“Art, after all, is supposed to be a kind of communication, and “personal expression” is cinematically interesting only to the extent that what’s expressed finds and strikes chords within the viewer. The difference between experiencing art that succeeds as communication and art that doesn’t is rather like the difference between being sexually intimate with a person and watching that person masturbate.” – David Foster Wallace “A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again”
Not to leave things on such a sour note from the last post - actually there were some stellar examples turned in for the second assignment. Redemption aside, it's more about wanting similar results demonstrated in class - there's a joke there somewhere about pushing values I'm sure.
And some equally revealing stories accompanied the presentations: I like to see what, if any, effect hearing the oftentimes deeply personal and emotional history behind each selected article of clothing has on perception and interpretation of said drawings. There's also an observation that the same folks who have interesting tales to tell coincidentally are the very same people who happen to give a shit about their artwork too. Care and attention to detail.
And boy oh boy do I ever appreciate having the bar set so freakin' high by a handful of students in every class - it makes it easier (on me, not the slackers) and definitely provides the impetus to keep raising expectations. Though to be sure, there are the comparative few that you always have to remember to keep their efforts in perspective - not everyone gets it right off the bat but I'm confident (even if sometimes they aren't) with constant practice quality results will show.
In fact, I'm already anticipating being baffled & miffed over many of these fine works being rejected from this semester's Student Art Show.
“If I could have had my own way, I would have confined myself to black and white.” – Edgar Degas
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