Art, it isn't just for douchebags!

(left is a detail of a print in progress)

I was talking to this guy the other day who had seen my profile on some website. He says "So you're an artist eh?" I says "Yup." He then tells me he kinda likes Picasso but not much else.

That's pretty typical, most people these days couldn't tell you the name of a living visual artist to save their lives, but they can go on and on about their favorite bands and TV stars. My guess is the average person doesn't see visual art as holding anything of value for them. It's for the educated and the upper class understand criticize and purchase, and it's for emo trust-fund hipsters, or for reclusive/irresponsible/egotist crazy types to make. Neither is true, but it's a heluva stigma to overcome. There are people out there that are doing amazing work, and much of it is actually quite affordable. The visual arts are an essential part for enriching your life, and right now most of the visual stimuli we get each day are commercials & advertisements. The average American is exposed to about 3000 advertising messages each day. Even if you don't really look at them, everything you see gets absorbed and affects you subconsciously, so that game you just watched that kept showing ads for that candy bar in the background will make it much more likely that you may buy that candy bar when you're at the store, vs if you had not seen that ad in the first place. So my question is, what kind of images do you want to fill your life with? If you have kids, do you just want them to see ads only as art? Because it kind of is, I'm not saying advertising is bad... but it's like with food, or what you wear, or the friends you have. What you allow into your life will affect the quality of your life. If your walls are bare in your home (and I have a few friends that just never hang art in their house), how does that make you feel when you come home? Do you feel differently when you go to someone's home that has a lot of great stuff up on their walls?

Just something to think about.

In order to react against all that, I'm going to start to feature artists that I find that I feel are super-sweet. So stay tuned! KAJTKYBSAH5S

So here's a few things that are kinda interesting. Here is a short film with Milton Glaser talking and sketching.

MILTON GLASER DRAWS & LECTURES from C. Coy on Vimeo.

This time around for music we have Frontier Psychiatrist by The Avalanches.



Have a good week!