Dear Artist, About fifty documented instances exist of children reared by animals. Children brought up by wolves or bears tend not to speak or draw. On the other hand, children born into a world of speech and art adopt the…
Dear Artist, I’m laptopping you from a cave on the northern coast of the Dominican Republic. By flashlight I’m scanning drawings done up to several hundred years ago by the Taino Indians. Shredded-end sticks dipped into powdered charcoal mixed with…
Dear Artist, Nigel Spivey, in his insightful book How Art Made the World, speculates on “peak shift.” It’s a concept that comes from research into both human and animal behaviour. A neurological principle, peak shift says we need exaggeration to…
Dear Artist, Memes are like genes — they carry characteristics from one generation to the next. Unlike genes, memes don’t hang out in chromosomes, they live and thrive within the culture and environment. In studies of various religions, for example,…
Dear Artist, I always thought it was just my problem. Every time anyone — friend, art dealer or family member — wanted to take a look around my studio, I felt I needed to apologize and tell them, “Nothing much…
Dear Artist, There are three main types of subject matter — positive, negative, and neutral. While there are loads of hybrid possibilities, I’ll describe three extreme works so you get my drift: Positive: Cats playing with a ball of wool.…
Dear Artist, “The childhood shows the man, as morning shows the day,” said the British poet John Milton. For many of us, the choice to be creative was made early on, and it had a lot to do with how…
Dear Artist, Yesterday, Tatjana Mirkov-Popovicki wrote, “Boats are art objects that take on a narrative and emotional personality. They try to tell a story. That’s why boat paintings appeal to a certain type of artist and collector. They ask, ‘What…
Dear Artist, “If you want to be an artist — try being artistic.” This deceptively minor slip of info was given to me by a fellow painter, Maurice Golleau, somewhere in Provence many years ago. I’ve come to realize that…
Dear Artist, In a recent interview, the noted art dealer, collector and benefactor Eugene V. Thaw, was asked how he would define the art of collecting art. “It’s all about ordering,” he said. “It’s about making some sense out of…