Call for Entries: Royal Society of Marine Artists Annual Exhibition 2022

The Royal Society of Marine Artists issued its invitations to marine artists to submit entries for for its annual exhibition. It wants to see more art inspired by the sea and marine environment 

This open exhibitions invites submissions of subject matter which MUST be essentially marine in nature i.e. involved with TIDAL water. This includes:

• harbours and shorelines,
• traditional craft and contemporary shipping, 
• creeks and beaches, 
• wildlife and marine workers
• in short anything that involves tidal water.

Paintings of non-tidal rivers, inland lakes and waterways etc are not permissible.

The deadline for entries is noon on Friday 8th July. 

You can find out more on the page providing details about this OPEN exhibition.

I've summarised key points below.

The Exhibition

The RSMA always holds its Annual Exhibition every Autumn at the Mall Galleries in central London. This year the exhibition dates are Thursday 22nd September to Saturday 1st October 2022

Four good reasons to enter

The Annual Exhibition by the Royal Society of Marine Artists

1. People who like boats are often wealthy - meaning they're more likely to have funds to spare to buy artwork!  This is important within the context of an economy where lots of people are being careful about their spending, t
2. This exhibition ALWAYS attracts a lot of people interested in buying marine artwork. This exhibition has typically had very good sales in the past.
3. It ALWAYS has a LOT of decent prizes. You can find out more about them here.
4. Prizes awarded in the past have been dominated by strong work by non-members - which is always good to see for those who submit work via the open entry. 

However, in order to do well, you MUST have and demonstrate a genuine interest in marine art. 

That's because expert and enthusiastic customers also mean those who can spot errors in artwork painted by those new to the subject and/or painting from photographs with no other observational prep. undertaken. I well remember being taken round the exhibition once by somebody who pointed out all the "made-up" paintings - it was a revelation!

This was my Review: Royal Society of Marine Artists Annual Exhibition 2020 - which also shows you the range, type and quality of artwork on display.

Call for Entries

This is an OPEN EXHIBITION which tends to display paintings, drawings, sculpture and prints.

Below you can find

• a summary of how to enter the next annual exhibition.
• a list of prizes (see end)
• an archive of posts about past exhibitions - which contain a lot of images of the type of artwork that gets selected for exhibition.

What sort of artwork can you submit?

SUBJECT: The RSMA seeks submissions of art inspired by the sea and marine environment. 

 

It makes two statements about the scope - as follows

Who painted this? #66

This week's "Who Painted This (and the rest!) #66 is a painting has a tease in the title. 

That's because you should be able to work out what the title might be if you study the painting very carefully - and if you right click and open in a new tab you'll get a slightly larger version. 

HOWEVER there are a number of paintings which use that title - by completely different artists. I'd never realised quite what a popular theme this is until I started this post!

The other part of the tease is where I saw and photographed it (in London) is not where it normally lives! That's because it was 'on loan'.

Below you can find 

• The details of how to participate in this art history challenge  
• the rules of the challenge 
• the answer to last week re. Who Painted this #64 
• the names of all the people who got most or all of the answer correct
• who provided the best answer last week - which gives you an idea of what a good answer looks like

Your answers will be published next Sunday - before the next challenge.

How to participate in "Who painted this? #66

Tell me the story of this painting as best you can!

These are the for how "Who painted this?" works.

This is about using brains not technology - so please do NOT "cheat".

Briefly, in your comment ON THIS POST you must tell me ALL or as many of the following as you can:

• the title of the artwork
• the name of the artist who created this artwork
• the date it was created
• the media used
• where it lives now
• how you know all this eg how did you do your search
• anything else you can find out about the artwork and/or artist - tell its story!

The Winner of this week's challenge is the first identifiable person (i.e. no anonymous guesses) who, in my judgement, is 

• the first person to get to the answer by fair means 
• AND provides the best quality answer in terms of added details about the artwork and artist

Remember also

• no use of Google image search or Tineye to find the image allowed 
• this is a traditional web search of images using words only plus "hit the books" time
• I don't publish the comments until next week's post.

Comments on this blog post will only be published once a week - on the following Sunday.

(You wouldn't believe how many spam comments I'm having to identify and delete each week because of this challenge!!)

NOTE: You can find out more about the background to "who painted this?" and  THE RULES for participating in this challenge. on the Who Painted This? page at the top of the blog menu https://makingamark.blogspot.com/p/who-painted-this.html

Who Painted This #65?

Pommes et oranges by Paul Cézanne
Vers 1899
Huile sur toile; H. 74,0 ; L. 93,0 cm.
Legs du comte Isaac de Camondo, 1911
Musée d'Orsay 

The challenge last week was to work out which of the paintings of apples and oranges by a well known painter this one is - and where it is and other relevant details! 

How a Court Artist works

Court artists - not one but THREE - have been all over the news media in the last two weeks as the Vardy vs Rooney Farce has played out at the High Court. But 

• do you know how a Court Artist works?
• did you know there are only four court artists in the UK?

Court artist Julia Quenzler drawing the picture that covers the first 20 seconds of our piece on 6 and 10 news tonight. (If u missed it!) pic.twitter.com/1y4dF4Tn4d

— Danny Savage (@dannysavage) November 10, 2016

The Court Artists

Here's some facts about court artists working in the UK

• There are only four Court Artists in the UK - and they are all women!
• They exist because cameras are not allowed in UK Courts. 
• Typically they are only employed to draw key players in the high profile / celebrity / sensational cases
• Court Artists are typically hired by the news media and commissioned to produce visuals for major news stories involving court cases
• To gain access to the the courtroom for high-profile trials, the courtroom artists must be sponsored by an accredited news agency.
• Their major skill needs to be in memorising what the scene looks like as NOBODY is allowed to make a drawing in court. However court artists can make written notes about manner and clothing. 
• Once they get outside court they have to work quickly to download the memory AND meet the deadline to produce the visual for the client. 
• Typically most use charcoal pencils and pastels for speed and saturation of colour.
• Each has a distinctive style - and some are better at accuracy and catching features than others.
• Court artists can also merchandise their sketches via the picture agencies such as Alamy.

Their names are as follows and you can find links to their websites embedded in their names below (if they have one)

• Priscilla Coleman 'The Courtroom Artist' - who uses GRN as her agent
• Julia Quenzler - no website or social media site
• Elizabeth Cook - no website but is featured on Alamy
• Siân Frances - has worked for The Times and Channel 4 News. She now describes herself as a "former court artist".

All the Court Artists seem to have been around for some time - and at least one seems to have retired herself. What I'm very surprised about is that:

• they don't make more use of photographs of the key players when drawing them outside the court - given some of the drawings are HIGHLY exaggerated and stylised and sometimes bear little resemblance to the individual in question.
• they don't have more competition from younger artists wielding marker pens which are so very often the medium of choice for those drawing fast for illustration today.

I'm impressed by the ensemble drawings of Priscilla Coleman - which you can see on her website. I assume most of these are drawn after the court risen for the day given the number of individuals she manages to cram in. It rather looks like she has a nice business in commission based artworks from some of those involved!

There's a really good way of checking whether you'd be any good as a court artist. Spend some time watching court cases on public enquiries on television and then move to another room and recreate a drawing of what you saw!

Back in January 2020 - before the Pandemic hit - The Crown Court (Recording and Broadcasting) Order 2020 was published as draft legislation. The intention was that sentencing remarks in profile cases could be televised. However that's not the same as covering a civil court case such as Vardy vs Rooney - and I'm sure there will be a continued demand for courtroom sketches - done outside the court!

Articles about court artists

• Drawn in the dock: the story of courtroom illustration | It's Nice That
• Courtroom artists on their toughest cases: 'It's a compelling, sometimes upsetting job' | The Guardian - in which Elizabeth Cook describers her job
• Court artists: Quick on the draw | The Independent
• A day in the life of a court artist | BBC
• EXCLUSIVE: Secrets of the courtroom artists sketching the rich and famous in the dock | Daily Mirror
• Court Sketcher | Granta

TALK: Introduction to Retirement and Pensions for Artists

If you are a creative living in the Greater Manchester area and want to grow inbusiness confidence, you may be interested in a Zoom Talk I'm giving for the Islington Mill WEAVE Summer School

 

Islington Mill WEAVE Summer School

Islington Mill has an ongoing commitment to artist education and development. 

 

WEAVE is a free business support programme for Greater Manchester based artists, creatives and SMEs. I'm afraid you can't enroll if you're not based in the Greater Manchester area

 

The Summer School has been produced with funding from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF).

Summer School is a 4-day series of workshops and masterclasses, that are free to attend for participants of Islington Mill’s WEAVE programme. New participants are welcome to sign up at the event for free to enjoy our full programme across the week.

The modules have been chosen and developed through conversations with the Islington Mill community and are designed to support creative individuals and organisations. Whether you are a freelance performer yet to fill in your first tax return, a mid-career artist, or maker with an established business, we have classes to support your development and help you grow in confidence.

TALK: Introduction to Retirement and Pensions for Artists

My talk is going to be about one of the aspects most people don't think too seriously about when younger and some sadly don't at all until it's too late.

A career as an artist does not come with a pension plan - you need to think about how you will cope financially when you need to retire. Katherine Tyrrell will talk you through the basics of pensions for artists including why it's absolutely essential to think about later life and pensions from the beginning of a career, paying NI and some of the myths about how to fund yourself in later life and why these can be very risky.

This workshop aims to:

• Get you thinking about planning for your retirement and pension planning
• Point you in the direction of relevant reading material
• Help you find places where you can get more advice
• Provide a starting point for discussions with expert advisers

 

Zoom Talks for Summer Schools

I've started getting back to normal post sugery and clearance to start walking again - but it's slow going. 

However one thing that's been very odd is that I've had lots of requests for Zoom Talks and help for individuals in the last few weeks. I was giving a talk last night and this one next week and then another one for a prominent arts organisation in August as part of another summer school.

If you're interested in a Zoom Talk on a variety of art busines topics, read this page on my Art Business Info for Artists website first and then contact me via the form at the bottom of the page.

If you have a Summer School focused on business matters for artists and would like some wider exposure you can always try messaging via my Facebook Page - https://www.facebook.com/artbusinessforartists

 

Who painted this #65?

It looks like there's a decent number of people interested in this weekly challenge.

This next painting is one I photographed in the museum where it lives over a decade ago. 

Who Painted This #65?

I'm assuming that many of you will get the name of the artist pretty quickly. This week's challenge is reminder that the complete answer contains more details than literally who painted this

The challenge this week is to work out which one this one is - and where it is and other relevant details! Tell me the story of this painting as best you can!

Below you can find 

• The details of how to participate in this art history challenge  
• the rules of the challenge 
• the answer to last week re. Who Painted this #64 
• the names of all the people who got most or all of the answer correct
• who provided the best answer last week - which gives you an idea of what a good answer looks like

Your answers will be published next Sunday - before the next challenge.

PS I need to be upfront and say the time the "who painted this" post will get published every Sunday depends on the weather!! I'm now doing my daily walk outside again - as I did before my surgery - and had to head out this morning as I checked the weather forecast and realised it was going to start raining at midday - as indeed it did on my return home - 200 yards from my front door. I'm afraid my physio/recovery takes priority at the moment!

How to participate in "Who painted this? #64

Don't forget - there are rules to how "Who painted this?" works - and these are detailed in THE RULES for participating in this challenge.

This is about using brains not technology - so please do NOT "cheat".

Briefly, in your comment ON THIS POST you must tell me ALL of the following:

• the title of the artwork
• the name of the artist who created this artwork
• the date it was created
• the media used
• where it lives now
• how you know all this eg how did you do your search
• anything else you can find out about the artwork and/or artist - tell its story!

The Winner of this week's challenge is the first identifiable person (i.e. no anonymous guesses) who, in my judgement, is 

• the first person to get to the answer by fair means 
• AND provides the best quality answer in terms of added details about the artwork and artist

Remember also

• no use of Google image search or Tineye to find the image allowed - this is a traditional web search of images using words only plus "hit the books" time
• I don't publish the comments until next week's post.

i.e. comments are being opened up again - but ONLY for this weekly post and comments on this blog post will only be published once a week - on the following Sunday.

NOTE: You can find out more about the background to "who painted this?" and the RULES on this page https://makingamark.blogspot.com/p/who-painted-this.html

Who painted this? #64