MurrayG
Contributing Member
- Messages
- 658
Hi Bart, I agree again. I find that critiques usually help. But out of interest, I sometimes go look at the works of those folk. I can usually see if there is a "preference" at work. Fr the most part, I take all critiques as useful as it can also point at my preferences by inference.Murray, "likes" help. C&C when requested can help, but not always.
On WC I posted one a year or more ago and a couple of folks pointed out to me that the top half of my painting didn't really seem to fit with the bottom half, even though it was in fact sort of a realistic portrayal of the inspiring landscape scene. At first I was a bit taken aback, but then played with it in Photoshop as they had suggested. Sure enough, cropping out the top and using only the bottom made a much better and more cohesive composition. I eventually took a scissors to it and then framed it in the cropped way. Worked!
I have a painting colleague who teaches and likes to give criticism. What I find at times is that his criticism is based on his preferred style and the rules he learned in fine art school. But sometimes those rules and that style don't fit what he is critiquing. His work is very good and I recognize his preferences. Yet he doesn't quite always get the inspiration of the art he's critiquing. I'm not offended if he offers a word on mine (or others) but I do know to take it with a grain of salt. Or to take it from his perspective only, especially when I'm clear that his intent in painting a similar scene is not my intent.
My style is really something like post-Impressionism/Expressionism. I deliberately do not do photo-realism. Someone recently dubbed it "chaotic realism", which tickled the hell out of me. I like that description. But in actuality my paintings are quite realistic and reasonably faithful to the scene that inspired them. All I'm doing is choosing a more dynamic composition and amping colors a bit, sometimes stylizing shapes a bit. A good artist is a good observer and interpreter in my view. That doesn't fit with rigid rules.
Being self taught, I am still learning much of the technical goodies that some artists take for granted. Yes "Likes" help it gives a yardstick. When something challenges me, I cannot say that I like it, but I can appreciate the work.
Thanks for your input, it has helped give me perspective.