[John de la Vega]

Jim and distinguished Forum friends,

Tonight I reread all the posts concerning Freud's portrait of the queen (a hoot as well as a failure, in my view). i find this whole exercise fascinating and - very - meaningful. The discussion is lively, probing and challenging to no end (perish the thought! Actually, on second thought -). It does touch upon some of the biggies: beauty, art history and historicity, most certainly on human nature and the nature of our understanding. Can we expect less of an exchange about art?

Jim, I strongly applaud the way you (and certainly others) have found your way around these topics, anchoring some occasionally clouded thinking by us down to a sane and safe harbor (this thought on this sad sad hour of tragedy for so many).

We mostly believe, rightly so, that we react to art with our likes and dislikes, with our biases and prejudices. It's inescapable, right? Some of us try to understand and overcome our biases (I say this at the peril of sounding 'holier than thou'), yet some of us don't seem to be able to do it, at least for a time, so deeply invested we appear to be in our hard - earned beliefs and practices which keep us sane and proud in the often titanic effort of our craft and profession (A point already made by one of our group). Some of us - and I find plenty of instances in this discussion - have modified, or seem to be willing to go a long way, towards modifying and expanding our cherished views, as in

expanding our experience

Bravo!

There's nothing wrong in reacting from our gut to the work of Freud, Picasso, and others. It is, however, perilous, to say the least, to step into the art criticism and opinion arena with just likes and dislikes. Sure, this is a free country and we are blessed to be able to say whatever we like as one of the group has aptly stated, but to be able to speak with some articulation it might help, say, to know an artist's life and work, to be aquainted not only with the historical context but also - and most importantly - to really 'see' how the physical, formal and aesthetic 'reality' of the work operates and fits in that historical context besides in our own perceptual field. What actually 'happens' there on the surface alone make take a long time and effort to really see and digest. Is it worth our while, even with art we dislike? I think so. Unfortunately such effort is rarely undertaken as part of our duty to ourselves as artists to go deeply (as in the case of Picasso's 'mature' language of creation of form, a language as foreign to many artists who should know better as Southern Swahili). Result: among other deucies, the 'whether Picasso drew - or not - drew well - when -he - was - young malarkey. Where is it written that groudbreaking creation and communication of emotion require the ability to draw well in the academic sense? How many correct draw - by - numbers academicians did it take to produce one Cezanne, Picasso, Matisse? Don't get me wrong, I am totally in favor of academic training, particularly for us portrait painters. But to put
'correct' drawing as a precondition to create 'realistic' art is just plain nonsense, even when we can say that drawing certainly may help many, if not all, artists. Let's never forget that, as a whole, the history of art (particularly of our beloved 'Western' Art ) is decidedly

not the history of the ability to draw and paint 'realistically'.

Some years ago I visited Brian Yoder's gallery on the web to find a section called "Bad Art", which included artists such as Kandinsky, Picasso, Rothko, and others. I emailed Mr Yoder with the idea proposed before, that it's fine to have our personal taste dictate likes and dislikes, but it's not fine to rashly place these and other recognized masters as examples of 'bad art', especially in a gallery pretending to perform a cultural and educational service. He emailed back assuring me that his bad art people were not selected on any subjective, personal - taste basis, but on 'objective' art history criteria, which by the way he never produced when I asked him to. Sounds familiar? Check Art Renewal Center's piece on David Hockney's work (which I don't particularly care for). On and on, narrow-mindedness and yes, provincialism constantly comparing apples and oranges, taking offense at the financial success and recognition enjoyed by many of the moderns, making judgements based on ignorant high - and - low, true - and - deviant definitions of artistic periods, and, especially, incurring in a total failure to understand the nature and role of BEAUTY, RELEVANCY, and EXPRESSIVE MEANING in our human artistic and creative drive.

Practically every day of my life I read and meditate on John Dewey's "Art as Experience", a most unusual book, the compilation of his lectures on the philosophy of art at Harvard University in 1931. I consider Dewey (1859-1952) to be a breathtaking embodiment of the highest American - and universal - thought. Art as Experience acquaints us, in an analytical, 'intellectual', yet rich, poetic and down - to - earth language, with the deep meanings and existencial reality of art, with how all of this relates to living and experiencing, our understanding making art possible in an inevitable, transforming, ever - changing way.

Thank all of you, and you Cynthia, and moderator M Rushworth, for making this section of the Forum possible!