Reporting copyright infringement & impersonation to Google - MAJOR FAIL

For all those who wonder what happens when you report the infringement of copyright or impersonation of your website or blog to Google.....

• The good news - Google reviewed my report
• The bad news - Google has not done what it told me it had done

In short:

• Earlier this year I found a blog which had lifted my blog posts wholesale - and then changed some of the words - and decorated the blog with Google Adsense adverts
• I reported it to Google in April - but heard nothing
• I reported it again in September with a LOT more detail. To do a report you file a formal copyright infringement report - providing a lot of detail
• see https://support.google.com/legal/troubleshooter/1114905
• see https://support.google.com/legal/troubleshooter/1114905#ts=1115645 (re infringement via Blogger)
• you wait for a long time 
• My first report was ignored. 
• My second report was filed on 14 September; 
• I received an email from the Google Blogger Support Team today (9th November 2020)
• you get an email saying they agree with you - and the blog is now suspended and will no longer be viewable
• you check the URL of the offending blog - and FIND THE BLOG STILL EXISTS!!
• you email the Google Blogger Support Team saying you are very unimpressed and are now writing a blog post about it
• you email the Google Blogger Support Team saying you want to pursue the money paid to the blogger who impersonated by blog

GOOGLE FAIL

Bottom line what looks good on the surface does not deliver in reality

We take inappropriate content seriously
If you see content on a Google product that you believe violates the law or your rights, let us know. We’ll review the material and consider blocking, limiting or removing access to it. Behaviours like phishing, violence or explicit content may also violate our product policies and qualify for removal from Google products. Before creating a request, try to flag the content in the relevant product.

In visual terms this is what the process looks like.......

Making A Mark is a Top 10 UK Art Blog - again!

I got a nice note from Vuelio this week saying they'd run their algorithm to update their Top Ten Listing of Art Blogs in the UK for 2020 and my blog Making A Mark had made the top 10 yet again.

Currently at #4 in the Top 10, this is the write up Making A Mark got.

A big mover, up five places, MAKING A MARK is for artists and art lovers, and contains news about major art competitions and exhibitions, interviews with artists, techniques and tips for art and business. With a live pageview and visitor count, you know you’re in good company alongside the millions of other readers who have visited the blog since it was created by Katherine Tyrrell back in 2006.

Vuelio have been ranking blogs since 2008. The ranking is calculated according to an ever-evolving algorithm - you can see an explanation in this post. 

The methodology takes into consideration a vast number of factors including social sharing, topic-related content, post frequency, engagement, social media influence, traffic and interactivity.

The benefits of the rankings are various - for Vuelio, their clients and bloggers at large in that they

• set a benchmark for the blogging industry 
• serve as a resource for Vuelio's clients who are primarily in the PR and communications sector.
• allow Vuelio to demonstrate the power, strength and reach of its blogger database and research facilities 
• strengthens their relationship with bloggers. 
• generate traffic for the Vuelio website.

The Top Ten Art Blogs

For the record, the top ten art blogs are listed below:

1. StreetArtNews - which has been around since 2009. 
2. Jackson's Art Blog - which I highly recommend for all those interested in art materials and techniques with art materials. Its most regular writers are Julie Caves, Clare McNamara and Lisa Takahashi. Some of you may remember the latter as the wildcard winner in the Landscape Artist of the Year semi-final in 2018.
3. We Make Money Not Art written (somewhat irregularly) by Régine Debatty - and which seems to have been around forever. 
4. MAKING A MARK - enough said! ;) Except I started it in 2006, and since then it has received over 5.2 million visitors and 16 million page views - from visitors from all over the world. I'm always absolutely amazed at the number of people it reaches. Almost as much as the number of people who recognise me when I'm walking to and from an art exhibition in London - given I post very few pics of myself!!
5. Art Plugged (new entry) - a contemporary creative gallery with a blog which I think will appeal to the younger emerging artist. 
6. Hookedblog - Created by Mark Rigney in 2005 and focused on the street art scene
7. ArtWeb Blog - a blog which is related to an online website for artists. The blog has been around for some time and contains useful content. 
8. Inspiring City - another covering the urban / street art scene set up by Stuart Holdsworth in 2012.
9. The Primary Art Class - I think Emily Gopaul's blog is a wonderful idea and will doubtless be invaluable to all primary school art teachers - and parents!
10. Scribblah - Rose Davies describes herself as: ‘artist, printmaker, scribbler, ageing headbanger, feminist, activist, mad-cat-woman, cake-maker, accidental-archaeologist, mud-wrangler, wild, Welsh and opinionated’ - so more than just about art!

A number of these have been in the top ten for a long time. I get that's the payoff for being persistent in our blogging!

REFERENCE:

• I'm in the spotlight! - profile of me in 2017
• Making A Mark is a Top 10 Art Blog in the UK 2017

Selected artists for John Moores Painting Prize 2020

The Judges have worked their way through 3,000 entries and just 67 artists have got a painting into the biennial exhibition of the John Moores Painting Prize 2020, the UK’s oldest painting prize.

Past prize winners have included include David Hockney (1967), Peter Doig (1993), and Rose Wylie (2014). Sir Peter Blake, winner of the junior prize in 1961, is patron of the Prize.

The John Moores Painting Prize is organised in partnership with the John Moores Liverpool Exhibition Trust. The exhibition will be held at the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool between 12 February – 27 June 2021 as part of Liverpool Biennial 2021, the largest festival of contemporary art in the UK, taking place across the city’s public spaces, galleries and museums from 20 March to 6 June 2021.

I wrote about the exhibition in February this year in Call for Entries: £25,000 John Moores Painting Prize 2020 + NEW Prize and this post tells you a lot more about the background to the prize and how it works - which I'm not going to repeat here.

All images © Robin Clewley 

Selection Process

In its more than 60 year history the Prize has evolved but one fundamental rule has remained the same; paintings are judged anonymously, allowing the works to speak for themselves and giving the process and final exhibition a unique authenticity.

The Jury for the 2020 Exhibition are:

• Michelle Williams Gamaker - an artist working with moving image and performance.
• Jennifer Higgie - staff writer and Editor-at-large of Frieze magazine, and the writer and presenter of Bow Down; the podcast about women in art history.
• Gu Wenda, an artist born in Shanghai. 
• Hurvin Anderson, a painter whose work explores spaces occupied by Caribbean immigrants
• Alison Goldfrapp - a British-based artist who studied fine art at Middlesex University before embarking on a career in music that has spanned more than 26 years.

The jury also 

• select a final shortlist of five paintings, from which the £25,000 first prize winning work will be chosen and four additional prizes of £2,500 will be awarded. 
• identify the recipient of the first £2,500 Emerging Artist Prize, supported by Winsor & Newton.

The names of the five prizewinning artists will be shared in January 2021

The names of the first prize winner and the Emerging Artist Prize will be announced at the opening of the exhibition.

John Moores Painting Prize 2020 judges.
From left to right, Michelle Williams Gamaker, Hurvin Anderson, Gu Wenda and Jennifer Higgie.  

For the first time in the history of the Prize the judging was all done online. 

High spec cameras, screens, speakers and AV software allowed judges to appreciate the scale, texture and detail of the works in real time (see below)

“Judging the John Moores Painting Prize this year at a distance presented a new challenge in the Prize’s history. Instead of standing with the artworks we zoomed right in, carefully scanning the surface of each painting. Ultimately our decisions were based on a number of themes that emerged and resonated with the other jurors in our collective discussions. We were deeply inspired by all of the artists from Stage 2 who showed clear commitment, talent and love for painting. We could feel this through the technology, that enabled us to view the work, and it was so inspiring to see artists achieve this, particularly in these uncertain times.”  Michelle Williams Gamaker

 

Selected Artists

67 paintings were  longlisted for the exhibition from almost 3,000 entries.  All the images below were taken during the selection process. You may see your painting - but it also gives people an idea of the sort of paintings that are entered.

The artists selected to exhibit paintings in the John Moores Painting Prize 2020 are as follows. I've highlighted artists I've previously featured on this blog - plus added in those who have tweeted about the selection

B

• Dohyun Baek - Mom's Birthday Follows the Lunar Calendar
• Nicola Bealing - The Horse
• G L Brierley - Untitled (Corpo)
• Rory Biddulph - Smoker
• Louise Bristow - Citizens
• Hannah Brown - Hedge 4
• Lindsey Bull - The moors
• Robbie Bushe - The Neanderthal Futures Infirmary

C

• Mary Castle-Millner - Man with a Hose
• Leah Michelle Cayol - Lickkle Man
• Lara Cobden - A Year of Ghost Wishes
• Noemi S Conan - Las, Laska, Lass (Hilary Emerging)
• Paul Crook - Yellow Escalator

D

• Peter Davis - Wetin dey
• Pedro De Siqueira - Note to Karen from finance: can power transcend?
• Sam Douglas - Standing Stone
• Michelle Dovey - Bird Tree 2019

E

• Sarah J Earnshaw - Hazel Grundy, 1988
• Liz Elton - Tender

F

• Maria Farrar - Pearl Necklace
• Alan Fears - The Paper Tiger
• Michele Fletcher - Compost
• Max Fletcher and Andrea Celeste La Forgia (collaboration) - Postcard to A.G.

G

• Tricia Gillman - MOMENTS 1: Mind's Eye
• Rachel Glittenberg - Night Swimmers
• Melanie Goemans - Hawthorn (triptych)

Some wonderful news to share #MelanieGoemans painting ‘Hawthorn (triptych)’ has been selected as part of the prestigious @JMPaintingPrize 2020
Huge congratulations to Melanie, seen here at Cornwall Contemporary with two of her exquisite paintings, which can be seen on our website pic.twitter.com/1gI7kPW6qi

— CornwallContemporary (@sarah_cornwall) November 5, 2020

• Steph Goodger - The Motherland
• Massimiliano Gottardi - Jung /Jungle (spatial crease)
• Robin Greenwood - Untitled

H

• Christopher Hanson - Mother
• Lily Hargreaves - Didn't That Used to be Part of the Fun?
• Rebecca Harper - Between Two Worlds
• Georgia Hayes - Proboscis Crossing
• Michael Hempstead - Dead Soul's Boogie-Woogie: Dancing Now

J

• David Jacques - Sargasso
• Alison Jones - Connoisseur (my 1970s)

K

• Caroline E Kent - Two Minute Silence
• Sally Kindberg - Hang Loose
• Matthew Krishanu - Riverboat

L

• Laura Lancaster - Invocation
• LANTAIN - HORTUS CONCLUSUS: Le Rouge et le Noir
• Stephen Lee - March
• Brendan Lyons - Plasticity Horizon - an artist based in Liverpool.

M

• Kathryn Maple - The Common - Kathryn won the Sunday Times Watercolour Competition Winner 2014 and 2016 (see my blog posts for 2014 and 2016). She now works in acrylic and oils.
• Peter Matthews - Summer Sequoia
• Barry McGlashan - Klavierkonzert
• Robert McPartland - Field 2. Grapefruit.

O

• Pat O'Connor (Mrs Walter Lang)
• Laurence Owen - A Plant Fizzing with Air Bubbles Bursting in its Plumbing
• Sikelela Owen - The Knitter

P

• Shanti Panchal - The Terrace - Shanti was one of the five artists shortlisted for the Prize in 2018. moved from India to work in Britain in 1978 and has developed a unique approach to watercolour painting which means, for me at least, his painting style is one of the most recognisable I know. He has been selected for numerous art competitions

During my early years in London, and while travelling to Europe and America, I observed that, historically, the potentials of watercolour had not been explored to the same extent as those of oil and acrylic. Watercolour paintings were too limited to pretty flowers and sweet landscapes. It was a very frustrating experience. I was not prepared to accept the conventional limits of the medium.

I started working obsessively, even to the point of damage, from 12’x6′ canvas to 12″x6″ paper. To achieve depth, the colour has to penetrate the paper. I do not mix colours on a palette but directly on the paper itself. Through the process of hammering and scraping the surface, shifting images and ideas, working and reworking, my success and failure have become an integral part of the painting. I use layers and layers of colour – layers and layers of life’s experiences injecting into the very fibre of my existence, so ecstatic and at the same time so suicidal.

• Mandy Payne - Remnants of a Welfare State
• Lyle Perkins - O.R.B
• Katie Pratt - Darnington

R

• William Riding - The Geometer
• Philippa Robbins - Cactus Against a Blue Wall - Also selected - with 3 artwork - for the ING Discerning Eye 2020

S

• Miho Sato - Windy Day
• Brian Sayers - Encounter
• Caroline Streatfield - Portal
• Annika Ström - I am Curious Pink (no.1 of The One Hundred) 2020
• Edward Sutcliffe - Floral Painting 1 - Edward won the BP Portrait Travel Award 2014

V

• Nicholas Vaughan - Tunnel of Tusk
• Kiki Xuebing Wang - Untitled (Loafer)

W

• Harry Whitelock - I'll Break My Neck For You
• Charles Williams - Watercolourist Mask - Artist, writer, lecturer, illustrator and Venice Biennale participant (Website | Instagram | Facebook). Charles won Heat 1 in Sky Arts Portrait Artist of the Year 2020
• George Wills - Paranoia

Y

• Fleur Yearsley - To The Moon & Back

“This exhibition is an extraordinary chapter in the John Moores Painting Prize’s long history. From the Call for Entries which launched just weeks before the first national lockdown, to the challenge of bringing together hundreds of paintings from across the UK, we’re delighted to have got to this stage and to finally have a truly exciting longlist."
Sandra Penketh, Director of Art Galleries at National Museums Liverpool

Review: Episode 3 of Portrait Artist of the Year Series 7 (Autumn 2020)

This is my third commentary on an episode of this year's series of Portrait Artist of the Year (Series 7 / Episode 3). It follows exactly the same format as my two previous reviews

The explanation about this art competition for a £10,000 commission to paint Carlos d'Acosta is set out in Episode 1 review below. 

• Review: Episode 1 of Portrait Artist of the Year Series 7 (Autumn 2020) 
• Review: Episode 2 of Portrait Artist of the Year Series 7 (Autumn 2020) 

I've added in a few of the range of comments that pop up on social media when the programmes are broadcast - such as this one.....

Just realising I never truly understood why people shout at the tv watching football until I started watching portrait artist of the year

— Lydia Maltby (@LydiaMaltby) October 25, 2020

Episode 3: The Artists, Self-portraits and Sitters

The Artists - outside Battersea Arts Centre

In alphabetical order the artists are listed below. 

• As always definitions of who is professional and who is amateur is determined by the artists and does not necessarily follow convention.  
• For the record mine is that you are professional if you have to list being an artist as an occupation on your self-assessment tax form - because you make too much money for it to be considered amateur!

The Professional Artists

This heat had 5 professional artists

• Nicola Fitzgerald ( Website | Facebook | Instagram) lives and works in London; teaching, continuing to study (University of the Arts London Foundation in Fine Art; Heatherley School of Fine Art Diploma in Portraiture) and undertaking commissions. She specialises in portrait and wildlife paintings and prints. The majority of her work is in oil or in watercolour and ink.
• Naila Hazell ( Website | Facebook | Instagram | Twitter) - grew up in Baku, Azerbaijan. She is a British contemporary artist working in London. She was taught by renowned Soviet social realism painter Boyukagha Mirzezade while studying fine arts and builds in colour.
• Susan Macfarlane ( Website | Instagram | Twitter) a Scottish artist based in Hampshire. Trained at Edinburgh University/Edinburgh College of Art and at postgraduate level at The Slade School of Fine Art. Her website suggests she specialises in painting small children.
• Carole Nataf ( Website | Instagram) - an experienced London-based artist who was born in France. She has exhibited in galleries in the U.S., Paris and London. Has an MA and a PhD in the History of Art from the Courtauld Institute.
• Jayson Singh (Instagram) Portrait/figure painter based in London. Community Mural artist. CSM & Heatherley’s art school graduate

The Amateur Artists

Plus 4 amateur artists

• Andrea Cryer ( Website | Facebook | Instagram) - a Textile Artist who draws with thread to create unique portraits, landscapes and townscapes. She has a degree in Creative Art  and combined Fine Art (Printmaking) with Textiles. 

Wow - we were amazed at the skill of textile artist Andrea Cryer on Sky Arts Portrait Artist of the Year this week, completing a portrait of the wonderful Deborah James from the You, Me & The Big C podcast. Check it out if you haven’t yet seen it. pic.twitter.com/Vtbaquf0fb

— Bernina UK (@berninauk) October 30, 2020

• George Ellinas ( Website | Facebook | Instagram | Twitter) Self taught artist, mainly portraits in pencil and acrylics
• Victoria Kitchingman (Instagram)
• Sally Ward ( Website | Instagram) a contemporary artist based in London, specialising in portraiture. Her work has been exhibited by the Royal Society of Portrait Painters (RP) at their Annual Exhibitions in 2019 and 2020. Member of the Kingston Artists Open Studios. 

I don't watch any reality TV shows or anything like strictly, I'm a celeb etc or even programs like MasterChef and bake off but one program one guilty pleasure I'm into is portrait artist of the year on sky arts absolutely love it! Lol

— Donald McCrorie (@grandetoro1949) November 2, 2020

 

The Self Portraits

Not a very good view if the wall of self portraits

Not a particularly good shot of the wall of self portraits this year. I'm not too sure why the self portraits are social distanced too.

We had a better view - albeit obscured somewhat - during the lineup for the shortlisting - and I now get the spacing! They've got every artist spaced a metre apart and lined up in front of their own self-portrait!

Artists with their self-portraits

I thought there were some good ones.

This is a summary of the size, format and content of the self portraits in this heat

SWLA's new website and annual exhibition closing early

Society of Wildlife Artists Annual Exhibition 2020

Today I went to see the Annual Exhibition of the Society of Wildlife Artists at the Mall Galleries. It's open for two more days rather than as planned due to the lockdown starting on Thursday.

It seemed to me that quite a few people had made an effort to get to the exhibition as it was quite busy when I first arrived.

View of the East Gallery - and some of the sculpture in the exhibition

I've just been trying to upload the photos I took to Facebook - except "NEW FACEBOOK" is so utterly incompetent (just like last time) and cannot cope with uploading all of them - and then wants to do seperate posts for every "partitioned upload". It's driving me absolutely crackers so I'm walking away and will try again later - which may be later tonight or early tomorrow. (This time of day is not a good time to do uploads)

A new website

The SWLA have a brand new website and on it you can see:

• The Natural Eye 2020 Award Winners
• A really lovely post about all the hares in the exhibition this year
• A Passion for Peregrines - about all the artists who have been drawing / painting / sculpting peregrines in the last year
• and more!

some of the news items on the new website

I'll be writing a review of the exhibition this week.