The Fear and Folly of Public Opinion in Art

An artists life can sometimes be difficult. Not only are we often perceived as hippies who can't make a living, or that our art is a hobby and not a real job. Opinions, both good and bad on our work is a constant force on what we do. It has a power all its own that can be so acidic that it may burn through an artists life leaving scars and even death in its wake. No matter how well known we are, the court of public opinion asserts a great force on what we do and always will.

Scenes From the Abbey at Skye

The Abbey at Skye is a scale model of the ruins of an Abbey on the island of Scottish isle of Skye. It has been carefully created by artist Grey Cross to be used for an extensive series of art showing the spirits, faerie folk and mysticism surrounding this ancient place. Photographs will be taken in a wide variety of lighting and angles to weave a story around the Abbey and its history with the intention of eventually creating a novella to accompany the art. There are about 200 man hours involved just in the creation of the model itself. More images will follow on this page as the project develops so check back often. 

Julius Caesar never made it to Scotland when he conquered early Britain. This piece shows the ghost of Caesar returning to Scotland to claim it for the long lost Roman Empire. A pict slave girl rests at his feet while a blood moon rises over the abbey.

The Artist is a Child Who Should Never Grow Up

When I was a child, I had a vivid imagination. So much so that I think I spent most of my preteen years living in my fantasies and hiding from my realities. I don't know if I had an imaginary friend when I was very young, but I suppose I really didn't need it. I was my own imaginary friend.

I remember for awhile I was completely absorbed in knitting yarn. I would take the yarn and I would weave gigantic spider webs out of it. These things would stretch from one side of a room to the other. I would anchor each piece of yarn from one high corner to the opposing lower corner. When I had 8 of these crisscrossing each other, then I would start to weave an intricate spider web from one strand to the next until the thing dominated the room making it completely unusable unless you wanted to get caught in my web.

"I AM A..." How Artists Describe Themselves

We all attach labels to ourselves. In the art world there are so many labels that we can lose our perspective in what suits us best. 

It is not enough to say "I'm an artist". Its too vague. 

I conducted a small experiment awhile back. I would introduce myself sometimes as an artist and other times as a sculptor. There was an immediate difference in how I was perceived. 

To those who I told I was an artist, there was a vague sense of "oh how sad, he has no real job". 

To those I told I was a sculptor, there was more of a sense of interest. Telling them I was a sculptor evoked interest and a need to know more. What kind of sculptor was I? What kind of materials did I use? Was it hard work? 

The Not So Greatness of Alexander - A Story About Stolen Art

How do we handle the theft of our work? As artists, we face a constant threat of others stealing our work online? The worse cases of this are people who try to resell our intellectual property. 

I am not a believer in watermarks. I think a huge watermark over our work nullifies our attempts to promote our work online. I do believe in ID'ing our work with our logo, but a watermark that takes up the center point of an image does nothing except to detract from what we have created.

The Revenant Legendarium - The Spirit Worlds of Artist Grey Cross

What is The Revenant Legendarium?

The physical universe is vast. It stretches beyond our mortal ability to comprehend. Even with modern day telescopes we cannot fathom just how massive it truly is. We are quick to dismiss anything that does not fit into our current model of our universe.

But there is so much more. 

When we pass, where do we go? Its obvious we no longer exist in the physical world. But what then? The spiritual universe is as vast as the physical but its rules are the antithesis of the physical world. Like matter and antimatter, the two shall never cross lest we destroy ourselves.

But the spiritual universe exists. We are immortal beings that exist for a time here and a time there.

Immortality Has Arrived - The Artists Virtual Life

We are the first generation in the history of man to become immortal

The advent of the internet era has made a part of us impervious to death. What we perceive sometimes as a toy, as a method of communication, as a way to waste time when we are bored, has in its own quiet way turned us all into immortals. Its not because of the internet alone that I say this. Its because of the massive social networks promulgating the net now.

Before these came along in their present form, the internet was still a fractured place. Those using one service like AOL or a host of others, were still locked into a small part of the cyber universe. But now, organizations like Google, Yahoo and Facebook are unlocking the doors and expanding services to the point where we now have a doppelganger of our true selves living out there in cyberspace. 

Viewing Your Art Through the Buyers Eyes

Artists can be very myopic. We micromanage every piece of art we create and we fuss over every single detail incessantly. We see whats in front of us, but sometimes we miss the bigger picture.

The simple fact is that this is not how others view our work. Think about it, when you see another artists work for the first time, do you see every little detail about that work? Or rather do you take in the wholeness of the piece, seeing it as a complete structure and not as a series of small brush strokes?

Art Bloggers - Tips For Creating Content

Art bloggers make two common mistakes when they blog. These mistakes lay at opposite ends of the spectrum from each other.

At one end lays the trap of only blogging your art and nothing else. The result is that unless you can create new art daily, there are vast amounts of time where your blog sits unused while you create. No new content equals no new viewers.

The Graffiti Illusion

Street Art is a powerful tool. It allows expression in ways that no other form of art can equal. It gives an anonymous voice to the issues of the day. Graffiti can be found from the ancient stones of Hadrian's Wall to the back alley's of modern day Beijing. It exists when no other voice is allowed to speak. It states our fears, it expresses our joys. 

CLICK ANY IMAGE TO ENLARGE

What is the Graffiti Illusion? 

It is the illusion that graffiti exists where it never actually did. The graffiti in these images does not really exist. It is conceived and created in the artists mind and never existed in reality. Using original photos and art, he plans and choreographs a theme for each piece and then carefully executes it into a single work of art. Any given piece may have dozens of components which were brought together to create the image.

The Spine is Strongest - Finding our Artistic Backbone

Creative people who share their views are often shunned. The Dixie Chicks come to mind as a great example of a group of singers who spoke their minds and had their careers nearly destroyed for speaking their minds on political issues.

What results is that anyone with a creative career such as musicians, movie stars, artists and performers have to think twice about whether they want to take the heat for expressing views that may go against their fans views.

The Art of Fear - The Nightmares Artists Face

I had a dream. I saw an abandoned house sitting alone in a field. The doors were open to the elements and the floor boards were cracked with gaping holes that were open to the dirt floor beneath. There were construction people with hardhats surveying the property. A large yellow tractor sat waiting outside. Several men walked through the house room by room until they came to the attic. At first view it was also empty, but one of the men noticed a small door to one side and opened it with some effort.

The Immense Power of Imagination in Art

As I work with emerging artists, I often see amazingly talented artists who have skills that far surpass my own. In every way they have the potential to become great artists and masters of the craft. But they are lacking one key element to move them from artist to master. 

Imagination. 

Choosing Your Artist Name - Standing Out From the Crowd

One of the things that artists don't think about when they are beginning their professional careers is their name. I think this is because many of us think "to change my name means I am not being true to myself". I respect that line of reasoning. But It is important that we at least consider alternatives earlier in our careers rather than later.

How Do We Make People Look? Name Recognition for Artists

One of the biggest questions emerging artists struggle with is how do we make people look at our work? What is the secret that some artists seem to find that makes people stop and actually look at their work. Is there a magical formula for it? My belief is that its simply word of mouth. The secret is in making word of mouth spread. 

I kind of see it in my mind like a set of scales. When we start out the scale is weighed completely against us. We are a completely unknown element. It does not matter how talented we are or aren't. The more people know about us as artists the more the scales start tipping in the opposite direction.

Using the @ not just the # (Twitter Science For Artists)

If you google the term "twitter tips" you will see in almost every article tips on using hashtags #. Hashtags increase your exposure, gain you a bigger viewing audience and allow you to zero in on a target area. 

What the experts don't talk about as much is the use of the other big symbol on twitter. The @ symbol. 

Critiquing Art

I get asked to attend a lot of shows and to review a lot of portfolios from other artists. No review of work is complete if you are only telling the artist that their work is good or their work sucks. I like to look at a critical evaluation of a piece of art like the building of a wall. One brick doesn't make a building. Many bricks do. Saying "good" or "bad" is the equivalent of one brick. 

I also feel like I need to make sure I am applying the same set standards to each piece of work I look at and give it as objective a review as I can manage. I feel sometimes that art critics and gallery owners do not use as impartial a set of standards as they should. I've seen professionals in the art world apply very personal standards and biases and I think this hurts the art world. Because all art is subjective. Its all the eye of the beholder whether they like a piece or not. So professionals should hold themselves to a higher set of rules and guidelines.

Artists Challenge - Shadows of Perfection (UPDATED 1--05-16)

Artists Challenge

Shadows of Perfection

This challenge involves reducing your available light by 75% while creating a work of art. The only rule is that you don't bring the lights up till you've completed it. If it takes you several days, then cover it over or hide it before you bring the lights back up. This will teach you how much we rely on our eyes and give your other senses a chance to come forward and take charge.

All finished pieces will be shown on the Immortal Artist site. When completed email a photo of your piece and some brief thoughts on how you felt the challenge went and whether you learned anything about relying on other senses and not just your eyes to create art.

Emails to: gcsartno@aol.com

Wall Vision Art Galleries (ART IDEAS)

Art Ideas is a series of conceptual ideas for changing how we operate as artists and how the art world functions as a whole. All ideas are freely given and welcome to anyone who might be able to pursue them. The Revolution Begins With Beauty.

One of the problems that a gallery owner faces is that they get inundated with artists asking to be seen yet there are only so many days in the year and only so much wall space to utilize. If you consider the average gallery may do twelve shows a year that does not leave much leeway to host a large volume of artists.

There is a hell of a lot of work that goes into showing a new artist. A gallery must, out of necessity, show that artist for at least a months period of time if they wish to have the work seen and the buyers become interested.

Mastering Symmetry in Art

One of the biggest problems I find that face people that want to become artists is symmetry. I spend a lot of time looking at other peoples art, evaluating it, discussing why one piece works while another one doesn't. And most often a bad piece of art is deemed bad not because the colors are off or the composition is unclear, but because it is no symmetric. 

There is a natural flow to a perfect piece of art. Lets look at the classic Mona Lisa.

No Photo is a Bad Photo

In this day and age, it is so easy to snap a photo that we forget the value of them. For the amateur any given photo means it is pretty much disposable, to a professional photographer the best images are precious and to be taken care of. To an artist who is also a photographer every photo should have meaning, whether poorly shot, hard to see or blurry.

I see more and more people calling themselves fine art photographers, but they think with a professional or even amateurish point of view. I teach to students and interns that no image is valueless unless it is nothing but one solid color. 

Protests and Activism as an Art Form (ART IDEAS)

Art Ideas is a series of conceptual ideas for changing how we operate as artists and how the art world functions as a whole. All ideas are freely given and welcome to anyone who might be able to pursue them. The Revolution Begins With Beauty.

In today's world there seems to be a protest about something almost every day. Most have valid reasons for doing so. Believe me, I think protests are one of the most important forms of public expression we have. 

But what I think what is missing is the form of the protest. A mob milling around shouting just incites more violence rather than less. It often seems that this form of protest ends up having its message totally lost in the maelstrom of emotions. 

Travel Stipend Grants for Artists (ART IDEAS)

Art Ideas is a series of conceptual ideas for changing how we operate as artists and how the art world functions as a whole. All ideas are freely given and welcome to anyone who might be able to pursue them. The Revolution Begins With Beauty.

There are a lot of great opportunities out there for artists. But many of them come with the stipulation that you get yourself and your art to the place its being shown at your own cost. 

Art residencies are good about making sure the artists travel costs are taken into consideration. But say you want to enter a piece of art in a juried competition that is a thousand miles from where you live. Even if you are well suited to enter that competition, the cost may be past what you can afford.

The Elder Gods Saga - Learning to Match Art to Verse (UPDATED 09-10-16)

There is something very magical to me about using the written word in art. I would hazard to say that anytime one creative discipline is merged with another, that it becomes something new and amazing. 

The Elder Gods was my first attempt at matching written verse to art. There were five pieces of art created first and then I made an attempt to create a poetic saga, that merged the five pieces into one ongoing story. 

The First Burning Man I Ever Attended as an Artist, I Wasn't At

When I was in my teens (I'm 51 now) I became a coordinator for Hands Across America. For all you young ones, this was a one-day event that tried to create a people chain, holding hands from one side of the United States to the other. My role was to organize and coordinate people going from Lansing Michigan to the staging area in Peru, Indiana. We had one mile to fill, and even though I was only 18 at the time, I pursued it with gusto. And you know, we did it. Our mile of that thousands of miles of people had no gaps and stretched out through Peru into an Indiana cornfield and beyond. 

I couldn't tell you how many people we brought down there and I recall very few of the details of the event now. But there is one thing that sticks with me to this day; the hours right after the event ended. We'd all worked so hard and so long to bring it about, and we'd all become very close. And we just didn't want that feeling to end. 

Understanding the Assimilation Art Movement

This page is an accumulation of notes and concepts regarding Assimilation Art. Because its a work in progress it may take me years to put it together, but as I devise a working set of parameters I will add them here. Check back often for new information and I truly welcome your comments and participation in this emerging art form.

~Grey~

Assimilation Art - Is the merging of two or more distinct art forms into one or more new forms. In some ways it is similar to mixed media art. Assimilation art may yield multiple end products where mixed media usually results in one piece of finished art. Assimilation art may produce multiple finished art pieces spawned from the same original work that are all different. Assimilation art may also take one art form and morph it into something new. For example, the artist creates a photo series that morphs into a painting based on that photo series that again morphs into a sculpture, etc etc.

The technical Greek definition of morphology means "the study of shape". At its very basic definition this is assimilation art. You are studying the shape and how it changes over time and how it can take on new shapes and forms.