Sunday, August 10, 2008

10th August 2008 - who's made a mark this week?


It's really great when other people "make a mark" about what you do. This week two close friends and I all enjoyed a big boost to our profiles delivered by the actions of others - what was really odd was that they all happened on on the same day!
Art Blogs

First off - I'm NOT theming my blog for the Olympics - this is an art blog not a sports blog!

Bloggers seem to be having a lot of downtime this month for various reasons - including breaks for holidays. I'm certainly enjoying the new regime for this month which means I get time to do the other things that need doing right now - like getting ready for exhibitions!

However I'd like to make a couple of important points
  • I really enjoy reading the blogs of those who keep writing even if they're not creating. Tracy Helgeson (Works by Tracy Helgeson ) has been an absolute star in this respect just recently - we've moved out of the new studio, into the old one, out to the flowers, across the veggies and into the chicken hut - A Chicken Update While I am At It! I, for one, am loving every minute of it - I feel like I've moved in!
  • At the same time, for all those who are experiencing enforced blogging breaks due to ill health (self or family) do please know that many of us keep you in our thoughts and wait eagerly for fresh posts when you have the time or feel up to it. It was really great to see Cindy Woods (Learning Daily) back with several new sketches this week and at the same time sad to know Vivien's posting will need to take a back seat for a while - see re absence.
Back to art bloggers who were blogging last week. Those who've had their holidays include:
Art business and marketing
  • My poll about What's the MAIN way you sell your art? (see side column) is gathering pace. Out of the 33 responses to date some 39% sell most of their work online - but interestingly only one person sells most of their work via an online art gallery! Personal blogs and websites appear to be much more effective at achieving sales. There's 20 days left if you've not voted so far.
  • This week I discovered The Voluntary Arts Network. This aims to promote participation in the arts and crafts across the UK and Republic of Ireland. This is the list of Visual Arts groups listed in the Directory (I'm not quite sure why the young farmers think they're artistic - maybe it's the crop circles?) - including some which don't often get much of a profile on the internet such asthe National Society for Education in Art & Design. I think I'll be doing another post about this network and what it has to offer in the near future
Do not--ever ever--send an email with your entire list in the To or Cc line.
Alyson B Stanfield
  • Why? Alyson B Stanfield (Art Biz Blog ) reminded us of the reasons why on Saturday in Preview: Tweak your email habits. Sending an email with your entire list in the To or Cc line is the fastest way I know of telling people you don't really know enough about how to protect their privacy or security - or worse still don't even care!
  • The Artists Network has created a fan page on Facebook for the fans of The Artist's Magazine, Watercolor Artist and The Pastel Journal.
Art collections and collectors
  • The Art News Blog, commenting on the introduction of resale rights for artists in Australia, is not convinced that artists should receive royalties on resale of their work - see Artist Royalties. DACs is the Design and Artists Copyright Society in the UK. Last year they paid 12,500 artists and visual creators their share of the £3 million resale royalties that they collected. I think Art News Blog misses the point about how artists have previously never had an opportunity to share in the increasing value of their work. Should art galleries and collectors be the only people who share in any profits which are made? What do you think?
  • The Guardian's Money section is proving to be an interesting place to look for pointers on the art market
    • How much does a sound art investment cost? - was a question posed (with a bit more detail) on the 1st August - and a variety of answers have now been assembled and printed alongside it. Click the link to read their responses.
    • I was alerted by one of my readers to an interesting piece yesterday about collectables. It focused on how investors switch to "recession-proof" collectables (such as stamps and signatures) as a hedge against soaring inflation. It's an interesting message for artists who are not just trying to generate sales but instead prefer to create collectors.
Art galleries, museums and exhibitions
The Courtauld Gallery holds the most important group of works by Paul Cézanne (1839-1906) in Britain. This exhibition presents the entire collection for the first time with major paintings such as the iconic Montagne Sainte-Victoire (1887)and Card Players (1892-5) shown alongside rarely seen drawings and watercolours.
  • I posted yesterday about the current exhibition at the Llewellyn Alexander Gallery - Not the Royal Academy - a Salon des Refusés
  • which I saw when submitting my furry friends to their annual scrutiny - I'm really pleased to have had four feline artworks accepted for the 14th Annual Exhibition of the Society of Feline Artists at the Llewellyn Alexander Gallery. I'll be posting one a week between now and the opening of the exhibition.
  • I've only just discovered the Yahoo site Upcoming. It's a social calendar website and allows you to add in events. It looks to me like it's being heavily used by the geeks (this is Robert Scoble's Upcoming), musicians and performing artists - maybe it's time for the visual artists to get involved and start promoting their events.
  • I've got a few posts coming up about submitting work to juried exhibitions, both national and interational, so people interested in drawing and dry media should stay tuned!
Art fairs
  • I've only just come across a very sound batch of posts by experienced craft artist Luann Udell (Luann Udell ) - which have as a common title Good Booths Gone Bad. Luann is very experienced at showing at art fairs - and she's been at League of NH Craftsmen’s 75th Annual Fair all week. Here's a sample
Art materials and supplies

Inquiring Mind by Laura Hardie
10x14 inches, Coloured pencil
Colour
Tips and Techniques
  • James Gurney (Gurney Journey) is on a roll at the moment - with consistently interesting blog posts. This one is about Technique and Training and doesn't provide quite what you'd expect. You might end up wondering where technique and training begin and end.............
Websites and Blogging

Blog about where you find your inspiration to blog.

Share the tips and techniques you use to inspire blog posts. In this blog challenge, I don’t want you to tell the back story of a specific blog post, but the techniques you use in general to keep the river flowing on your blog.
Lorelle

  • Here's a list of some her past blog challenges

and finally.....

After last week's post people have been asking me all week what "chuffed" means. It took the English2American Dictionary for me to realise why I can happily use this word with English friends and get funny looks from American ones.

Here's the definition of "chuffed"

chuffed adj generally happy with life. You can also get away with saying you are “unchuffed” or “dischuffed” if something gets your back up. Make sure you only use this word in the correct tense and familiarise yourself with the meaning of the word “chuff,” too (see previous entry).
English2American Dictionary
For the previous entry 'chuff' I refer you to the English2American Dictionary page for words beginning with 'c' - and I can confirm I NEVER use this word!

If you'd like to know when the 'real' paper copy of the dictionary hits the shelves leave your email for Chris Rae who's the bright spark who had the original idea.

7 comments:

  1. I am chuffed!

    The Gurney Journey question has my input up. Light spectrum is the answer, versus value which is a whole different property.

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  2. Chuffing is such a nice word!

    Chorma versus value then?

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  3. Sorry that should have read Chroma v. Value

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  4. Yes, Chroma is not showing up as Value in the images. Fascinating illustration of the differences in the two properties.

    Notice that hue disappears in the value circle (at the Gurney Journey link) and we don't wonder why. But Intensity (Chroma) goes away and we scratch our heads!

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  5. Congrats on the Lines & Colors write-up.

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  6. Cheers Katherine!

    Even when you take a semi-break you still have a packed weekly review! Congrats on your well-deserved recognition this week.

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  7. thanks Katherine for the mention and checking in on me still! thankfully I've still felt up to a bit of drawing if not the scanning and blogging, I'm working now to finish a trip sketchbook from a few months ago, looking forward to sharing it with you soon :)

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