Does anyone remember this little character? I made him about two years ago, and I called this image "Drugs and Art Don't Mix" (not true for many I'm sure, but it is the case with me. Well, besides caffeine.) Sounds a little "Nancy Reagan-esque" (Just Say No!) now that I think about it, but I thought it was amusing at the time. Anyway, I'm wondering if anyone would like to adopt him for the small price of amusing us here at Bent Objects. Write a little something about the joy that art brings to your life (no sucking up by mentioning Bent Objects!). Your favorite artist, painting,
song, whatever.
In the end, I'll upset most everyone by picking my favorite. It's always a hard decision. Then I'll ship the little character to your doorstep, anywhere in the world.
Give it a try?
30 comments:
How dull would our lives be without art? It's everywhere, whether we realize it or not. Every movie we see, song on the radio, every package on our pantry shelves have an artist behind them, designing and creating. That doesn't even touch art that is done for the love of beauty, even for the purpose of confrontation, just to get a reaction. Remember Andy Kauffman wrestling all those women and ticking off hordes of onlookers? Pure art, though your mileage may vary.
This comment isn't about the joy that art brings to my life -- its a question -- what's in the bottle?
Art is how I live. I grew up on a steady diet of Loony Tunes, Disney, comics and an ever-growing collection of sketches and doodles of my own making. As I got older I was introduced to the likes Michelangleo, Rodin, Rockwell, Kethca, Nick Park and on and on. Now I am working as an animator and illustrator and I am still collecting reference and art books from all over the place. Art is how I make and know my way in the world. Without it I wouldn't have met my wife or have the life that I live now. All in all art is pretty cool.
Aside from being my creative outlet, without which I might actually need a drug or three, art has been an amusing form of communication for me. One of my favorite art-com anecdotes involves getting my seventh grade peers to snicker uncontrollably in the school library, while I drew pictures of boobs and penises. There was power in my pencil, and there was no stopping me. Mwah-ah-ah-ah-ahhhhh!
I love the Beatles, they are great art. And they are certainly connected to drugs. So I think the Beatles and other music artists refute your claim. I am just saying.
I love monet, monet makes me happy!
Monet is my drug!
Of what
do muses
dream?
relaxed and still
considered
rendered
reduced
abstracted...
she is a puzzle
to be solved
and wonders if
there is a challenge
in the expression
of her skin
a rill of flowing mane
a landscape of
hip and waist
rolling down to
a mesa of shins
a scrabble of toes
needing the light
loving the shadow
together contrasting her contours
of dreams and reality
that in their turn
are her puzzle to be solved
she lays along the line of light
playing to her best side
and lives to inspire
disrobes to disarm
sleeps in the warm regards
of Rembrandt palettes
and morning sun
I'd know who Piet Mondrian was for years, but his work, and that of other modern painters, didn't make any sense to me until I went to Chicago. We were in the modern section of the art museum, and I turned a corner and wound up facing this vivid, bright piece of colors and geometry. I sat on the floor and sketched it and stared at it for an hour. Whenever I think of that piece by Mondrian, I feel happy, and I cry a little
I Hate Soap Operas.
I have ever since I was the snotty nosed, pig-tailed, five year-old Grandma baby-sat after school. Our afternoons were filled with her incessant dramas with plots that never moved on. And I still cringe to this day when I flip through the channels and see that blasted hourglass or spinning globe.
But, every day, Grandma would give me a choice. From her favorite chair at the big table she'd point at me and say, "You sit here quietly while we watch my soaps or go in the other room and draw."
I picked "the other room" every damned day. And that's where an artist was born.
In a little room off the front porch with a low coffee table, the perfect size for drawing at, and out of ear-shot from the melodramatic soaps, I learned how to create. My pencil found it's way across the paper to produce friends for me, creatures with wings and horns, girls wearing clothes I wanted to design, or even some butt-kicking Ninja Turtles.
So, art, for me, began as an escape from the anathema of my youth and still exists as an escape. An escape from rules, reality, assumptions, life, yourself, myself, or just really bad TV.
Coffee eh?
You're one of those coffee "users"
http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/79820/Danger-from-just-7-cups-of-of-coffee-a-day
Visual art takes me on a little journey. Whether I'm looking at sculptures or photographs, the scene in a sugar, panoramic egg or one painted on a canvas ... whether I'm examining hand-made toys or weavings, cartoons or print ads ... for as long as I choose to look, I'm transported there. I get a glimpse at another world ... another perspective ... another view. How flat life would be without these journeys!
My love of art began when my sister read me "Little Blue and Little Yellow" when I was 3.
I love color, and it's the reason I'm an artist today. The joy of a sunny yellow, the peaceful sigh in a deep blue, the flirty reds - making something with color is the first thing I think of in the morning and the last thing I think of before I fall asleep.
And Little Blue and Little Yellow (Leo Lionni) is still the best book in the universe! :)
Lydia
Understand Blue
The joy that art brings to me is simply inspiration. Be it a sculpture, a painting, a photograph... it makes me want to be more creative in my own life. So that I too may inspire others, and inspire my child.
My grandparents covered their walls with valuable and prestigious paintings. My father likes funny posters that make a statement. But my gallery, featuring two young local artists, is the best of all. Such colors! Such personality! I can see at a glance what they try to express - experiences, joy, heartfelt desires. They always capture the moment - the butterflies in spring, the Christmas tree in its season.
The only problem is the high rate of production. I'm running out of room on my fridge door.
@ma smalls- stale aspirin of some sort.
@spleenal- I find it interesting that hearing dead people is such a common hallucination that it's mentioned just under the title. Isn't that strange?
@everyone else- I've greatly enjoyed the comments so far. This is one of my favorite things about having a blog.
enjoy art in all varieties, but there is a kind of art I "do".
I come from a little country in Europe called Slovenia. We have a long tradition in choire singing, but the choir I sing in is unique.
Let me tell you a little bit about it and how it makes me feel to be a part of it. It's called Perpetuum Jazzile. About 40 singers, all amateurs behaving like true professionals.
We spend a lot of time together on rehearsals and concerts. And boy, I can tell you, we are friends! People fall in love, find best friends, go to vacations together and last year when colleague died we all cried but managed to sing happy songs at his funeral (his family who knew how important the choir was to him wanted us to). I am sometimes suprised how much time we can spend together and still get along.
But what really matters and still suprises me even more is how audience can feel that. We are not super good, we make mistakes, but you can't really tell, because it's our energy, joy, friendship, youth, reperoire (jazz, pop, bossa nova, gospel, swing, close harmony, funk ...), silly choreographies, happiness and enjoyment we get from being able to perform, that astonishes people who often come back for more.
We've had people told us that they laughed and cried because of emotions they felt during concert. They've come to thank us for making their day, week. Sometimes they spontaneously stand up to sing along or dance. It is hard for me to stay serious and continue singing when my eyes are filled with tears of joy when I see how our music, something so important to me, you get a standing ovations from 1.600 people (who mean it).
And all we are is just a bunch of ordinary people with ordinary problems who have to leave work earlier to catch a bus which will take us to next small town where we will make magic one more time...
I'm sorry it's so long.
Greetings, Mojca
First I'd like to say I'm a huge fan of your work, you made me change my perspective to the little things around me that i took for granted, so thank you.
second, in my case the art i enjoy the most is music specifically the Blues, after a hard and long tiresome day, nothing beats going home, turning up the stereo and listen to BB, Clapton, SRV and many more. the blues make me forget about anything else, make me relax and clear my head and look forward to a new day with a fresh start, and if that's not art ( the ability to affect ones mood through song, music, paintings, photographs or performance) then i don't know what is...
i am by no means an artsy fartsy person - but I am a big fan of photography. of course I think ansel adams is amazing and national geographic is the epitome of amazing photographs. i wander around through out the day and occasionally make my hands a screen and view my surroundings through my own lens. I really really appreciate macrophotography - to see the kind of details people see in some big picture is just cool! zoom in ... no more, no more ... MORE! cool - no other word for it.
i also love a local artist from my farmer's market here in chucktown, sc. she does what is called encaustics and she can be seen at danitacole.com - i like to support the local artists because they take that risk to do what they love despite KNOWING they will probably always be struggling with money.
I thought he deserved a name based on a few of my favorite artists:
Pencil Van Gogh
Pillet Mondrian
Leonardo De Scribly
MC Etcher
Salvador Drawi
Pill Gauguin
Eddoodle Manet
Michelozengelo
Sketchy Kandinsky
I appreciate art because I can't "do" art. Oh, sure, I can draw well enough that you can recognize what I've drawn. I can take photographs that are well composed and lighted. I can play a dozen or so musical instruments well enough to get by. But I cannot do any of these things well enough to stir your soul, or touch you deeply, emotionally.
And my dad is a pharmacist, so the subject matter gets me, too.
Selling cars isn't what I thought I'd be doing at this juncture in my life, but that is nonetheless where I find myself, and art is one of the things that makes it a pleasure. The cars I sell (being from Europe where the art comes from) happen to be beautiful. The clients I sell them to love them for that, the way I do, and it gives us something to come together over.
Conversely, the clients I don't sell them to can't see it, and I take pleasure in that too. It's not that I'm an elitist (or maybe I am). It's just that it's nice to know that a beautiful object can exist in this world as its creator wanted to, and continue to exist in defiance of mass taste. The Rothko painting doesn't burst into flames because of some idiot's snickering, and the cars I love don't vanish from the market just because so some people can't see beauty in simplicity.
In its obstinate omnipresence and durability, art reassures me that truth is always present, even in the most absurd of circumstances.
I like the character, but I just wanted to comment about art and drugs not mixing. I agree 100%. I "used" to get hammered and work and while it was a lot of fun, about 50% of the time I wasn't happy with the results the next day. Sooooo what I've learned over the years is to "Brainstorm" while you are enjoying your intoxicant of choice... but when you get ready to produce try to be clean and fresh. Better results... at least for me.
I really like decorating, so art is important to me in that respect. I'm piecing together different Asian-themed decor for my room right now. I have a Chinese fan pinned up in shadow box, and several pieces of Asian-inspired artwork.
The difference that a painting, plaque, or picture on the wall makes to a room is astounding. You can really personalize the way any room feels just by the kind of art you use.
Artsty fartsy, thats what I have always been told, but I love it and I dont care that I will never get rich it's good for my soul, I say! Without art in my life I would surely wither away like pieces of ash from a unmanned fire.
my heart would stop beating and my hands would shrivel up and become useless appendages...art art never leave me never leave me alone.
I'm a volunteer in a Children Rehab center, where little gipsy children who has been abused by their families and forced to do illegal acts stay. Most of them don't even know how to read and write, let alone "art". Last weekend I've seen their little workshop, where they paint (without decent materials, because most of painting stuff smells and some of these children have tendency to chemical addiction). Among their paintings, I've seen an exact Jackson Pollock, painted by a 10 year old (of course she has no idea of him or his paintings). When I asked, she said the picture doesn't mean anything, it's just her action, what she did that minute! I'm still so shocked, it took me years and tons of courses to understand what's going on! It's always argued that modern art is hard to understand by ordinary people, whether it's really art and etc but that little girl just put that out so clearly, how universal, natural and humane art is. Every kind of it. It's just something we have inside.
I saw Art for the first time at a coffee shop. She was sitting near the window, reading Ernest Hemingway, and drinking an Americano. She wore paint splattered overalls and a gray knit hat over hair like golden rod. I returned to that coffee shop many times before I finally got the nerve to ask her out. We went to dinner at a fantastic cafe and had a wonderful time. I never thought that I could have so much in common with someone. We discussed Margitte and Gram late into the night. After that night our relationship seemed to progress in wonderful blur. She was the kind of girl who could always find pictures in the clouds and create music from the rhythm of the street. Every night we would paint the town red and dance to the beating of our own drum. The world was our oyster. Then one day, I got down on one knee and vowed to devote my life to Art. She agreed. Art and I have been together ever since that faithful day. Art has brought much joy into my life, and I will love her until I die.
I have two, I guess. Michelangelo for his sculptures, and Van Gogh for his paintings and for opposite reasons.
I have one of those 50 pound coffee table books on Michelangelo and it just amazes me to look at his marbles and 'see' the muscles in the arms and the legs. To think that anyone could breathe life into a piece of cold rock has just amazed me for about 40 years.
Van Gogh I love because there's so much you CAN'T see in his paintings, but what is implied because he is [of course] an impressionist.
I love that what you see isn't what everyone else sees because you fill in the 'incomplete' parts with what you know from your life, so in that respect it's art that you must contribute to in order to enjoy it.
And that, I think, is what is most fun about art and why I enjoy it--in all its forms.
I kept trying to write something, but all I come up with sounds lame. I guess, art is.
Art is in the lines in a city skyline, in the way snow piles on the boughs of a pine tree, in the way droplets of rain spatter on my windshield as I sit in my car and eat a McDonald's double cheeseburger. Art is all around us; it's in the sounds of cars and the song of birds, in the way I brush my teeth in the morning and pour a glass of water at night. It's sight and sound and touch and smell, everything that adds up or adds to an experience.
Art is.
My all time favorite bit of art is probably Harvey Dunn's "The Prairie is my Garden." I see it and I can feel wind.
Beside that piece though, and despite every attempt to make my tastes more "high brow," I'll enjoy anything that makes me laugh or just plain makes my day brighter. Pedestrian art, if you will. It makes the world a better place.
Unfortunately nothing witty or earth-shattering to write about; I just wanted to comment about the cute lil pill-popper! Keep up the fantabulistic work! :D
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