Instant Artist Statement Generator

I wrote about my disgust with artist statements a long time ago in this blog entry. Today, my friend Eric Wieringa alerted me to the Instant Artist Statement: Arty Bollocks Generator, a satirical web app entered into the 10K Apart contest put on by An Event Apart. I’m well pleased. If you are an artist, please click the image above to find out what to avoid when writing your artist statement. If you need help writing an artist statement, try this:

A Better Artist Statement

Hi,

My name is ______________ and I’m from _______________. I like to make stuff. Sometimes I make things that mean something, other times I just try to make something pretty. Displayed here are several of the pieces that I haven’t sold yet. If you like a particular item, please ask me about purchasing it. I will try to answer your questions as directly as I can. Thank you for viewing my art work. I hope you enjoy looking at it. A kind word from you will probably make my day.

Sincerely,
________________

Utter Bologna!

Note to my regular readers:
I apologize in advance for this rant. The following post helps to explain why I ignore nearly all art and find it quite worthless, though an art school graduate and proficient artist myself. Sorry for the sassy tone, this one really got me though.

Found in a recent “art events” program:

“The exhibition comprises a body of new work made from materials as diverse as wood, board, posters, photographic paper, metal and perspex. The work is primarily sculptural, yet aims at blurring the boundaries between the conventional modes of object-making. It provides an informed insight into the sensibilities of working with unconventional materials.

[Artist's name respectfully omitted] uses artistic practice as a tool for examining our perception of reality as well as our relationship to culture and its productions. He creates processes in manipulating selected materials and transforms them to take on some form of ‘otherness.’

His work demonstrates an ambition to recreate a new way of looking at the meaning of things.”

Sorry. Was something actually said? I read a lot of words, but failed to extract anything even roughly resembling content.

This artist’s statement quite exactly demonstrates the grossly inflated nothingness, which I abhor and yet seems to be the art industry norm. Sadly, most artists’ statements read quite similarly. And I just shake my head.

I understand the pressure to have meaning in your work (it happens to all of us), but when your work is meaningless, why not just say so? If you want to make pretty pictures, then do so. People will still buy your pieces. Look at the local retail shops: lots of work, no meaning, just prettiness. There’s no shame in that. It’s refreshing even.

But when artists create something and try to virtualize artificial depth with philosophical BS, I get nauseous. I suspect I’m not the only one either. Does anyone else out there feel this way when walking into a modern museum?

Not every artist is a great thinker with amazing things to say. Few are. When we’re out of our league, it shows. Bigger words don’t make us sound better. Anyone worth their salt can see right through that stuff. Our attempts to validate our work with superfluous words only makes us look ridiculous, especially if our work is sub par. At any rate, validation is the job of the public, the critics, and history itself. Only time will tell if we have added something worth saying, in the medium in which we are gifted.

There are enough things in this world with real meaning that are quite misunderstood. Why distract people with visual vomit, much less our intellectual noisemaking?

Getting A New Phone

Last night I opened for my friends Nathan Metz and Nick Bosworth. They have some really great songs, so it’s always good to hear them play.

I like to brag on my friends that have done something incredible or are just amazing people. At the show, one of those great friends showed up. Dan Swartz and I were in the Art Department around the same time and we worked on a project together. Since then, he has developed his illustrating skills to new and dizzying heights. You can check out his work at daniel-swartz.com.

Also, I ordered the 8GB iPhone®. Waited for the price to drop and then made my move. I needed to switch carriers anyway, so I figured I’d get a phone with some functionality. I’m ready for some sweet syncing action.