Copyright Issues in Blogging

I found numerous lovely paintings and mixed media projects I wanted to highlight at the recent 39th Annual Juried Exhibit at the Durango Arts Center, which I wrote about last week. I did not photograph any of the artwork on display at the gallery because of copyright laws.

It turns out, a number of the artists I wanted to highlight do not have images readily available online. For example, I wanted to show something of the artist, Barbara Belanger, because her use of color in her painting, Confetti Cottonwood, created such a happy sight. The painting creates a nice bridge between representational and abstract painting. Her palette lifted my spirits just walking toward them. Belanger created a wonderful sense of motion simply by placing the background structures at a matching angle. I get sad about these copyright issues when I want to put something online that is not legally available. But, I certainly understand the feeling an artist might have (as cited in one of the links below) when he/she enters a gallery and sees someone selling an image copied from that artist’s own work.

Below, I have attached three links to online articles, one explains the law, one, a blog that violates the law, and the third one acknowledges, the times they are a changing.

http://bucks.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/21/when-its-illegal-to-photograph-artwork/

http://forum.expressobeans.com/viewtopic.php?f=32&t=89027

http://www.artnews.com/2013/05/13/photography-in-art-museums/

Ann Smith, Featured Artist from Durango Arts Center Juried Exhibition

http://www.sanjuancollege.edu/pages/5301.asp?id=370

Ann Smith’s painting, Change, recently hanging at the Durango Art Center’s 39th Juried Exhibition took my breath away. An abstract landscape, the earth appeared to glow from the inside out. Her palette, brushwork, and management of the space were stunning. Please visit her website, which I will link below, in order to see how this artist manages light to glow from the inside.

In the part of her portfolio called Images, the figure titled, Reclining, is one good example. Also, I’ve included the link beneath the photo above because I found her comments about painting very interesting.

What beautiful work this woman creates.

http://www.annsmithwatercolors.com/index.html

Durango Arts Center 39th Annual Juried Exhibition, Part One

Recently I leafed through a book in the Durango Public Library, The 100 Best Art Towns in America: a guide to museums, galleries, festivals, and dining, by John Villani, published in 2005 by Countryman Press. I was surprised to find Durango included on the list. This is the fifth time I’ve been here in the past three years.

It’s true that the Durango Arts Center is fabulous. In July, 2012, we saw a wonderful display of hand blown glass, The Blown Glass Invitational exhibit featuring Chihuly and artists he has influenced. In May, 2013 they were Celebrating Ute Culture. Last summer, in June 2014, it was an amazing display of jewelry: Top Jewels, National Jewelry Design Exhibition. Their education programs seem excellent.

I’m sure there are retail galleries I haven’t visited in Durango. According to Villani’s book, many practicing artists live in the Durango area. The author also states that if there existed a more energetic collecting environment, the Durango art scene would certainly be bustling.

The 39th Annual Juried Exhibition is currently hanging at the local center. After I read the Durango section in Villani’s book, I went back to view the display a second time, partially to see how many of those wonderful works had sold. Three, $285.00, $300.00, and $600.00, all very inexpensive for the quality of the work.

This is my first installation of three about that art show, which will be ending in one more week. A town full of wonderful and prolific artists who live in a sluggish art market town do not live in one of, The Best Art Towns in America.

Link here to view archived material about two of the shows mentioned above, and to the Durango Arts Center artists.  http://durangoarts.org/artist-directory/, and http://durangoarts.org/exhibits/exhibits-archive/

More on Georgia O’Keeffe

Byron gave me an elk skull, which has been hanging in my dining room for a few years now. One day I noticed that the empty space, where the nasal cartilage had deteriorated, formed the outline of a classically female shape. Byron gave me the skull because I like Georgia O’Keeffe’s skull paintings so well.

If I hadn’t noticed that human outline in my elk skull, I might not have noticed the similar shape in O’Keeffe’s painting below.

Ram’s Head White Hollyhock and Little Hills, 193

I might not have noticed the way the line across the top of the cow’s skull below resembles the outstretched arms shoulders of a human figure with a bowed head from behind.

Cow’s Skull: Red, White, and Blue, 1931

As I mentioned a few months ago, had I not seen Alfred Stieglitz’s nude photographs of O’Keeffe on display at the musee d’Orsay in Paris, I wouldn’t have recognized the artist’s shape painted into her New Mexican landscapes, done years later.

There has been a lot of discussion about whether O’Keeffe painted erotic images into her famous flowers. Georgia O’Keeffe painted the truth. It’s great entertainment, looking for all the repeating shapes in this (sometimes/often) glorious world.

Vision and Inspiration/Chuck Close

One day a few years ago, driving along in my car, I saw an armadillo up ahead in the road. Not so unusual somewhere, but unlikely since I live in Minnesota. Coloring:  correct. Shape: largely correct.

Here’s a quote from  William Herschel that Peter Turchi has used in his wonderful book, A Muse & A Maze: Seeing is an art which must be learnt. Perhaps because we largely learn the rudimentary aspects of vision before the part of our lives we remember, it’s easy to forget it is a skill, one worth developing.

Chuck Close Self-Portrait

I was stunned the first time I saw Chuck Close’s famous self-portrait, linked below in an archived blog by the same writer I reblogged last week.

When you are standing nearby, the giant canvas is a series of tiny abstract squares. But, at a certain, proper distance away, Close’s detailed face emerges shockingly. It’s similar to the feeling I’ve had when, looking at my bark mulch, a snake takes shape out of the camouflaged background.

https://artofquotation.wordpress.com/2014/11/10/inspiration-is-for-amateurs-the-rest-of-us/

My eyes were a big problem for me all the way through elementary school. VISION is one of my subjects, in thought and in writing. But, just now I’ve realized that, so far, I’ve forgotten to explore this subject in the novel draft I’m writing, and in painting. This is the kind of thing that artists like Close know and practice because they have done their work.