Category: marketing

The Artist Book Foundation (TABF) proudly presents its latest exhibition, ROBERT KIPNISS: Shades of Nature, in coordination with the tenth anniversary of its publication, Robert Kipniss: Paintings and Poetry, 1950–1964. This compelling retrospective offers art enthusiasts a rare opportunity to explore the life and artistic evolution of acclaimed painter, printmaker, and recognized poet Robert Kipniss, and features a selection of his works from different periods of his illustrious career.

Robert Kipniss is a renowned figure in the art world, recognized for his exceptional contributions as a painter, printmaker, and poet. Since his first exhibition in New York in 1951, Kipniss has had over 200 solo shows. His printmaking began with lithographs, but since 1990, he has worked almost exclusively in intaglio, with the majority of his prints being mezzotints. The forms in his work are reduced to essentials and his subject matter may be trees close up or at a distance, landscapes, bridges, or interiors. His use of exceptionally subtle black-and-white tones creates atmospheric effects of solitude and introspection. Throughout his career, Kipniss has left an indelible mark on the art community with his distinctive style and profound vision, making him a notable influence in the realm of visual expression.

Kipniss’s works are represented in the permanent collections of The Metropolitan Museum of Art; the Whitney Museum of American Art; the Los Angeles County Museum of Art; the New Orleans Museum of Art; the British Museum; the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris; and the Pinakothek Moderne, Munich, among others. He was elected to the National Academy of Design in 1980 and to the Royal Society of Painters–Printmakers, London, in 1998. He lives in New York and Connecticut.

Photo courtesy of The Artist Book Foundation (Robert Kipniss: Shades of Nature exhibition at The Artist Book Foundation gallery)

ROBERT KIPNISS: Shades of Nature delves into two significant periods of Kipniss’s artistic career. The exhibition opens with a visual exploration of the young poet and painter discovering his artistic voice during the 1950s and 1960s. On the gallery wall opposite the paintings, three poems featured in the Robert Kipniss: Paintings and Poetry, 1950–1964 book are exhibited for visitors to read and ponder. This display mirrors the interplay and the contrasts between his paintings and poetry, inviting viewers to immerse themselves in the artist’s differing visual and literary expressions, thereby enriching the journey through his artistic realm. The early drawings and paintings offer a profound insight into this critical phase of Kipniss’s career when he made the pivotal decision to devote himself entirely to painting.

He recalls that “while I found the act of writing poetry painful—no doubt because I was writing about the anger and darkness within me—I found only pleasure and excitement in painting. In the very act of putting paint on canvas I found an exuberant and unrestrained exploration of form, color, texture, and emotion—all of it intense and thrilling. . . . It stunned me to see that when I stopped writing poetry, my paintings turned dark and surreal, filled with foreboding and anger—eerie, aggressive, and imbued with the emotions of the poetry I was no longer writing.”

Photo courtesy of The Artist Book Foundation (Robert Kipniss, Sheds and Fence, 1969, lithograph, 12 x 18 inches, on view at The Artist Book Foundation gallery)

The exhibition also presents Kipniss’s foray into the medium of printmaking, which he reluctantly began in 1967 but for which he ultimately developed a deep affinity. Visitors to TABF’s gallery will have the opportunity to appreciate early print works, highlighting the artist’s enduring passion for printmaking that has resulted in over 750 editions in drypoint, etching, lithography, and mezzotint.

In addition to early works, ROBERT KIPNISS: Shades of Nature unveils later works of the 1990s and 2000s that explore the refined and ephemeral landscapes of Kipniss’s mature style. While the artist quit painting in 2018 due to the physical challenges of standing for long stretches at the easel, he continues to draw and make prints. As ever, the majesty of trees and the transformative power of the natural world remains central to his practice.

Photo courtesy of The Artist Book Foundation (Front cover of the Robert Kipniss: Paintings and Poetry, 1950–1964 book published by The Artist Book Foundation)

Kipniss’s engrossing book, Robert Kipniss: Paintings and Poetry, 1950–1964, is the result of many arduous months of revisiting his writing from more than half a century ago, poems that he stashed away and essentially forgot. “Writing was a struggle: a few lines, maybe six or seven, and then rewriting followed by more rewriting before going on. . . . Some of the poems are straightforward, some are infused with surreal irony, and some are angry,” says the artist in his candid and honest preface to the book. Thoughtful and articulate from conception to completion, his never-before-published poems are choreographed with his early paintings in the exhibition’s contemplation of the influential and foundational years from 1950 to 1964. “When I stopped writing [in 1961] my vision was no longer divided between word-thinking and picture-thinking: these approaches had merged and in expressing myself I was more whole,” reflects Kipniss in his reflective musings.

Readers of this gorgeous volume are all the richer for catching a glimpse of an intensely personal segment of this accomplished artist’s private history. In an unambiguous assessment, Kipniss elaborates: “The most significant insight that arose in this undertaking . . . came when I began to collate reproductions of my paintings of the 1950s. I could clearly see that my work in the two mediums was from very different parts of my psyche, and that while they were both in themselves completely engaged, they were not in any way together.”

This written and visual account of previously unpublished poems and early paintings, which received critical acclaim, are accompanied by two astute and illustrative essays by Marshall N. Price and Robin Magowan, that will further inform readers familiar with this highly respected American artist as well as those just discovering the beauty and mystery of his work. Price was curator of modern and contemporary art at the National Academy Museum in New York, New York and is now the curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University. Magowan is an award-winning poet based in Santa Fe, New Mexico. He is the author of 10 books of poetry as well as two collections of travel writing and two books on bicycle racing.

ROBERT KIPNISS: Shades of Nature is a must-see exhibition for anyone passionate about the enduring allure of visual expression and the timeless legacy of a remarkable artist. Admission to TABF’s gallery is always free and all are welcome.

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Author Bio: 

​​The Artist Book Foundation (TABF) is a nonprofit art book publisher that celebrates artists’ lives and work through publications, related exhibitions, and public programs. TABF works collaboratively with artists, museum curators, art historians, and collectors to develop catalogues raisonnés, monographs, surveys, and exhibition catalogues. It is dedicated to preserving, promoting, and celebrating the artistic legacy of acclaimed as well as underrepresented artists. With a focus on producing artist-centered publications that delve into the lives and works of these remarkable individuals, TABF plays a vital role in fostering appreciation for the arts and their lasting impact on culture and society. Additionally, TABF’s book donations program provides access to the arts to the widest audience possible by delivering thousands of copies of their publications to underserved public libraries, schools, and prisons across the country.

The importance of artist books is not in question, but their existence could be if they are not published by a nonprofit whose mission is to ensure their future and to capture the legacy that is found on the page—print and digital—for generations to come. If you consider that museums are run as nonprofits for the common good, rather than to satisfy shareholders, then you can appreciate what inspired the creation of The Artist Book Foundation. Connecting artist books with markets worldwide is essential and easier than ever as the foundation has contacts internationally to ensure that promotion, sales, distribution, and specialized content reach all corners of the globe. 

It is critical to be where the art world is getting the greatest attention and setting the highest standards. Located on the campus of the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (MASS MoCA), TABF’s scholarly publications help to inspire and develop a growing interest in the arts. Art historians, museum curators, and other experts in their fields author and contribute to all of the foundation’s richly illustrated books, with the ultimate goal of clearly communicating the artist’s practice. The foundation partners with artists, galleries, museums, and others to create publications of exceptional quality and design. The books are supported financially through these partnerships to produce the most comprehensive presentation of an artist’s history and work.

Painter Julie Feldman presents a collection of expressive portraits that capture the mystery and soul of women. See more of her portfolio on her website.

As a contemporary American oil painter, my abstract figurative portraits focus primarily on the female face. They explore the complexities and contradictions, the vulnerabilities and strengths, and of course, the innate beauty found there.

“Anna” Damaged Photo Series, oil, tea, plaster, 20″ x 16″

My journey to  becoming an artist began in Baltimore when I was five years old. One Saturday morning, my mother took me to the Baltimore Museum of Art for my first art class.

“Prima Donna” oil, acrylic, 48″ x 30″

I still remember the  painting in one of the galleries that we walked past on our way to the art studio. It was Picasso’s Mother and Child. It made quite an impression on me. So much so that as I was conducting  research for my Muse series, and encountered the Picasso again, the remembrance of that Saturday morning made me realize that exquisite memories of the past are what inform my work.

“Between Desire and Devotion” oil, 48″ x 36″

I returned to full-time painting in 2015, after living in Los Angeles for many years where I had a decorative arts business. My first paintings were in acrylic. Most of my work is now done in oil. It allows me the freedom of texture, stroke, light and intensity to create portraits that I hope speak to you from the canvas.

“Second Sight l” oil, 48″ x 36″

My work has been described as evocative, accessible, mysterious, and sometimes haunting. What I know is that as I paint, I often feel as if I am visiting with the soul, the life of this face I am creating. I somehow hear their story and translate what I have heard into a visible form.

“Second Sight ll” oil, 48″ x 36″

Inspiration for my latest series comes from the quote, “In order to turn a life into a memoir, we must cultivate the art of looking back…” This latest collection, entitled Looking Back explores the art of revisiting memories and the emotions they evoke. Often I become caught up in the faces I am creating, pondering their past, in trying to see what they see when they “look back.”

“The Engagement 1938″ (damaged photo series), oil, 48″ x 36”

My paintings are based on personal memories, family photographs, and found imagery. I am influenced by reality versus memory, vulnerability versus strength, and beauty for the sake of beauty.

“View from a Paris Balcony” oil, chalk, 48″ x 36

My paintings all narrate a story of fragile presences and the essence of human emotions. I hope they give the viewer a deeply moving experience.

Julie Feldman invites you to follow on Instagram and Facebook.

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Welcome to season five, episode 25 of The Abundant Artist, the show that dispels the myth of “the starving artist” and shares how you can live an abundant life as an artist and make a living from your talent, one interview at a time.

Our guest today is Marisa S White, an award-winning artist-photographer based in Colorado. A drawing and painting major, Marisa fell in love with photography in college and eventually began to incorporate it into her work, creating mixed media collages. In 2012, she was introduced to Photoshop, and her artistic world changed forever.

“I’ve got a decent personality for sales and that has served me well.” — Marisa White

In this episode, Marisa shares her journey as an artist, why she went from art school to setting up her own payroll business to back in school learning photography, how her “decent personality for sales” has served her well, how she handles her gallery relations, and many more tidbits about her art life.

Join us for today’s podcast to learn more about Marisa’s “trials-and-errors” in life which, she believes, have got her to the point where she is now.

In this episode:

[1:20] Cory kicks off the conversation with Marisa asking how she came up with the idea for her series titled Certain These Clouds Go Somewhere.
[4:48] Cory reminisces about his growing up years in Utah, and how he resonates with Marisa’s creative feelings emanating from being surrounded by giant mountains and being in and among the clouds.
[7:19] How does Marisa describe herself – a photographer, an artist, or a collage artist?
[8:12] Marisa shares her art journey with the TAA audience, from art school to where she is today.
[11:20] How going to the Rocky Mountain School of Photography and being exposed to Photoshop there changed the course of Marisa’s art career.
[14:35] Cory asks Marisa why she decided to sell her payroll business and go back to school to learn photography.
[17:22] What does Marisa mean when she says she has “a decent personality for sales?”
[19:40] Cory compares the sales cycle in the mid-upper tier of the art market with that of enterprise software solutions.
[22:23] How Marisa loves to share the stories behind her artworks with visitors in art fairs.
[24:20] Marisa talks about her creative process.
[28:48] Why Marisa thinks that making behind-the-scenes videos of their creative process can be a bit frustrating for artists since they do a lot of things “in the moment,” but why she still recommends doing so.
[30:43] How do buyers find Marisa?
[31:40] Apart from galleries and art fairs, sales through social media have started picking up lately for Marisa.
[32:10] How does Marisa choose the art fairs she goes to?
[34:14] Why it is important as an artist to keep track of where your sales are coming from.
[36:13] Cory asks Marisa whether she has formal contracts with the galleries she is working with.
[39:46] Marisa explains how she handles her relationships with multiple galleries.
[43:10] Why is Marisa using both Photobiz and ArtStoreFronts for her website?
[45:22] Marisa is going to get her own retail space soon.
[47:31] Cory thanks Marisa for joining the podcast!

Resources mentioned:

Marisa S White’s website
Marisa’s series Certain These Clouds Go Somewhere
Marisa’s Instagram
Marisa’s Facebook
Kelli Erdmann’s Instagram (kelladactyl)

About the guest:

Marisa S White is an award-winning artist best known for seamlessly stitching multiple photographs together, weaving personal narratives through surreal and fantastical imagery. She uses surrealism to hyperbolize emotions and experiences that aren’t always so easy to put into words. Marisa has received numerous accolades for her art, is collected internationally, and has exhibited across the US and in Europe; most notably at the Crocker Art Museum in Sacramento, California. She currently resides in Colorado with her husband, whom she fondly refers to as Captain Awesome, and their two rescue fur babies.

“The pandemic wiped my calendar clean in a matter of a week … so I used the time as a little sabbatical.”

“I [used to love] color for color's sake … Now I'm seeing color more as a harmonic journey….”

“I'll check [my blog stats] periodically, but I really don't wanna use it as any sort of religion or anything to steer business decisions too heavily with.”

“My problem is that there are so many shiny things that it's really, it can be difficult for me to narrow down and choose something.”

“You have to show up regularly for your supporter base.”

“My biggest secret [for using Patreon] was trying not to create extra work for myself. The fewer barriers between my creative process and the delivery of that content to … my supporters, the easier it is for me.”

Before ChatGPT and other artificial intelligence (AI) large language models exploded on the scene last fall, there were AI art generators, based on many of the same technologies. Simplifying, in the context of art generation, these technologies involve a company first setting up a software-based network loosely modeled on the brain with millions of artificial “neurons.” Then, the company collects millions of data digital images, oftentimes scraped from the web. Finally, it runs the images through the neural network. The network performs billions (or even trillions) of mathematical operations on the data samples, measuring various features of the images and relationships between them, and then updating the values of the artificial neurons based on those calculations. This final step is called “model training” and it enables AI art generators to create entirely new images, typically in response to a user typing in a text prompt, as explained further below. Online digital images used as training data are an indispensable part of this process.

OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, released the DALL-E text-to-image art generator in January 2021 and its successor, DALL-E 2, the following April. Two other text-to-image AI systems, Midjourney and Stable Diffusion, came out in 2022. It is well known that these models were created by training on millions of digital images downloaded from the web. This article has two goals: to provide a reader-friendly introduction to the copyright and right-of-publicity issues raised by such AI model training, and to offer practical tips about what art owners can do, currently, if they want to keep their works away from such training uses.

A GENTLE PRIMER ON GENERATIVE AI ART MODELS

Before diving in, it helps to have a big-picture sense of how generative AI art models are built and how users interact with them. The technical details are fascinating, but too complex to dwell on. Here’s the bare technological minimum to let us get to work:

• From the user’s perspective: You type in some text, e.g., “A vase of flowers with some orchids and other pretty things. Make the vase emerald blue, and the final image photorealistic.” You hit enter. The model runs, using conceptual linkages created during its training between millions of word labels and billions of image features to synthesize a new work, prompted by the criteria you typed in.

Djordje Petrovic for Pexels

• Under the hood: As noted above, AI art generators are virtual neural networks defined by billions of numbers called “weights” or “parameters.” Model developers set those parameters by running millions of images, along with text labels for each image, through training algorithms. These training images aren’t stored as perfect bit-by-bit digital replicas. They are compressed into complex mathematical entities (vectors), each of which is a huge matrix of numbers. The word labels are similarly converted (“embedded”) into vectors and combined with their corresponding image vectors. The training algorithms then run each image-word vector through a series of incremental steps, first gradually adding and then gradually removing random noise from the vector. Through this “diffusion” process, the model adjusts the numerical values of its parameters to capture the conceptual linkages between the word concepts and image features. It may seem like magic, but it is a chain of probabilistic mathematical operations run on an incomprehensively massive scale.

Because of the intentional randomness inherent in this diffusion process, only rarely will an AI model output a copy of an original training image (or something close to it) in response to a text prompt. Even in those rare cases, close reproduction typically occurs only when a user deliberately forces that result through careful prompt selection. So if outright copying is unlikely at the output stage, what are the copyright and right-of-publicity issues at stake? We’ll focus on two of them.

TRAINING ON COPYRIGHTED ARTWORK

The first big issue many in the creative and tech industries are grappling with is the permissibility of reproducing training images as an intermediate step in the training process. Many text-to-image generators are trained on massive datasets, such as LAION-5B, that include many copyrighted images. Copyright protects against unauthorized electronic reproduction. The AI model’s neural-network parameters do not store digital copies of a training image, but interim copies are typically made temporarily during training, usually in the stage of converting images to vectors. At the same time, copyright has a fair use doctrine, permitting certain copying without permission of the owner based on balancing four factors, like whether the copier’s use is transformative and whether the copying would impact the value or potential market for the image. So the question arises: When a model developer copies a digital image for training—but the model never outputs that same original image—should the intermediate-step copying be excused by fair use?

Antori Shkraba for Pexels

IMITATING ARTISTIC STYLE

The other core issue is that text-to-image AI art generators often can reproduce elements of an artist’s style, even when the content of the synthesized image is not at all similar to the original work. Think of Van Gogh’s “Starry Night” and its distinctive stylistic aspects—the swirling, strong brushstrokes; the tones of the yellows and blues; and the soft light emanating seemingly from underneath. Now take that stylistic “skin” and apply it to a wholly different scene, a bowl of fruit, or an airport runway. Van Gogh’s style may be carried over, but a copyright claim is challenging. Because the content of the picture is fundamentally different, the work is not substantially similar. Generally, copyright protection does not extend to abstractions like styles standing alone.

Style transfer in AI art generators has received considerable attention. The best-known example is digital artist Greg Rutkowski, recognized for his dark moody fantasy scenes used in games like Dungeons & Dragons. At one point last fall, users had explicitly prompted Stable Diffusion to create images “in the style of Greg Rutkowski” over 93,000 times. Because the content of the synthesized images was different, a copyright claim would be a stretch. Another possibility is a right-to-publicity claim. Generally, this right guards against an unauthorized commercial use of a person’s name, likeness, persona, or identity. But courts, at least so far, have not clearly decided whether a visual artist’s style can qualify as a kind of “persona” or “identity,” nor have they discussed what level of distinctiveness may be necessary to create such “personas” or “identities,” nor how such distinctiveness is to be measured.

Andrea Piacquadio for Pexels

PRACTICAL TIPS

Eventually, courts will weigh in on these training data and style transfer issues. Earlier this year, Getty Images sued Stability, the company behind the Stable Diffusion model, in Delaware federal court over the use of Getty copyrighted photos in Stable Diffusion’s training. Similarly, a group of visual artists sued both Stability and Midjourney in California federal court over their copyrighted artwork and included right-to-publicity claims. But those cases are still in their early stages. It will take time before we receive clear, actionable guidance from the courts. In the meantime, what can artists concerned about style imitation nor training usage do?

Your current options are mostly technological, not entirely satisfactory, but better than nothing. First is detection. Software tools exist to help you determine whether an AI art model used a training dataset that included your image. The startup Spawning offers the free site Have I Been Trained? where you can upload your file and check to see whether it exists in the LAION-5B dataset used to train Stable Diffusion and other AI art generators. Or, if your artwork is highly distinctive, you can try to “hack” the model by experimenting with different text prompts to induce the model to output something close to your original image.

The next step is communication. If you believe your artwork was improperly used to train an AI model, you can write the developer’s legal department, identifying your images with specificity and asking them to remove those images from the training dataset. There’s no guarantee your request will be honored, but you will have provided notice of your objection. There are also ways to communicate your anti-scraping intent through metadata instructions. If you publish your artwork on your website, make sure the site’s “robot.txt” file includes tags prohibiting web crawlers. OpenAI recently announced that its GPTBot scraper would respect these tags. Similarly, DeviantArt, an online site where artists showcase and sell their digital works, includes a “NoAI” HTML tag by default for uploads to its platform. Also for individual digital images, the Adobe-led Content Authenticity Initiative has issued a technical standard—C2PA “content credentials”—for cryptographically binding a metadata “manifest” to images. The newest version of the standard (1.3) allows users to include an instruction in the manifest prohibiting AI model training on the image. Of course, these metadata systems are not ideal solutions, because they are not legally mandated or widely adopted yet. But they offer a promising path for future protection.

A final step you can take is prevention. Academics are developing and have released tools that would allow artists to electronically modify their digital artwork and photo files to inhibit their downstream reproduction. To specifically address the issue of style mimicry, a team at the University of Chicago developed Glaze, a software program that manipulates individual pixels to alter the style. The change is imperceptible to the human eye, but the AI art model is “tricked” into thinking the image has a different style, cubist instead of photorealistic, for example. Glaze is now publicly available to artists through the University of Chicago website. A similar tool, still in the prototype stage, is PhotoGuard from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. PhotoGuard alters digital photos, also at the pixel level, so that any AI-synthesized outputs using those photos have degraded appearances—key areas of the output may be grayed out, for instance.

Campus Production for Pexels

PARTING THOUGHTS 

Issues around artistic style transfer and the use of copyrighted works as AI training data will be with us for the foreseeable future. Legitimate, provocative, vital debate between creators, developers, and the public continues in the news, in legislatures, and in the courts. But while we wait for the right balances to be struck, it behooves visual artists to understand both the basics of how AI image generators work and the technological tools available to them to help control unauthorized uses of their works. The times are ever-changing―and we must keep up with the times.

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Author Bio: 

Aleksander J. Goranin is a partner in the intellectual property practice of Duane Morris LLP. He is a software copyright and patent litigator and counselor, specializing in technology-driven cases, high-stakes problems, and turning the complex into the understandable. Alex is active in the leadership of the Copyright Society and co-chairs its AI Series of educational programming. At Duane Morris, he helps lead the firm’s AI Steering Committee and publishes its biweekly newsletter summarizing legal developments in artificial intelligence, The AI Update.

Today’s art education should go beyond the goals of money-making or art for creativity’s sake

By Samuel Frandino

Many years ago, I worked for a theatrical scene shop that was engaged in a variety of projects at a new Universal Studios theme park. One project involved having artists “age” the exteriors of buildings to fit whatever milieu a scene required. The painters at the shop achieved this effect by using the specialized art of scene painting. As I walked along one themed street, I watched a talented painter create rust stains that appeared to have been there for years, but had been placed there only an hour before. He would paint an area and then stand back several feet to look at what he had just done before going back to the wall to paint. After repeating this sequence a few times, a supervisor told him to speed things up because there was a lot of area to cover. There was a brief discussion about art and process that ended with the supervisor telling him that this wasn’t his home studio: This was art for money, we give the client what they want, when they want it, and we don’t go broke doing it.

Neither that scenic artist nor his supervisor started out with a vision of art as a money-maker. Young children make art just for fun, so from the start their first art teacher is coming into the game in the second quarter. That student has an expectation of what “art” is going to be like, and it is a positive expectation that doesn’t involve factual content or vocabulary. If you were an elementary school art teacher looking into those eager faces, would you want to be the person who makes a child hate art by asking them to prove their learning in some sort of assessment? Probably not. In the absence of some higher power forcing you to perform such an atrocity, you substitute factual content with something else. You open the doors to creativity with performance tasks in various media and techniques.

That scenic artist had made the transition from wide-eyed excited child praised for his creativity to artist in the service of capitalism. And I bet he was happy to be there, as I bet you’re happy to be working in the arts, too, probably looking to get in deeper. But there was a lot to learn in order to get from wide-eyed child to employed artist cashing a check from the client, company, or gallery: facts about materials, techniques, and tools, not to mention contracts, taxes, and bookkeeping.

Students who dream of becoming working artists, and the rest who live in a culture increasingly bombarded with imagery, must develop a visual literacy, the holy grail of art education. Visual literacy provides students with the ability to express their thoughts and emotions and to understand the expressions of others.

If you ask children what they think of a painting, you’ll probably get simple value judgments. “It’s good.” “I like it.” “I don’t like it.” They require a special vocabulary to express why they feel a certain way. With knowledge of the elements and principles of art, children are able to identify the artist’s technique and have the words to express what they see and why the art creates those feelings.

Visual literacy provides a connection between vocational art education and creative expression, as well as the tools necessary to understand the subtle messages and manipulations around us. It allows a 16-year-old art student who is desperate to communicate a sense of isolation and sadness to go beyond the stereotypical symbols that are so common in many artists’ early work. In a more commercial application, visual literacy enables fast-food restaurants to stimulate their customers’ appetites and increase turnover rate by adopting a yellow and red color scheme. Conversely, the decor of an upscale restaurant in Manhattan with a prix fixe menu is likely to be considerably more muted; the last thing they want is for you to feel rushed or still be hungry after dropping $1,000 in a single evening.

To effectively express yourself, or to collaborate with others, you have to learn the content of art. In most school districts, the delivery of that content is very similar. Young art students are encouraged to be creative in an age-appropriate range of media, and even if they are all following the same instructions leading to similar outcomes, at some point they are encouraged to make personal choices. They will do performance tasks like mixing colors, but unless testing of concepts is mandatory, the art teacher clings to the hope that the students are learning, or at least able to remember how they ended up with the color green they used in a particular project.

As the students grow, so does the range of projects they work on and the media they use. In high school they can start to take art classes in specialized subjects, like drawing, painting, crafts, ceramics, digital art, graphic design, and photography. In a fully functioning art program, a few students will take coursework in preparation for art education beyond high school. Although this K-12 curriculum has long served educators well in the past, it is incomplete and increasingly inadequate for producing students who understand imagery and the way it’s used to manipulate personal and public decisions.

Educators must introduce students to the ubiquitous use of imagery beyond the students’ personal conceptions of what art is. Generations of humans have believed in their science textbooks’ simplistic representations of atoms, waves of energy, and the solar system. These images do not reflect reality, however; they are visual analogies and metaphors that fit on the page. Musical notes and even the letters of the alphabet are images to which we assign sounds and combine to make melodies and words that in turn communicate thoughts and emotions. The use of imagery as a representation of some concept too large for us to imagine—deconstructed and abstracted to fit what we can understand—is an important part of visual literacy, though it does not fall into the accepted paradigm of art.

Although it may not lead directly to personal expression or occupational skills, a visual-literacy curriculum reveals to students how the presentation of ideas through images affects their perception of the world. These images often define their understanding of concepts or social issues for the rest of their lives.

This idea might seem like a lot to add to what many art teachers think of as too little time to begin with, and it is a diversion from spending time in the traditional pursuits of art education. Some students already don’t like art, or art class, even without this added component.

A very smart seventh grader once told me that art was his most difficult class. In every other class, the teachers told him what to do and how to do it. Math was learned processes, and social studies was facts and dates. The answers in those classes were either right or wrong. In art class, however, he felt lost without explicit instructions and black-and-white answers.

How do students approach the question: What makes a bowl “art” instead of just a bowl? Considering this type of question tends to give students pause. Ask them whether an ugly bowl is artwork, and the students have to ponder what “ugly” means and what “art” means. It may be the first time they’ve confronted an interpretive question. In their increasingly diverse culture, they will confront issues for which the answers are unclear. A comprehensive education in art can help them begin to tackle these situations.

The problem with much of the discussion about art education is that it is highly subjective. The simple fact that every person is required to attend school means that everyone has their own personal experience from which they construct an opinion. As a middle school and high school art teacher, I’ve met hundreds of parents at open houses, and I am often struck by how many of them fondly remember their own art classes, even decades after graduating from high school. Many remember their art
teachers as trusted confidants, and some talk about the hours they spent in the art room after school or when they should have been in other classes. I want to ask these parents whether they learned anything about art in their classes, but I don’t want to ruin the magic of the moment. I bet that one in 100 knows the basic elements and principles of art, and that estimation is generous.

We can’t continue to model curricula after our nostalgic personal experiences or to offer art education only to those who intend to find employment in the field. Everyone, especially a child growing up today, needs to understand the nature and the power of imagery. In today’s world, images are unavoidable, and they manipulate our selection in everything from products to presidents. The business of art is everyone’s business, not just the business of those who are cashing checks.

Ceramic artist Mary Kinzel Means presents a delightful collection of whimsical and symbolic sculpture. Visit her website to see more of her portfolio.

I’ve always been drawn to faces and expressions. I was constantly being chastised in grade school for doodling faces on my assignment edges, something I did without thought, throughout college and even now. The difference is that today I celebrate the expression rather than feeling at fault.

 

“Spirit” ceramic and mixed media, 11″ x 4″ x 10″

 

When I’m on the phone, I sketch. If there is a paper and pen in front of me at a restaurant, I’m going to draw. My doodling and love of arts landed me at the University of Tennessee as an art major.

“Dreamers Vessel Trio” ceramic and mixed media, 18″ x 14″ x 17″

 

Upon graduation I felt less than positive about making a living as a professional artist, so I ended up on the other end of the art spectrum as a consultant. After years of selling other artists, I discovered ceramics (something which I had never experimented with in school) and literally fell in love, thus starting my second career.

“Miss Molly” ceramic and mixed media, 10″ x 7″ x 13″

“Balance” ceramic and mixed media, 15″ x 17″ x 7″

“Starting to See” ceramic, 11″ x 4″ x 4″

“Peanut Ride” ceramic and mixed media, 10″ x 9″ x 5″

I’m a tremendous animal lover with horses and elephants being two of my favorites to create. As much as I appreciate their aesthetics, it’s the symbolism that truly moves me. With strength and independence representative of the horse, and good fortune, wisdom, and protection symbolic of the elephant.

“Midnight Musings” encaustic and ceramic, 12″ x 3″ x 12″

Dream imagery is another recurring theme in my sculpture, with the hopes of providing the viewer with an introspective sense of remembrance. Ultimately, my work is a connection between earth (clay) and the ethereal.  Sometimes whimsical, sometimes serious, but always peaceful, positive, and full of gratitude.

“You have to match the gallery with the style you know of what you're doing. So you have to really do a lot of searching and discovering for yourself as an artist.”

“[The recession] really made me think what can I do? What can I do to work that hard for myself as my business?”

“The people who go into galleries are 1% of the population. I wanted to reach the other 99%.”

“I put all my effort into really being clear about who my market is, which are interior designers, who have, who buy repeatedly because they have clients.”

“I'm 65 years old, I never thought I would be doing a video. I do not like to be in front of the camera, but my passion for teaching, like all I'm focusing on is what I can teach. These tips.”

Recent high-profile investigations of noted collectors provide a reminder of the need for antiquities collectors to carefully consider the provenance and history of objects in their collections. According to The New York Times, the New York District Attorney’s Office (New York D.A.) recovered (by its own count) nearly 4,500 antiquities from 2011 through the end of 2022. The New York D.A. claims to have recovered almost 850 antiquities, valued at over $165 million in total, since the beginning of 2022 alone. Both individual collectors and museums should be aware of the signs of looted antiquities and consider reviewing their collections and updating their policies where applicable.

COLLECTORS BEWARE

Two recent investigations involving noted antiquities collector and Metropolitan Museum of Art board member Shelby Wright and hedge fund billionaire and philanthropist Michael Steinhardt show that even high-profile individuals are not immune from scrutiny.

Last December, it was reported that the New York D.A. had been issued two search warrants to search Ms. White’s home.  In April, the New York D.A. announced that it had seized 89 antiquities collectively valued at nearly $69 million and originating from ten different countries over the course of its investigation. It thanked White for her cooperation and is repatriating items from her collection to their countries of origin.

In 2021, the New York D.A. announced an agreement with Mr. Steinhardt not to prosecute him in exchange for his compliance with certain conditions following a grand jury investigation into his collecting activities. Under the terms of that agreement, Steinhardt relinquished all interest in and claims to 180 antiquities in his collection, with a value of approximately $70 million, and agreed not to acquire any antiquities (defined as artifacts created before 1500 CE) for the remainder of his life. Mr. Steinhardt denied that the artifacts were looted.  The New York D.A is still repatriating the named antiquities to their countries of origin; recent repatriations have gone to the Palestinian Authority, Egypt and Italy.

The New York D.A. in recent months has also announced a handful of significant returns from the collections of unnamed private collections.

The New York D.A. also targets dealers it suspects of being responsible for trafficking in looted artifacts.  For example, it has repatriated hundreds of antiquities to India and Pakistan from the collections of Subhash Kapoor, who was sentenced in November 2022 to ten years imprisonment in India for burglary and illegal export, and is the subject of a pending extradition request from the New York D.A.

CULTURAL INSTITUTIONS — YOU TOO!

Significant cultural institutions are not immune to being targeted for allegedly possessing looted antiquities. In September 2022, the New York D.A. announced that it obtained three search warrants against New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art seeking items it believed were looted and seized 27 artifacts valued at over $13 million. The museum told The New York Times that it was fully cooperating with the investigation.

Image for Pexels by Andrew Neel

In August 2022 the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles announced that it would return five objects to Italy after receiving information from the New York D.A.  In September 2022, the New York D.A. returned to Egypt an artifact known as the “Green Coffin,” valued at over $1 million, after negotiating its return from the Houston Museum of Natural Sciences. Lastly, in February 2023, the New York D.A. returned the “Hadrian Head,” valued at $250,000, to Italy from the San Antonio Museum of Art.

LESSONS FOR COLLECTORS AND MUSEUMS

Collectors—both individuals and institutions—should be aware of signs that the New York D.A. considers in determining if an object that lacks a robust provenance could be looted, to guide their decisions on what to purchase or display:

1. It reached the market through a known trafficker, like Mr. Kapoor.
2. There are photographs of the antiquity in its looted state, used by looters to “authenticate” their finds by showing them dirty and unrestored.
3. The antiquity was dirty when purchased, as legally authorized excavations usually thoroughly clean the item.
4. The seller was able to specifically identify where the antiquity was found, though it was not part of a scientific or authorized excavation.
5. The antiquity is in fragments that are easily fixed (for example, broken at the elbow or knee).
6. The antiquity reached the market after a period of geopolitical turbulence in its home country.
7. There are reports of looting in the area where the antiquity was found.
8. A complete hoard — that is, a grouping of items — lacks a provenance.
9. There is a provenance, but it is generic or unclear.

Images for Pexels by Tom Balabaud

Collectors who have purchased or are considering purchasing antiquities that meet some of or all these criteria should consider seeking legal advice or requesting additional provenance information.

Institutions—particularly as their collections become increasingly visible through ongoing digitization efforts—should consider revising their own policies to reflect modern standards (and to avoid the embarrassment of a criminal seizure).  New policies adopted by the Smithsonian and the Metropolitan Museum of Art provide some guidance.

In May 2022, the Smithsonian announced a new “ethical returns policy.” As part of that policy, the Smithsonian affirms that all items in its extensive collections must have been acquired “legally,” but goes beyond that to consider “current ethical practice and principles.” As part of that obligation, the Smithsonian pledges not only to consider the “care and potential return of human remains and/or objects of tangible cultural heritage,” but also to “shar[e] associated information.”

Image for Pexels by Charles Parker

In New York, following significant seizures from the New York D.A., the Metropolitan Museum of Art in May 2023 introduced four new initiatives to oversee its collecting practices. First, the museum committed to researching the provenance of items in its collection through art dealers whose methods and practices have since come under scrutiny. Second, it will hire a dedicated “manager of provenance research,” along with three additional researchers. Third, the museum commits to participating more visibly in the cultural property discussion. Finally, it created a dedicated committee to guide the museum in considering these issues.

In Closing

Antiquities collectors should carefully consider the provenance and history of objects in their collections to avoid being accused of looting. Collectors and institutions may be well-served in considering the potential upside of investing resources into examining their collection policies in light of mounting external pressures—including local, state or federal officials and foreign governments.

______________________________

Author Bio: 

Meaghan Gragg is a partner in Hughes Hubbard’s Litigation Department and Co-Chair of the firm’s Art Law Group. Sigrid Jernudd is an associate in the New York office of Hughes Hubbard & Reed, where she focuses on litigation and international arbitration. 

2016’s Hottest Art Events and Organizations from Around the Globe

ANNE & MARK’S ART PARTY
San Jose, California
Billed as an “Occasional and Irrational San Jose Arts Fest,” Anne & Mark’s Art Party is an amazing art happening. The most recent unveiling was this past September, but no matter when it happens, the Art Party is an integral part of the Northern California art scene. It’s been described as “Mad Max meets Moulin Rouge” and “Burning Man meets Venice Biennale.” You’ve got to experience it to understand it. That is, whenever it comes around again.

ART DESIGN CONSULTANTS’
“ART COMES ALIVE” AWARDS
Cincinnati, Ohio
Art Design Consultants proudly sponsors Art Comes Alive (ACA), an annual fine art contest and exhibit that awards the brightest and best artists working in North America in a variety of categories. The awards provide a great opportunity for artists to be acknowledged for their talents, to gain exposure, and to win purchase awards and gallery contracts.

ARTBLEND
Fort Lauderdale, Florida
Artblend takes a new approach to every artist who comes into their gallery or who is featured at one of the many art shows where the gallery exhibits. Artblend is a full-service, art-related business based in Fort Lauderdale, giving emerging, mid-career, and established artists the marketing expertise that they need to build their business.

CONTEMPORARY ART
PROJECTS USA
Miami, Florida
Headquartered in Miami, Contemporary Art Projects USA is dedicated to nurturing new contemporary art by providing exhibition opportunities and resources for emerging artists and curators. Their mission is to promote art appreciation within the international community and to generate resources that support artists’ creative endeavors. From biennials and gala auctions to exhibitions and major international art shows, they are always on the scene.

GALLERY EDEL
Osaka, Japan
Gallery Edel is committed to a completely new interpretation and perspective on exhibiting the most significant and important art trends in Japanese contemporary art and international contemporary art. The foremost objective of Gallery Edel is to enhance the experience of both artmaking and art appreciation by embracing the culture of art worldwide. The gallery’s approach is exemplified by their 2016 exhibitions at Art Santa Fe and Red Dot Miami, where they are showing the work of recent Japanese art phenomenon Yayoi Kusama.

MARC STRAUS GALLERY
New York, New York
Marc Straus is one of New York’s leading contemporary art galleries, located on theLower East Side of Manhattan. The gallery identifies and fosters some of the best international talent, representing 17 artists from 13 different countries, most of whom have not been shown in the U.S. before. Additionally, the gallery has taken a position of showing older artists who have not for decades, or in some cases ever, been looked at in the proper light. Their show and exhibition of artist Todd Murphy exemplifies the impact of that position and vision.

SFMOMA
San Francisco, California
After years of great anticipation and with a blizzard of red confetti, one of the most anticipated openings and art events of the year came to fruition. The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) opened its doors to the public in May 2016, and changed the look and feel of exhibiting modern contemporary art for years to come. Attended by dignitaries, renowned artists, and members of the art community far and wide, the festivities included a gala celebration and a grand public opening.

TEFAF
New York, New York
Founded by art dealers in 1988 and run as a non-profit foundation, TEFAF has a proud history of showcasing masterpieces in every category of art and design – from antiques, Old Masters, and Haute Joaillerie to contemporary painting, works on paper, and 20th century design. It presents two fairs in New York: TEFAF New York Fall and TEFAF New York Spring, held in October and May, respectively.

Photographer Chris Palm draws awareness to the world’s vanishing tropical forests through his TreeTalk series. Learn more about this project by visiting his website.

I’ve been making photographs most of my life. I was was drawn to the magic I saw in harnessing a chemical reaction powered by the sun as images would emerge on paper developing in the wet bath. Back in those days, there was a certain indisputable truth spoken through the language of photography. Somewhere in the transition to digital, seeing is no longer believing. We have become numb to the most remarkable of imagery.

“Cascade” photography, face mount print to acrylic, 24″ x 36″

For years I focused on travel and street photography captured on my journeys around the world. Social media provided a immediate platform to bring viewers with me wherever I was traveling.

“Churchtree” photography, face mount print to acrylic, 24″ x 36″

After circumventing the globe several times with camera in check, I began focused more on standing still. I wanted to explore overlooked subject mater that would be important to archive for the future. Tropical forests and trees in Ecuador have been the focus of much of this work.

“Kelly” photography, face mount print to acrylic, 24″ x 36″

TreeTalk is a portfolio of images from deep within the Choco Forest of Ecuador. Unfortunately, only about 1% of this system still remains on the equator. In the not too distant future, will we have any wild forests left?

“Tower” photography, face mount print to acrylic, 24″ x 36″

Forest photos require some translation to make them visually interesting. I like to work a lot with perspectives to try transport the viewer into the forest. Occasionally I even employ some parlor tricks from the old stereo grams to create three dimensional trees that appear to move about. With the tropical portfolio, I like to print face mount to acrylic as I feel it provides the greatest depth and helps bring the trees to life.

“Canopy” photography, face mount print to acrylic, 24″ x 36″

I never imagined taking photos of a forest could be so political. In 2016, when I began developing the concept of TreeTalk, there was significant resistance in the United States to art that explored environmental topics. Climate change or anything related to the need for environmental conservation was met with resistance from a very vocal, abusive and organized minority.

“Tissue” photography, face mount print to acrylic, 24″ x 36″

From threats of violence to cyber attacks and social media trolls, it felt like every attempt was made to shut down my forest art from Ecuador. Interestingly enough, at the same time, almost 90% of oil being pumped out of Ecuador was headed to California.

“Face” photography, face mount print to acrylic, 24″ x 36″

In addition to forest photography, I have started design work printing silk scarves. Proceeds from these go to fund a small bio incubator I manage on the coast of Ecuador. It explores alternative economic models and provides alternatives to deforestation. We are currently exploring silk and vanilla as two commercial lines that could be developed to provide employment while maintaining traditional cultural ways of life.

Chris Palm invites you to follow him on Instagram and Facebook.

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Is it still possible to have a great idea for a series of new work and grow it without much of a social media presence? 

Eric Jackson did it last year. With less than 1,000 followers. 

Eric started selling his art at local art shows in Maryland in 2017. At the time he was teaching art in public school. After the 2020 pandemic, he left teaching to pursue his art career full time. He’d already built up some pre-pandemic momentum by scheduling up to 20 art fairs and other shows per year. 

In late 2020 Eric began taking some classes with TAA. Between what he learned in classes and his own efforts, his sales steadily increased and he landed a public art project that increased his visibility. 

Last year he decided to build on his history of making wildlife art to make a new series about the Chesapeake Bay watershed. He wanted to bring attention to the interconnected nature of the Chesapeake Bay and the 19M+ residents who depend on the watershed. He started out by collecting water samples from 100 different sites across five states and making t-shirts using that water. 

This turned into a successful Kickstarter project, relationships with a bunch of regional nature nonprofits, and his art and tshirts in various museums, art fairs, and galleries. 

“ I ended up doing a press release when the project launched which brought in a ton of press last year.  The first press release ended up bringing in features in five different regional papers, features in newsletters and put me in touch with tons of regional organizations which took an interest in the project.  Maybe most importantly, that networked me into a bunch of contacts that I can still draw from today.“

Within a few months, he was having regular conversations with organizations interested in partnering with him, and individuals who heard about it from friends or coworkers. That word of mouth kept sales steady for the shirts throughout the year, allowing him to keep momentum going – and keep people engaged in the stories he was telling. The travel involved in the project lended itself well to long form written content describing his journey across the watershed. He crossposted interesting stories and photo journals on his blog and as regular content for his bimonthly newsletter. He noticed his open rate and click rate skyrocketing.  

“I did a follow up press release when the project completed this January, and again led to a number of news features. I can probably attribute at least 1000 email signups which all came from the project and the press releases around it, and doing the press releases were absolutely a direct influence from TAA.”

Eric’s ongoing success with One Hundred Shores is due to executing the core principles of public relations work. 

• Knowing What to Promote – Eric knew he had something he was excited about and that might catch some interest from other people passionate about the topic of his art. 
• Creating Solid PR materials – Eric learned how to write a concise and clear press release and assemble an effective media kit. 
• Partnering with Influencers – once attention began rolling in, Eric was able to turn that into speaking and co-marketing opportunities. 

With his permission, we’ve added Eric’s initial press release to this public Google Drive folder so you can check it out. For those with experience in PR, you’ll notice it’s a pretty standard press release. 

Eric isn’t rich (yet), but between original works, prints, tshirts, teaching and speaking gigs he’s on track for a very solid high five-figure year in 2023. Launching the 100 Shores Project has given his writing a focus and new things for his fans to be excited about as he rolls out new versions of the tshirts and continues to travel around the country showing his work at various art fairs. 

His original works continue growing in price and recognition on the national stage.  He’s shown his work at many prestigious national art festivals including Coconut Grove Art Festival, the Naples National Art Show and the American Craft Show.  opening a public-facing studio in his hometown.

Eric Clark Jackson is a professional artist whose work explores a connection to the water and wildlife of the Chesapeake Bay.  A contemporary fiber artist, his work is an intersection of fine art, contemporary craft, and the ecology of the watershed.

His work has received support from the Maryland State Arts Council, Baltimore Office of Promotion and the Arts, and numerous local arts councils. He’s presented his work at the National Folk Festival, the American Craft Show and the Coconut Grove Art Fest in Miami. He is heavily involved in local watershed initiatives on the Chesapeake Bay, and he has worked with numerous non-profits on the forefront of Chesapeake Bay culture and preservation.

An avid outdoorsperson, Eric continues to explore the Chesapeake from Leonardtown, where he lives with his wife and two girls.