{"id":180,"date":"2009-06-01T14:09:00","date_gmt":"2009-06-01T14:09:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/2009\/06\/01\/dont-get-me-started\/"},"modified":"2014-12-14T18:46:00","modified_gmt":"2014-12-14T18:46:00","slug":"dont-get-me-started","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/johnpicacio.com\/onthefront\/2009\/06\/01\/dont-get-me-started\/","title":{"rendered":"Don’t Get Me Started"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p> $\"\"$ <\/a>(left, art by Alphonse Mucha, 1905)<\/span>\n

I\u2019ll get to Mucha in a moment, but I\u2019d like to say that David Apatoff\u2019s Illustration Art<\/a> blog has been one of my faves the last couple of years. I don\u2019t always agree with everything he says, but I respect his views, which are genuine and well-said. His most recent post<\/a> is about Peter Max. Although I\u2019m not a fan of Max\u2019s pop art work, David eloquently makes a point near and dear to my heart about illustration vs. fine art. With apologies to David for the copy\/paste, here\u2019s what he said:

\u201cArtists and critics always chafe at the restrictions imposed by patrons or censors who interfere with the artist\u2019s original concept. In fact, it seems that illustration is held in lower regard than \u201cfine\u201d art mainly because the illustrator\u2019s vision is subject to the whim of some client or art director. There is some truth to that criticism, but Peter Max demonstrates how the lack of restrictions can be just as hazardous to the quality of art.<\/span><\/p>\n

In my view, Peter Max, along with Andy Warhol and Leroy Neiman, are good examples of artists whose work was spoiled and made rotten by excessive freedom. Today\u2019s fine art scene offers far more examples of artists whose self-indulgent, decadent work has little relevance or value outside their own cloistered circle. When the world provides resistance to an artist (whether in the form of a tough deadline, or a client\u2019s demands, or poverty, or totalitarian censorship) it can have a beneficial effect on the art. As the old proverb says, \u2018the wind in a man\u2019s face makes him wise.\u2019 <\/p>\n

Artistic freedom can help or hurt art. But if great art can be produced in a prison cell or a concentration camp, it\u2019s silly for the fine art community to suggest that it can\u2019t also be produced within the constraints of a commercial art studio.\u201d<\/p>\n

May I offer a \u201chell yes<\/span>\u201c? Way to go, David. I couldn\u2019t agree more\u2013which brings me back to Alphonse Mucha. The art pictured above is Mucha\u2019s response for a 1905 Moet & Chandon champagne advertisement. It\u2019s commercial art all the way, but is it any less a piece of imagination, craft, design, and inspired execution at its finest because it was created for an advertisement? And where does it say that a curator or pseudo-intellectual has to validate something that beautiful for it to be considered art for the ages?<\/p>\n

Several years ago, I had a heated exchange with a reknowned local \u2018fine artist\u2019 who specialized in ill-conceived installation sculptures. He was staring at a piece of illustration in a gallery and asked my opinion. I gave it to him, and he responded, \u201cThe trouble with illustration is that it can never be art in the highest sense because it always answers to someone. True fine art doesn\u2019t answer to anyone and therefore will always be a higher calling.\u201d<\/p>\n

Those<\/span> were fighting words.<\/p>\n

After I reminded him of the numerous city council and political hoops he had to hop through for approvals, and the gallery collectors whose dollars he relentlessly chased, I offered the following gentle morsel: \u201cJust because you masturbate on a wall and fool yourself into believing it\u2019s got value doesn\u2019t mean you\u2019re an artist.\u201d Maybe not one of my finer moments, but I\u2019m still proud of that one. I still believe the very best commercial illustrations of a superior talent like Alphonse Mucha doesn\u2019t need a curator or nostalgia to validate it.<\/p>\n

In the end, let me say as a proud, working professional illustrator, that it\u2019s not just the interaction with terrific art directors, or the answering to deadlines, or to problem-solving, or to strife, that can perhaps shape a piece of commercial illustration into something potentially special. ALL of those things are potentially huge, positive factors, but it\u2019s always about an artist\u2019s singular, skillful human response to a moment and to a context. That response must not only solve a problem and serve a client, but it must be strong enough to withstand the repeated scrutiny of that client\u2019s corporate masters and the timeless, infinite scrutiny of a potentially worldwide audience. And if in fact, that artist\u2019s response can pass these tests and not only maintain its pure expression, but in fact, be emboldened by these challenges and embrace<\/span> those challenges to transform into something transcendent\u2026..then which art is really<\/span> \u2018the higher calling\u2019?<\/p>\n<\/body>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"