Sunday, March 04, 2012

4 March 2012: Who's made a mark this week?

A young Neoregelia Scarlet Charlotte
coloured pencils 7.5" x 11.5"
copyright Katherine Tyrrell - all rights reserved
I'm pleased to announce that my coloured pencil drawing of a bromeliad was selected and will be hanging in the 2012 Annual Exhibition of the Society of Botanical Artists - at Westminster Central Hall next month - 20-29th April 2012.

Here's my post about the submission process last Monday Society of Botanical Artists Submission Day - and a botanical egg.  Do let me know who else has had their work selected too - particularly if you can't get to the exhibition and would like your work photographed 'in situ'.

During my week off I continued to experience problems with both my eyes and my drawing hand.  I'd been resisting the inevitable conclusion that I can't do detailed work anymore.  Or at least until I get the op and have brand new lenses - and hence I need to stick to my "colour field" approach to botanical artwork for now and sketchier approach for everything else.  Either that or I need to start working much bigger!

Artists and Art Blogs

Artists

Botanical Art
Drawing and Sketching

You can get a close up of my sketching technique in this month's banner
for Urban Sketchers London
Painting
  • Painting is re-emerging in the UK as an important way of creating art according to a Telegraph article - Damien Hirst: has shock art lost its bite?
  • Many congrats to Tracy Helgeson (New York State, USA) who sold 26 of her paintings at the opening of her new show last night - see Mini-Art at The Harrison Gallery March 2012.  My jaw dropped when I saw she was showing 100 small paintings and 7 large ones - but I guess then they're this size you'd need a lot.  You can see all the artwork in the show here - you might want to be like people on Saturday and buy more than one! :)  Tracy has reinvented her blogs and Works by Tracy has morphed into The Painter's Farm where there is much talk of goats!
People were buying 2 and 3 at a time, one couple bought 6! Everyone was having fun making little groupings of them.......
Paintings © Tracey Helgeson
Art Business and Marketing

Pinterest

The major topic of debate this week revolved around the explosive growth of Pinterest.  In particular the way the site does nothing to prevent people misappropriating full size images without permission of the owner ie copyright infringement until after they have been pinned.  Whereas it's undoubtedly the case some people think Pinterest is brilliant there are other, and I'm one of them, who find its business practices very dodgy.  The fact that the P*rn Industry have now discovered Pinterest and pinned large quantities of 'adult' images to the site does not impress - mainly because of the laxity of Pinterest quality controls over site content.  Do you want your images appearing on the same site as explicit content?

My own feeling is that the concept of a mood board approach is here to stay for retail and shopping but that a lot of work needs to be done before it's satisfactory for all parties. My recommendation is to "wait and see" - Pinterest is a site which needs to sort out a LOT of issues.

I highlight the concerns below in the copyright section.

Facebook
Art Competitions and Art Societies

Calls For Entries
Art Society Open Exhibition
Art Society Exhibitions
  • The Annual Exhibition of the Royal Society of British Artists opened at the Mall Galleries on 29th February.  I've not seen it yet but hope to do so early this week  - even if I get drenched!  There are a number of talks and demonstrations scheduled for this next week - see the website for more info.  James Horton, the President, has an article entitled "High Society" in the March 2012 issue of Artists & Illustrators magazine which describes the selection of artwork for this exhibition.
  • If you like watercolour you should start planning to visit London for the 200th Annual Exhibition of the Royal Institute of Painters in Water Colours Wed 14 - Sun 25 March 2012. This is their blog Artists of the RI
  • Botanical art lovers will want to know that Amicus Botanicus is holding an exhibition called Amicus Botanicus - A New Leaf at 54, The Gallery, Shepherd Market, Mayfair, London WIJ 7QX between 14-20th May.
Art Exhibitions
Art Education

Life Drawing
  • I've signed up to do a life class on 20 April at the National Portrait Gallery and I get to draw Sue Tilley who was Freud's Model for Benefit Supervisor sleeping.  I'm really pleased because when I met her at the PV for the Freud exhibition I remember thinking she'd be terrific fun to draw.
Tips and techniques
Copyright

Copyright infringement

I've become a complete Pinterest bore this week!  However at time I've felt very inclined to start a "civil rights for images" campaign!
  • Let's STOP ("stop taking our pictures") accepting that images always get taken! 
  • Let's STOP being passive victims of bad behaviour!  
  • Would you just accept it if somebody mugged you in the street? 
  • Why do we then accept people taking our images without asking permission?
Anyway - for those interested in this topic, I've rounded up all the links to the good articles on the topic of the misappropriation of images and copyright infringement related to Pinterest and created a new website Pinterest and Copyright - Photography, Art & Crafts which has four sections:
  • what Pinterest has to say about copyright
  • the basics about copyright, fair use and the public domain
  • commentary about "the issue with the images" from a number of different perspective - the lawyers, the geeks, business journals, the newspapers, the art business blogs and me
  • tips and tutorials for those needing a bit of help with watermarks
I'm going to highlight just a few of the links below
Here are my posts - which were oriented around the practicalities of stopping people pinning my images and then getting them removed from Pinterest.  Two of them have rocketed into my top ten list of most popular posts
Photography and removal of metadata
  • Photographers have been campaigning for a very long time of the need to recognise that their property  - in terms of digital files - needs to be protected.  PhotoMetadata was created by the Stock Artists Alliance and is a site which is a home to the campaign and various tutorials about how to protect your images.
  • However I'm wondering how many of those who embed their copyright information into their images are aware that it is removed by very many sites.  The Top 12 Myths about Embedded Photo Metadata is a recommended read for everybody who is putting photos of their artwork on the Internet.
As of late 2010, over half of the various social media or photo sharing sites either remove all embedded metadata on upload, or remove it from images that are processed to intermediate preview and thumbnail images.

the Copyright NoticeSource, Creator, and Contact Info, comprise what is referred to as "Copyright Management Information" and removal of these is against the law in the United States under the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA)
The Top 12 Myths about Embedded Photo Metadata
Opinion Polls

Pinterest hijacked the normal end/start of the month routine re the Making A Mark Opinion Poll and I'll be remedying that in the coming week.

Internet, webware and blogging
  • Picnik is closing in April.  For those looking for an alternative and without the budget to be afford the full blown version of Photoshop, I have to say I'm very happy with Photoshop Elements - although I've yet to upgarde to v10.
and finally......

I've only just noticed but my blog apparently went through 2 MILLION page views a while back.  It's a number which is so big it's slightly mind-numbing.  Many thanks to everybody who has visited and commented on my posts - it's your support which keeps me going.......

11 comments:

  1. Congratulations on getting in the Society of Botanical Artists Show! It is a gorgeous picture. Thanks also for my mention. Is much appreciated. And....2 million page views?? Wow, mind boggling. Congrats. But that said, there is really no other blog like this one and we need it. Thank you.

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  2. Congratulations on the acceptance of your painting for the SBA exhibition. I hope to see it in April.

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  3. Congratulations on the acceptance of this lovely drawing and on the 2million page views.

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  4. Congratulations on getting your amazing work into the SBA and another round of refreshing updates from the artscape

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  5. Congratulations on the acceptance, Katherine!
    And your articles on Pinterest have really got me thinking. Thank you....

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  6. Dear Katheryn,
    Congrats on your art work! Thank you for always important info, particularly, copyrights issues.
    Kind regards, Sadami

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  7. Hi Kathrine

    Have a look at at http://linkwithlove.typepad.com/linkwithlove/. I think they make some interesting points regarding copyright. I for one am trying very hard to link , refer and hunt down sources I use on my blog.
    And on the subject: may I use one of your London sketches as shown on the new urban sketchers london blog when I write about it on my blog (greyorgreen.blogspot.com) please. Let me know your thoughts and thanks for all your input.
    Kirsten

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  8. Yes - agreed interesting. Not sure that the message isn't a bit too big!

    Kirsten - if you write to me (see side column for email address) I'll email you an Urban Sketchers London image to use for your review

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  9. Big congrats on the botanical show! Well deserved. :) And I'll second Photoshop Elements - I've used both as a designer and the only real difference I know of is that you can't do CMYK on Elements. Most artists do photo editing for online or home/online RGB photo printers so this shouldn't be an issue.

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  10. Congrats Katherine on your own personal acceptance into the botanical show.

    I have been 'off the grid' for the last couple weeks and can see I have a lot of catching up to do.
    Floors and ceilings getting redone here at home meant no studio and limited access to my computer... constant reshuffling of everything from room to room! Oh this busy life we lead!

    Looks like you have been throwing DARTS at Pinboards lately. Glad to see you spearheaded the Pinterest/copyright/pin prevention issue. It should be based on permission and choice.
    I'll be interested to go back and read the posts more thoroughly. There is a lot there!

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  11. Hi Katherine, Congratulations on your acceptance for the SBA's 2012 Exhibition. I hope it's a great success. :)

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