Saturday night thoughts. Impressions from viewing a mass of artworks, more than 15,000 in a couple of days. I was looking in a popular online gallery, in the painting category.
And do you know what tired me out? What predominates in the mass of works?
From fashionable abstract portraits. Very colorful. I especially note the expressions on the faces, they are either frightened or angry mostly. And this combination of depression in emotion and vividness in presentation gives a dual feeling, unpleasant for me personally.
From smudges with dirty shades, a messy mishmash passed off as flights of fancy in abstraction. Well, of course, it's all abstraction. It's just widespread and mass trash. Where do artists get so much dirt in color, it's a mystery. Why they choose to make the size of the work bigger, that's also a mystery to me.
And the masterpieces. Human bodies with distorted proportions. No, it's not a technique working on the idea in a series of paintings. It's one leg longer than the other in mid-air. It's rubbery stretched arms that, if straightened alongside the body, reach the knees. And naked bodies fragmented, with a focus on the genitalia. You know, they depict something very strained, and with wild shades too.
What did the eyes find restful? On proper proportions. On skillful color solutions. On techniques that work for the idea and are fully justified. And on realism. Yes-yes. Among the fashionable abstractions, realistic works attract. This is what I wanted to look at, and I wanted to get to know the authors.
And it turns out that these authors not only have decent paintings. But also decent graphics and drawing. Even if they have different themes and genres and subjects and fantasies. I am all for good taste. In both abstraction and realism. And for respectful treatment of the human body. And you, as you browse through the works of other artists in large numbers, what do they exhibit? What are your overall impressions? Please share.