is the site of the “ Into the Pixel ” exhibition, a juried collection of 16 digital artworks printed on canvas and plucked from the kinds of video games being marketed nearby. Those who stumble upon these works can take a few minutes or more to muse upon the artists’ intent and inspiration — and perhaps glean some untold secrets, since the images are from games yet to be released. Now in its 10th year, “Into the Pixel” is still somewhat overlooked during the convention, although perhaps less so than in years past. Recent exhibitions at the Museum of Modern Art and the Smithsonian American Art Museum have considered such art in a different light, focusing on each video game as a whole. “The thing is, these people are not computer geeks — they’re real artists,” said Martin Rae, the president of the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences, which jointly produces the show with the Entertainment Software Association. “And t...

The 'art world' should be ashamed that one of the last refuges of artistic beauty and value is not in the art world, but in the art produced by the artists of the video game industry ... I think there is more beauty and value in a single screenshot here than in all the works of the "Tate Modern" put together: http://www.videogamer.com/wii/secret_files_tunguska/screenshot-4.html (And there's plenty more like this out there.) Even the garbage bin is beautiful The rich, expansive virtual worlds created by video game artists are, in a loose sense, 'virtual art galleries' - they're often 'larger' than 'real' art galleries, you can comparably 'explore' them, and every virtual detail is almost like a small piece of art in its own right. If you're ever in London, try this "experiment": Visit the National Gallery (for its classical paintings collection) in the morning, and the Tate Modern in the aftern...