The Public Is Not Invited & Never Has Been
Surrealism is a cultural movement that began in the early 1920s, and is best known for its visual artworks and writings. The aim was to “resolve the previously contradictory conditions of dream and reality.” Artists painted unnerving, illogical scenes with photographic precision, created strange creatures from everyday objects and developed painting techniques that allowed the unconscious to express itself.
–Wikipedia Source on Surrealism
One of the most important tools of any web platform application is the ability to see and study site stats. In a way that is visually sophisticated and insightful towards a better understanding of who your visitors are. As of late; and specially on strange lunar cycles combined with odd calendar dates (12/12/13) as a pithy example. An interesting pattern of behavioral attitudes emerges in the form of metaphorical liquid magma.
“Imagine That!”
Which does seem odd and peculiar; prompting me to begin analyzing the every day tracking of actual users who are visiting#ArtJournal but for some reason are not following, liking the articles nor commenting as I would prefer. As on most week start dates I will receive in the form of forty to sixty visitors as a total maximum with small to incremental user engagement. And I know it does take time to build an engaging audience of readers for any publication. But one feels obligated to at least explain who our intended target audience might be and to ease the public’s perception of what our goals and intentions are in fact.
Such has been decided to candidly and plainly attempt to explain my efforts, and methods of motivation for a creative fellow of more than three decades old. With the same clever and non conformist attitude for observing the world in a way that may seem abstract to the bourgeoisie. The term “bourgeoisie” is used in both the Marxist & Capitalist modes of perception. Nor do I mean to inflict a pejorative tone. A sort of balancing “push and pull” is at play to borrow a term used by the late Hans Hoffman is always present regardless of situational context.
Formal studies began in the Summer of 1998; then a mid-career eighteen year old high school student. With a tenacity for pen, paper, color, shape, texture, anatomy and a kind of ferocious compositional attraction for life drawing and abstract painting.
At Copper Union Saturday program for gifted high school students of fine arts; observational anatomy was a weekly practice. And later on after graduating with a BFA degree from Parsons in 2002; heavily focused on visual art, digital media, print making, art history and philosophy; I was ready to take on the “professional” working world. Creating; shifting and modularizing between the worlds of string theory dimensions and external pressures of maintaining a steady income. And yet amongst a sea of wild and complicated distractions brought upon by external stimuli; I was able to draw upon twenty-seven volumes of works on paper drawings ranging between 2002-2012. Which are dynamic, abstract, conceptual and polemic in nature; resulting in an upcoming project entitled:
Line On Paper
Line on paper is an upcoming art magazine focusing on documenting & exhibiting works on paper drawings, ephemera, limited edition artist prints within the context of fine art criticism. The publication will feature diverse voices in contemporary art & design. Each gallery as contained in the essay represents three unambiguous yet highly creatives working across distinct multidisciplinary media. The drawings I have chosen to exhibit are from a collection of twenty-seven volumes of works on paper drawings ranging back to 1998 to present time. A sort of “Retrospective Works On Paper” series.
And if you have been following #Art Journal or reading our weekly essays, you might have heard me discussed the long process of converting images for responsive design sliders in conjunction with developing original theme templates for WordPress as a publishing platform. And as the landing page for the project is now active on the web with more incremental updates in weeks ahead as we get ready to roll out the product soon. I simply wanted to print a pithy essay for Art Journal covering how and why the project has come forth. The galleries feature here are the works of Sylvia O; Hugo & myself as the creative editor/curator of the upcoming magazine. With more contemporary leading voices joining our ranks in weeks to come. In addition to developing a service for creatives to communicate & exchange ideas in a private and marketable platform away from social media contexts.
The Art Of Sylvia O
“New York native and MD creative presence Sylvia O has been heavily active in the alternative art scene since 2002. Her imagery uses the female figure as a means to expose the objectification of women, focusing on the often discarded essence and toy-like portrayal of women in contemporary culture. Displaying an unfiltered obscurity of reality and what “beauty” truly is. Herein lies the grotesque, where society’s obsession with beauty created an unobtainable ideal, often leading to the manipulation of identity”.
Writes Shane Pomahambo for Art Whino.com
Sylvia’s work is featured in a seminal contemporary catalog book entitle: “New Brow: 50 Contemporary artist” and available from Art Whino.Com today.
Hugo
The photo montages, drawings, ephemera & scriptures of Hugo are an echo in experience base philosophy.
Their experience is surrealism brother, some are good at hiding…from what I wonder..oh thats right! THEMSELVES! Ha!
For Hugo, experience is a form of reality that is both majestic and effused in his personal echo of wonders. Which he articulates with the most eloquent and fever tone of voice in his drawings, photographs & digital paintings. Often works of art have the quality to evoke emotions which are removed from the experience of the work itself. Thus in able to really break the code apart of how each visual piece is composed; all one must do is summon a certain period in art history as is the case for Dada and the Surrealist ploy. But for Hugo, his work derives not from the annals of historical infrastructure of meaning but from within. He achieves a more personal tone which goes right at the matter of your nervous system. Realizing an extremely original style embedded in color, line and a ferocious compositional subject matter that is truly his.
To use a jazz/rock metaphor as visual cues for describing line on paper to the “non-creative pubic” I would suggest the reader to immerser themselves with the sounds of Nirvana, Charley Christian, West Montgomery, Tool, Range Against The Machine, Monk, RadioHead and Portishead. As a ballad of the times we are referencing in conjunction with a pithy art historical perspective.
Furthermore; as Tom Wolfe explains in chapter two of “The Painted World:”
The notion that the public accepts or rejects anything in Modern Art, the notion that the public scorns, ignores, fails to comprehend, allows to wither, crushes the spirit of, or commits any other crime against Art or any individual artist is merely a romantic fiction, a bittersweet Trilby. This distribution occurs long before the public knows what has happened.
I would only argue that in fact the public does engages in crimes against art and those who wish to apply it as a formal practice. As there are many forms of bullying, deception and subversive attacks which go unnoticed nor does anyone actually care to look at what is really going on under the hood. I often think of the work of the late Mark Lombardi as a great point of departure for describing such crimes against the creative spirit.
Observe, analyze and report are more than a simple tale of romantic fiction as Tom Wolfe chants in his polemic scriptures. It has become a poetic “Mise en Scene” for those who actually pay attention to the noise.
During “these times”; a powerful and useful technique was added to the creative arsenal of things I can carry out from a technological perspective. Traits which I perform today on a part-time basis for friends; non-profits and small business clients. Self development projects for trying to publish fine art related materials such as drawings, non fiction essays, screenplay fiction and creative ephemera sprung towards learning front end web design. Resulting in a considerable two-year investment between attaining certificates in web development and drafting an online portfolio project which is now CTTDC as a startup design incubator. Projects such as Line On Paper & Social Concept DC are a few examples of the assignments we are currently developing in the “beta oven” using a lean startup methodology practices.
Thats Crazy!
Thus I have yet to answer the question regarding intended target audience for all our creative endeavors including line on paper magazine. Well, intentions lay upon a desire to spark a candid conversation between visual artist; creatives, writers, producers, journalist and technology DIY individuals. Each week we get closer to out goals and point of sustainable happiness with every essay/project which becomes public and ready for your enduring critique. For the public, a simple question to get you started:
What is the relationship between art, technology & culture in our ever-expanding epoch of transparency & surveillance? and what role does contemporary art criticism play in the matter.
Line On Paper | Artist Galley
Sylvia O | Drawings & Body Painting Exhibit
Artist web site | Coming Soon
Hugo | Works On Paper & Digital Paintings
DSC | Selected Works On Paper
Hitherto;
I have been describing the content strategy for Line On Paper magazine in terms of showcasing each gallery as a pithy overview of the body of work to be displayed once the project begins. In describing the intended target audience for the site & briefly outlining a workflow for the DIY creative using WP as a publishing platform. The template used for line on paper is a simple yet customizable drag & drop theme with editable content regions. And with the use of an elegant Child Theming structure I was able to extend the functionality by adding both bootstrap & media query integration into the core of the child theme. Allowing the web developer, the ability to tailor specific design experiences across mobile devices. In maintaining the look and feel of the old “dada magazines” of the late 1920’s as part of the theme aesthetic; was no easy task but one I was able to implement. Lastly, the integration of responsive image slides with integrated call to action content widget areas was a high order but essential feature to add in.
Next Steps:
I will take a short hiatus(3 weeks max) from our weekly roundup of essays here at Art Journal to focus on round one of Line On Paper magazine. During this time I would suggest following both the Fan Page and the Twitter feed for daily updates on all our beta testing projects and DIY creative endeavors within the realm of contemporary art, design & culture.
Art Journal Fan Page
Our Facebook Fan page is a small collection of essays from the art journal project and is composed of simple and thoughtful ideas to begin the conversation in the right direction. It would be extremely meaningful if your reading or following us to let us know by “liking” the page at least. The fan page attempts to answer the question posed to the reader earlier today and is a great started concept. We hope to see you there as you take part in the conversation happening there.
Arts Journal Zine 
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