metastasized painting

spermaduct

artist unknown, via spermaduct.tumblr

Update: per CA, this is Markus Linnenbrink's work. I like this image but a little of this style goes a long way. Google Images pulls up dozens of Linnenbrinks ringing every possible change on this quasi-proprietary technique. That glomming onto a signature style based on some barely unique studio trick is what drives me away from painting (physical studio variety).

Dennis Hollingsworth 2

dennis hollingsworth

detail of trio

Haven't written about artist Dennis Hollingsworth in a while. He has a good statement up about what his blog is about. The idea of a virtual studio visit compels--this should be a legitimate subject for art writing. The critic could talk about the blog-studio and relate it to what s/he knows about the work. In Hollingsworth's case, photos convey a sense of the complexity of the paintings but his detailed explanations of studio practices, tools, and preparations for exhibitions make a subject unto themselves. One could talk about images of the paintings, as images, without presuming to say they are the same as the work.* (Have done some of the above in previous posts.)

Hollingsworth speaks confidently about his art and his response to some critics after a discussion on my old blog is a marvel of studio Jiu-Jitsu. I recommend this to certain new media people who are touchy about criticism and only respond passively--criticism provides an opportunity to talk about your program, if you have a program.

*See also Martin Kippenberger and the Virtual Surface

Wow, Now I Can Zoom an Entire Page!

Don't really expect anyone to share my sense of tragedy about being forced to live in a smooth, anti-aliased Steve Jobs kind of world while surfing the web. But you can't stop the complaints from this page.

Sorry, there is a difference between Zen-like acceptance of conditions as they are ("a million computers interpreting things a million ways, man") and letting some Adobe-addled web designer shove his or her bad ideas up your crack. And having that be the *only* choice.

Case in point, let's consider what said web designer did to Charles Westerman's enlarged GIF [update, 2016: reposted here].

Viewed in Firefox 2, it's as seductive as an Ellsworth Kelly painting. [screen shot of moving image - a fleet, fast-loading 23 KB .png!]

Viewed in Firefox 3 (or on a Mac) it looks like a student just discovered the blur effect in Photoshop (and did nothing else to the image). [screen shot of moving image - a bloated 388 KB .png because it now has those "tasteful" interpolated gradients!]

If that's just random chance, fine. But it's a decision made by humans (to give your browser "zoom" capability for entire pages including images and not just text) and it's the taste of humans and that is not a force of nature. It can be ridiculed!

This isn't just a plea for designers to respect web artists' pet "lo fi" projects. There is a difference between rendering photos and rendering graphics. Making photography the default norm for the web is wasteful and unecological and part of our corporate masters' project to turn the web into TV so they can sell us more shit (and still fail in business).