painterNYC

Considering the fact that Elizabeth Peyton ended up being the ONLY painter that showed up on this blog out of my list, I will once again write about her work...

Critique#1: "This painting has an economy of brushwork and simplicity of composition that belies the workings of a fevered imagination and a startling bejeweled intelligence." 

Critique#2: "Are these last two what happens if you try to paint a face like a mondrian (the dumas being his late watercolors)? Compare mondrian's reptetiveness to the these last two." 

Neither criticisms (out of the 60 or so unintelligent/unintelligible ones I skipped) seem to comment at all on her simple subject matter of portraiture but instead seem to ask more of the artist when it comes to rendering real life and perhaps finding her own voice in the realm of art. Although I do find Peyton's work thoughtful and appealing at times, I have to agree with both bloggers on some issues. Sure, the artist does have a certain style to her but does that mean she needs to stay so one dimensional? I understand that this is the way she wishes to paint but after a while I feel myself getting bored. I just can't seem to connect with the figure or find any sense of a human in her and therefore lose interest with the lifeless creature. As forthe second blogger who believed that Peyton was ripping on Mondrian, I actually researched what his portraits looked like and didn't really see a similarity. 

I'd be a liar if I said I couldn't say similar criticisms about my work, so I guess I will give it to you straight. My last piece literally was just your basic average portrait of a celebrity, pretty similar to the likes of Peyton's above. Yeah it's nice and it looks like the star but, so what? Frankly, I got real bored real fast making my last painting and it's due to the same reason I got bored with Peyton's work: disconnect. The reason behind liking and not liking a piece of art usually revolves around whether or not the work speaks to the individual and evokes an emotion from them. How can one get something out of a blank dead stare? Thankfully, I learned a great deal from the last painting and realized that the subject matter wasn't exactly something I could develop much further and needed to move on. BUT, if I hadn't made that extremely smart choice I think I would have possibly tried to find a way for the viewer to connect with my subject better. Especially for those who don't exactly know anything about Lindsay Lohan the connection was probably even more of a strain to make. To do so, I could have possibly incorporated various photos of her as a child and before she got hooked to cocaine so that they could see the downward spiral. But, maybe the subject was just a one liner after all and I am glad I am going to keep it that way.