on art

an email from a friend, edited with permission

Art makes a difference - full stop
It endures longer than people problems, longer than people lives, longer than many nations.

... you must also give hope, give beauty, give examples of creation. You do that...

Keep putting in brush strokes.

And that is true too. How many people are diverted or soothed by the art on the waiting room walls? Given pleasure as they choose the artwork that is the final purchase in making a house a home? And didn't I say very publicly, at the time of my first solo exhibition, that I wanted original art to be accessible, affordable, so people could own works that had more meaning for them, works that wouldn't fade to the washed out blue I saw in so many homes? So doesn't that give me some obligation to make those works should they ask for them?

And no, I am not going to enter the debate about what is a picture that anyone could have painted, with or without guidance or talent, and what is art. At least not before breakfast.

I don't use a projector to get a likeness in my portraits, but that doesn't necessarily mean it is cheating to do so. But check out buying portraits on the internet, and then we can debate the difference between art and craft. Some "craft" is real art, other art is a "mere" craft. I say that with the utmost caution, because historically those words are loaded. Another time, maybe.

But now I must eat. I have more than my cereal to chew on.