7.07.2007

same as it ever was

the artworld is just like the "real" world in that as funding sources change with the dynamics of the economy, there are two distinct fields of production emerging -- a "nonprofit" and a "corporate' sphere.

To be an artist operating in the first sphere, you probably are doing site-specific and/or community outreach based work and rely heavily on grant-based funding to pay for the creation of the work and/or maintain your economic life as an artist. The second option for art production is much more commonly known --- it's the stuff that is covered by art magazines, art blogs, and other non-art specific periodicals...it's what sets artists like Warhol and Hirst into fame and motion ---- the idea is simple: innovate to create an artwork that looks enough like an Art product and/or can be marketed as such and then rely on the same business skills as an entreprenuer/any-old-corporate-employee (the biggest skill sets being PR, advertisement/product placement, networking, strategic R&D). Both methods meet the same end; the artist produces *something* that enters the cultural sphere.

However, what I am more interested in is the strict differences in the skill set each artist "type" (non-profit vs. commercial artist) necessitates for success. Let's face it...some artists doing public projects (for example) will always be paying out of their pocket (or rationalizing to themselves the modicum stipend offered in exchange for their artistic labor/material costs) to produce their works, unless they hone their fundraising/grant-writing skills. Others will be more adept at reading the demand (or if really skilled, creating the "demand for") of the marketplace and make work that fits that demand nicely enough to make sales out of the gate and is an art product that is highly marketable, or, is essentially commercially "aware" art...in other words, the art product has a successful "dot-one-point-oh" debut based on its inherent ability to capitalize on such "natural" facets of human nature as the want to be special (read: "i got the first one in the highly exclusive limited edition").
...
True, that at some point, both types of artists can reach a level of notoriety at which neither skill set is necessary to employ (i.e. the true definition of a "brand") in order to maintain one's position within the art market. However, I just simply want to recognize a simple fact (again, and again): Art is Business and Non-profits are just as much a Business in our contemporary times, regardlesss of the spin.






goodnight.

6.15.2007

often reduced to just paying attention

to lyrics you never noticed before, originally drowned by the movie-style thematic banging about percussion in the background:


Neil Young - There's A World Lyrics


There's a world you're living in
No one else has your part
All God's children in the wind
Take it in and blow hard.

Look around it, have you found it
Walking down the avenue?
See what it brings,
could be good things
In the air for you.

We are leaving. We are gone.
Come with us to all alone.
Never worry. Never moan.
We will leave you all alone.

In the mountains, in the cities,
You can see the dream.
Look around you. Has it found you?
Is it what it seems?

There's a world you're living in
No one else has your part
All God's children in the wind
Take it in and blow hard.




---"There is a need for surprise endings;"

1.24.2007

Discussing categories of Art earlier

and then reading this line:

"the human soul resists taxonomy"

how appropriate. my point exactly. there is no line; stop looking, and you will finally see the line for yourself.

1.16.2007

In case the last one didn't fool you...

it was all a farce...well, except for the driving stick shift.


anyway. new news is good news:

my first nyc show



1.03.2007

but, the good (?value judgment?) thing is that

i've accomplished already so many of my life-long goals, in just one short year (the former, 2006).

and in no particular order:

1 - Travel to the pyramids
2 - Donate all of my Baby Sitter Club Books to my high school (oh it was such a difficult parting!)
3 - Learn how to drive stick shift - sweet...
4 - Finally buy (and use a back-up hard drive (now all my pre-K-fed Britney is safe and my computer is ready for the post-baby birth re-birth!)
5 - Watch Dirty Dancing (i know, i know) for the first time
6 - Organize all of my photographs, yes, even the baby pictures :)
7 - Learn French (...kissing, that is) with my eyes closed
8 - Teach my grandmother how to knit

Bring it ON two thousand and sev-en!

lay-dee like

wow, my goodness. who wrote that last post? heavens to betsey! ME oh MY!





(again, "so this is the new year/and i don't feel any different")