April Gornik is a landscape painter who creates large, vast uninhabited vistas of calm sumptuousness poised precariously on a fleeting moment.

April Gornik offers a visual respite through painterly integrity to the daily barrage we encounter of jangling images competing for attention from signs, billboards, web sites on computer monitors and hand held devices, TV, and print media, I had been looking forward to wring about April Gornik’s work for a while, and the new solo show at Danese gives me an opportunity as it features the new and larger works. I was looking forward to writing about April Gornik’s work and her recent solo show at the Danese gallery gives me that opportunity as it features many of the new and larger works. Those of you who are acquainted with my articles are aware that I believe larger paintings are not necessarily better; sometimes it’s just like a person who has little that is meaningful to say and so shouts trying to impress. However, April Gornik’s vision is large and deeply meaningful so it is well suited to larger works,

The paintings in the show are lush as if one could paint a landscape as velvet. For me these are spiritual works, as the land or seascapes are filled with the absence of humans and their industry or objects. This develops another dichotomy, as the human element may be missing from the narrative, but the painter’s hand is always present.

Field and Storm, 2004, Oil on linen, 74″ x 95″

The landscapes are of desert, woods, meadows and sea. Presented together in the show, they remind us of ecological problems as well as those of the invading sprawl of civilization that our remaining wild or vast areas face. Perhaps, the often depicted encroaching storms and brooding skies in many of the works point to these concerns.

One of my favorite paintings by April Gornik is Storm Sea, which is pictured here. Since April Gornik maintains a home on the East End of Long Island, I suspect it is of the Atlantic Ocean at a nearby beach, which makes it seem familiar to me. The sea here is brooding, powerful, and the atmosphere is misty gray. The perspective angleof the painting is somewhat low, more the perspective of a child, or someone sitting on a chair in the sand as the waves crash and spill onto the unseen sand.

Storm Sea, 2008, Oil on linen, 75” x 101” inches

In elementary physics a string presents as either energy or pre-matter, but is neither simultaneously. April Gornik paints the waves as they spend their remaining energy churning forward in random directions, pushing into one another to form peaks. The peaks look much like the small grottos in a piece of crumpled paper or wrinkled piece of crisp cloth. It is a moment of physical transformation in nature revealed in paint.

This past summer I was privileged to attend panel discussions where April Gornik was a member. April is thoughtful and passionate about art and how art can impact our lives. Her new and excellent web site is filled with many of her recent works, plus an excellent article that I also urge you to read.

April told a story that I find useful since I am an emerging artist. It seems that at openings and shows, a fan will approach her speaking enthusiastically of a specific painting and how it moves him to feel joy. A few minutes later, another equally moved fan will approach and speaking of the same painting mention how he is moved to feel a far different emotion. For April, painting is the experience of visual communication, so she has learned not to explain herself or disagree but to simply say, “Thank you!”

So April Gornik, coming back at you: thanks for the beautiful work and your passion.

Images used courtesy of April Gornik

Will the different plans of President Elect Obama and Mayor Bloomberg’s to raise taxes for people above the middle class result some galleries, artists and collectors moving to other countries? Will there be repercussions of Obama’s election on the art market, especially in America? Can the USA and NYC retain its place at the center of the art world?

While many artists were outspokenly for Barack Obama, his plan to tax the rich will certainly affect the incomes and spending of the rich, and this certainly includes many if not most prominent art collectors. Since it is unlikely that the poor who will be lifted into better economic conditions will rush out to buy original art, even in local tent fairs during the warmer months, all artists will feel the consequences.

Higher taxes for the rich at a time when the country is falling into a recession could result in many changes in the art world.

Some changes are already being felt thanks to the lay-offs on Wall Street, where collecting art is popular. Recent auctions and fairs in the USA and abroad have revealed a decline in collector’s dollars and buying power.

Everyone who lives or does business in NYC is sure to feel the squeeze of the recent announcement by Mayor Bloomberg of higher taxes and the cuts in services. A good part of the problem for the city stems from the tax base being lower due to the recession and changes on Wall Street and in the financial markets. When Obama’s plan to tax the rich goes into effect, what will be the result for this city?

The art community has become an international one. Artists have always moved about fairly freely, while dealers and gallerists tend to congregate in hubs that are city and then community based. For instance, NYC is considered to be the center of the art world while the neighborhood hubs have shifted from Soho to Chelsea and now apparently there is a move towards the Bowery.

Successful artists, those making incomes beyond Obama’s do-not-get-taxed-more ceiling can live anywhere and produce art. If taxes are increased, cost of living increases while services go down, will artists remain in New York City or move elsewhere, even out of the country?

Many of the most successful galleries have branches in other international cities. If a gallery’s London branch can sell the work of a represented artist for the same price but be taxed less, wouldn’t it make business sense to handle the sale that way? Of course, this kind of dealing would take tax revenues away from NYC and the USA. Yet it is legal.

Will galleries remain? With art fairs and new galleries opening in cities throughout the world, why remain in NYC or the USA if it costs more to do business there? Why place artworks at auction in NYC when the same International collector who will buy the work will do so wherever it is auctioned, since he is bidding over the phone?

The news from Miami is that there are fewer parties and events scheduled for the periods surrounding Art Basel Miami and the satellite fairs. Plus, the patties and events scheduled are less costly than in previous years. Clearly when restaurants, hotels, part planners, caterers, florists, local luxury transportation, etc. make less money it affects the local economy. It will also affect the collectors who come to the fairs to see and buy art but also to meet and greet and party. Is the cut back in Miami something that will be experienced during the NYC fairs? If so, will less lavish partying result in fewer collectors attending from out of town?

Art remains one of the best investments around if—and it is a big IF – the collector invests in an artist whose work will rise in value. Even during difficult times artists will be discovered and their works will become more valuable. After the last recession collectors who owned works by the new art stars became far richer, as did the galleries that represented these artists.

However, what is to prevent a collector from moving their art out of the country to where the taxes will be lighter when a piece is sold or auctioned?

Perhaps President elect Obama and Mayor Bloomberg will devise ways to encourage and support fine art, galleries and collecting that will help the USA retain its current status as the center of the art world and market. Aside from the obvious wisdom of encouraging our culture, the art market in the USA helps create jobs, tourism and promotes the cultural leadership of the USA.

On a non-partisan basis, I urge you to contact (write) the office of President Elect Barack Obama, Mayor Bloomberg, your representatives in local, state and national government and suggest that a plan be devised in relation to taxing fine art sold on the USA that will help preserve the position of the USA as the international center of art and its market.  Email or send your friends this article, post it at social sites, write articles like this too your own blogs — in short take action now!

Michael Zansky is the artistic purveyor of the decay, debris and demise in an alternate universe of our civilization. His kinetic, symbolic and darkly playful work has some roots in more cheerful work of Alexander Calder.

Yet Calder also has a darker side, for while his elegant colorful mobiles may sway elegantly, his wire portrait sculptures, circus and other works indicate an ongoing struggle with balance through form and their more subdued colors and simplicity.

Clearly Calder was fascinated with movement, as is Zansky. Calder delved into movement and spatial relationships while Zansky’s movement seems usually related to time. Zansky’s works generally either involve movement or challenge the viewer to move along a gigantically scaled presentation, such as History as Ruin.

I was a fan of Michael Zansky’s work before even before he went to college. Michael is a schoolmate of mine from the High School of Music and Art. We were in various classes together, most notably for me, graphic arts with Mr. de Santos.

Back at M & A, I volunteered to work most of my lunchtimes in the guidance office as this allowed me to create my schedule each semester around my favorite art teacher, Mr. Bertram Katz.

Working in the guidance office also meant that I heard the teachers’ “gossip” about the students they thought would do well in various fields, or more likely my friend Karen did and she told me. By our senior year the word from the grapevine was that if any kids were going to make it and become professional artists it would be Michael Zansky and me.

Several years ago, after I had the notion to paint using symbols as strokes, that became the new Post Conceptual theory of art that I am founding, turned my life upside down changing careers to become a professional artist, one of the things I was suddenly curious about was, what happened to Michael Zansky?

I discovered that Michael is represented by the Nicholas Robinson Gallery. Recently he had a darkly delightful exhibition there entitled, The Western Lands. The title refers to both to the Western banks of the Nile, or the netherworld in ancient Egyptian belief, and the William S. Burroughs novel.

In this exhibit Michael Zansky continues his witty and disturbing exploration of a society in ruin and decay – a society that is very much like our own. Included in the works are classic books, dolls, busts of Plato, and other representative icons of our mass produced and a fantasized pop culture. Zansky’s work is always accessible and fascinating in its minutia as he depicts his decay in kinetic and luminous tableaux presentations.

In an article in NY Arts by D. Dominick Lombaridi, Michael Zansky speaks of his work, “Perception is fleeting. My work reflects the battle of the concrete and the ephemeral. It’s a comical situation without end.” Couldn’t that quote be applicable to Alexander Calder’s work, too?

Coincidentally, across Manhattan, The Whitney has a retrospective, Alexander Calder: The Paris Yeas 1926-1933.

One of the hallmarks of a great artist is the influence that artist has on other artists, even generations later. Calder is one of those artists whose influence can be seen in the work of many subsequent artists’ works. Among his pioneering influences are kinetic sculptures (including mobiles) and the use of line in sculpture.

Calder’s work is so accepted and well liked by people, including children as it can be fun and playful. The irony is that some of these children have grown up to become artists and Calder’s influence is sometimes overlooked as it occurred before art school.

Calder’s wire portraits, simplified and capturing the essential features and character of the pop figures of his time can be seen as the predecessors of Andy Warhol’s simplified silk screen Pop portraits capturing the people and pop icons of his time.

While Calder stresses the handmade quality (at that time) Warhol seeks to be mechanical. Yet, Calder’s later works, especially those large mobiles, are mechanically constructed in appearance.

Warhol’s focus on movement and time can be seen in his films. When he pointed his camera at a building or sleeping man and just let it film on, seemingly endlessly, the movement was not in what was depicted as much as in the machine that was depicting it, frame by frame.

Michael Zansky also uses the machinery, plus mirrors much like a camera to project onto large fresnel lenses images of a tableaux as it slowly turns in space. This is much the way that we are one step removed from the actual scene of a film or photograph (the camera being between us), except that it is possible to peek behind the lens to view the scene in reality.

Alexander Calder, Andy Warhol and Michael Zansky purposefully remind us that we are onlookers in their worlds of popular culture, audiences not participants. Each of these artists presents theatrical and unique views of our cultured skewered by their own views – and those views are not to be missed.

[Note: Michael Zansky’s kinetic works are rarely adequately captured by still photographs. To see more go to: www.michaelzansky.com and watch and listen to the video. Scroll down to the red “enter”, click on in and you’ll find another video and more about this artist.]

This week as work continued on setting up the new site and blog it became obvious that I could not come near the features offered by Word Press.

So the new Art of Seeing The Divine blog was moved to Word Press.  The new address is: http://www.artofseeingthedivine.com/blog/

Or, This link should work, depending on your browser and permissions: Art of Seeing The Divine blog.

The recent posts to that blog, including one a couple of days ago, were all moved to the new Word Press   blog site. A post will be placed on the site announcing its new location, which will be the last post there.

This week I met a medical doctor at a party. You know the usual banter of what do you do , what do I do ? I said I am an artist, with a new theory of art that is Post Conceptual as it uses symbols for every stroke, and that I had just finished an e book that is kind of a Visual self help seminar that can help people see more and actually change the way they see the world.

The doctor knew a little about art, so the new Post Conceptual theory gained his attention, but he gave me one of those kinds of smile more knowing adults bestow on children or those who seem sweet but daft.

As I explained that 90% of vision happened in the brain not the eyes, he nodded along as he knew all about it. So I explained how seeing the images of my artwork, with the tiny strokes that represent the essences of the universe, simultaneously the strings of elementary physics and for many people also the words of the Creator, created visual memories.  Now I really had his interest, and even cautious respect.

So I explained just a bit about the exercises and how looking at my art creates a visual impression on the brain, which then begins to decode the impressions of light that it actually sees but now, thanks to the images recognizes.  Then I stopped speaking as the doctor looked at me in amazement for a moment, smiled genuinely and said, “you’ve got it!” That would work! It really world!” He took my card.

If you have not yet checked out the new Art Of Seeing The Divine site and discovered the exciting e book that can actually help you change the way you see the world — do it now!

Judy Rey Wassernman has begun a new and second blog .

[Note: See the blog that follows this one: "New Art of Seeing The Divine Blog Update" as a few days after this posr the blog moved to WordPress at URL: http://www.artofseeingthedivine.com/blog/ ]

The new blog is more relevant for the just available e book, The Art of Seeing The Divine - Book 1 and the web site that has more information about the book, The Art of Seeing The Divine (artofseeingthedivine.com)

Back in the spring of ‘08, while researching web hosts and new blogging software for Post Conceptual UnGraven Image’s site, a blog was tested through what is now Google’s software.  Eventually the decision was made to create Post Conceptual UnGraven Image’s new blog through Word Press software that is self hosted through ungravenimage.com.

However, the other software and site hung around over at Google. So for now, as an experiment, another blog, The Art of Seeing The Divine (http://artofseeingthedivine.blogspot.com) is there. The new second blog deals with spirituality, how we see the world, inspiration, empowerment, religion and enlightenment, etc.

This blog, Art and Inspiration through the Post Conceptual UnGraven Image web site deals more with fine art, art shows and fairs, art news, collecting tips and of course, artistic inspiration.

Many people who are interested or find meaning at this Art and Inspiration blog will also appreciate the other one, too.

Over the weekend more work was done on The Art of Seeing The Divine web site. The home page tells the story of how and why my eyesight actually changed so that I can see more energy, which for  me and many others are the inspirational words of The Divine.  The site also tells how the and how the book came about, including the special Visual Exercise/Experiences that use art to help ap person chage the way the world is actually seen.

Plus now on both sites there is an email sign up for the free newsletter, which will include more art, inspiration and information of new print releases, shows, events, and discounts currently available.You are invited to come and see the blogs and sites for yourself. See more. Share the vision.

http://artofseeingthedivine.blogspot.com/

As of 10/30/08 now at URL: http://www.artofseeingthedivine.com/blog/

For the past few weeks I have done little but work at writing a book, which is the first is a series– and then building a web site for it, the prints and other items that will be available.

A tad over a year ago, I began to sort thorough the blog articles using some of them as first drafts of parts of chapters for a book. Last winter, when I stumbled into portraiture and what became the Essence series, I realized I had a series of books, each dealing with a different series.

The books were meant to be visual and inspirational, using images of my art, plus inspirational writing. When the web site host and blog software became impossible, about the time of the spring art fairs in NYC 2008, I began the tedious task of creating unique pages for each of the former blog articles, since the old software that was giving me so much trouble would not allow me to migrate the blogs into Word Press.

As I converted the blogs, I edited many (more need it!) and began earnestly working on a book. I also began to include visual experiences into the book, using my art and works by artists such as Monet and Picasso to illustrate ideas about how we see and how art can influence vision.

The task of rebuilding the programming and moving the web site and blog was completed, along with the revised manifesto just slightly before the weekend of ArtHamptons in July 2008..[I seem to tell time by art events.]

Also during the time of the spring fairs I was becoming increasingly more aware of a change in my eyesight, actually in how I saw the world. I am nearsighted, and discovered that whether I was looking at objects close of far away, with or without corrective lenses, I was definitely seeing more energy.

Tiny points of vibrant energy were everywhere, sort of like a Pointillist painting, but much smaller, vibrant and well, it is visually clear to me that the world is really energy! I see more, and am aware of more detail, plus for me seeing energy everywhere relates to the spiritual understanding and Abrahamic theology that the Words (letters) of the Creator are the essences, the building blocks of the universe. Apparently, what happened is as I painted with all the tiny, tiny Torah font letters which form into a narrative image my brain was forming visual memories. 90% of the perception of vision happens in the brain as it decodes the impressions of light sent by the eyes. My brain had learned to decode impressions of light that my eyes were receiving throughout my life, but my brain had no experiential way of decoding.

When I began painting I said I wanted to change the way we see the world, but I had no idea how truly I was going to do that! Of course, it had to begin with me.

Once I realized that I was actually seeing more energy, basic energy that is spiritually the Words of The Creator,  I set about to write an introductory book so that other people could learn to do this too.  The Art of Seeing the Divine — Book 1: Introduction is  a kind of inspirational visual seminar in the format of an illustrated book, which would help other people to also see what I am now seeing. The idea that energy, the Words of the Creator is everywhere is no longer theoretical for me, I see it – even now as I keyboard this message. It is everywhere I look and it is real. It has changed my life and my outlook.

Earlier this week I completed The Art Of Seeing The Divine – Book 1: Introduction. The rest of the week was spent finishing the artofseeingthedivine.com website, including setting up a shopping cart, coding and writing the information and creating buttons and images, etc. in Photoshop. As I write this I am still working on a good way to have people sign up for a newsletter. At the moment, my forms are simply coming up as email, which will work if a person sends it. However, I am going to have to get a better form of newsletter system before I really announce the book and site widely, early next week.

However, if you are one of the people who frequent this Art & Inspiration blog, you can have a sneak peek. The book is available (that all works). Send me an email to sign up for the newsletter – links are provided, just place write sign up in the subject and fire it off.

Any feedback is appreciated!

Can a woman be sexually attractive and be taken seriously as a leader or powerful person?

Is a painting defined as an image made with paint, or is there more to art?

Does calling something art make it art and news worthy? If the main focus of an artwork is to gain publicity for its maker, is it art?

Reportedly, two men have separately used paint to fashion images of Sarah Palin nude. Neither man has ever met Governor Palin or seen a photograph of her in the nude, so in actuality, although the images are entitled as Sarah Palin nude, these “portraits” are imaginary.

The titles however, mention her, because if they did not, the woman depicted could be another nude woman who has her current hairstyle and eyeglasses. It could even perhaps be Tina Fey, except I am not too sure what connection Tina Fey has to a moose. A moose and a rifle are props used in both images.

Why is a moose used? Does Sarah Palin have a pet moose? Aren’t they in Maine and other states? Even in Canada? What is with the moose?

The first artist reportedly used his daughter as the model for thfe naked body and then added what is assumed to be Governor Palin’s face portrait. The second artist used his own male body part to apply the paint. How far are these men willing to do to gain publicity?

The first “artist” apparently has his “masterpiece” up in a bar in Chicago. It is brining in customers who want to see Sarah Palin nude. Of course what they are seeing is a naive art representation of the artist’s daughter nude body wearing a Palin-like head.

The second image was sent to the blogger who is posting this stuff a few days later. He seems to have been influenced by the ideas of the first, but his rendition has Governor Palin shooting the rifle from her crotch, which is a disturbingly mixed metaphor.

Neither of these cartoonish paintings is meant to be a true artistic nude, rather each is sexist, salacious, and misogynistic.

These works are publicity stunts that play into the fear of people (perhaps men? then, what kind of men?) who are afraid (or to be politically correct: have concerns) about women who are both powerful and sexually attractive.

Since the blog that posted these images is usually a good one for news of the art world. I subscribe to their feed. Normally it is a blog I would plug here. If the idea is to report the news of the art world, are these images of Sarah Palin truly news, or just publicity stunts by basically obscure men who claim to be artists?

Neither image is even a good political cartoon. Certainly everyone of the four presidential candidates have provided much opportunity for political humor and cartoons, however these nudes are not humorous, just would-be sensationalism. If the titles did not mention Sarah Palin, but were of an anonymous woman, I wonder if the works would sell in a yard sale.

Although I strongly support the right to freedom of expression, includinng the right to paint whatever one wishes,  I have the right to question their motives, even their politics – although it seems this is not really about politics. If it were only about politics, then many, many Democrats and Republicans – all men – would have been previously pictured as naked male pin-ups.

Sarah Palin the only woman running on either ticket, only the second woman ever to be nominated for VP and she is also the only candidate that anyone is painting as a nude. I do not recall any candidate receiving that “honor” before this.

Clearly it is not about politics, but is just meant to demean Sarah Palin and dismiss her as attractive, plus gain publicity for the two male painters. If images had been painted that were racist of Barack Obama there would be a rightful amount of protest were they publicized. If age, race, religion and to some degree sex were mocked and dubbed art, there would be an outcry. I would outcry unless all parties were equally skewered (to bring up Tina Fey one more time – she and Saturday Night Live are equal satirists). However, female attractiveness seems to be the only fair game. Why is that?

A few words on a page is not automatically thought to be a poem or even if its author insists it is one, it is not newsworthy. A gesture is not a dance and newsworthy. A few musical notes are not counted as a song, nor considered newsworthy. In the fields of literature, performance and music a work needs more than a title to have it considered as art or newsworthy.

Yet paint applied to a canvas or board is readily considered as a painting and as art. Questioning whether it actually is art is usually taboo. That question is  thought to infringe on freedom of speech. It has nothing to do with freedom of speech!

So while I am grateful to live in a society where paint can be applied to canvas to create whatever, as an artist just because paint and canvas are used does not mean the result necessarily has anything to do with my profession or art. Real art not only gains public attention, it creates inspired controversy that provides insights and new understandings. Art is visual communication that is powerful and meaningful.

The art market bubble of the last few years has been threatened – or at least put on hold – due to the current crisis in the world’s financial markets.

Yet, art continues to sell. The art market has rippled in response to the ailing financial markets, not followed suit.

Some prices, especially at auction have fallen or basically stayed at minimum estimate, while others have slightly increased. At the recent Sotheby’s sale of 20th-century Chinese art in Hong Kong, two-thirds of the lots went unsold. Two weeks earlier at Sotheby’s New York ale of Impressionist and modern art early in October, 263 of 326 lots sold, which is good..

According to the economic news commentators, the stocks that are currently selling – at plunging prices – are “forced sales”. They are being sold by people or firms who need cash desperately, and by money market managers who need to cover withdrawals, even if they have to take a loss. The stock market is plunging, but it is not plunging based on high volume trading. Most people are holding on to wait and see what happens.

It can be expected that some stock market investors who are also art collectors could determine that holding stocks and riding out the storm can be accomplished by selling art, which so far has basically not lost its value.

Months ago due to signs of a recession, a possible art market dip was discussed by dealer Mary Boone. She has weathered the vicissitudes of the art market, which is often tied to the financial markets previously. When the market slows and dips in a recession galleries and artists are often forced to lower the prices for an artist’s work, especially if previous work declines in price at auction.

Even when an artist’s prices at auction are obviously lower due general economic conditions, the artist is perceived as being worth less. Art is all about perception. After the financial sector and the art market began to see gains, some of the artists whose works suffered in price during the last recession were overlooked for years, while newer artists quickly filled in their space and superceded them in price.

Ironically, over time the better bet for investors has proven to be holding onto their art. Unlike stocks, great and even much good art survives to eventually regain and supercede its highest price. Many companies and their stocks falter. Remember the dot.com bust? How many of those companies are around today? Although that bear market led to many living artists enduring lower prices for their work, today most have regained and then surpassed their former prices for their new work, with their previous work selling at even higher price points. [I will not name names to protect some artists, but this data is easily found by doing some research on artnet.com]

Princes for oil, gas, food and other goods have been climbing slowly but steadily since the winter of ’08. The dollar is falling in relation to other currencies during the current financial crisis. That means it has less buying power in relation to other currencies. If the government of the USA decides to print more money to handle billions of dollars it is pouring into the bailout(s), the dollar will be worth even less.

In my high school history text book there was a political cartoon that had been printed in a German newspaper before Hitler’s rise to power. The image illustrated the rampaging inflation of that era, by depicting people pushing wheelbarrows filled with paper money to buy something like a loaf of bread or gallon of milk.

Psalm 22 (Rembrandt)

The ravages of war, political upheaval and catastrophic weather and natural forces have proven that art, gold and precious metals and gems hold recognized value over time. Ten pounds of gold, a small bag of good quality high carat diamonds, a Rembrandt, van Gogh or Klimt will generally hold and then surpass its current value over time. Van Gogh and Klimt were used as their work was not as valued at the time of the German inflationary period as they are today. While some lower and mid range galleries will fold as discretionary income reduces. Those galleries that represent blue chip artists, plus those galleries that can find and represent emerging artists with unique voices and theories (especially painters as paintings sell the best at auction) will easily pull through the financial crisis and possibly even thrive. So will their collectors. Collecting art is a passion, but it is also an investment and thus, involves risk. As a result of a recession, some lower and mid range galleries may fold as discretionary income reduces for collectors.

Those galleries that represent blue chip artists, plus those galleries that can find and represent emerging artists with unique voices and theories (especially painters as paintings sell the best at auction) will easily pull through the financial crisis and possibly even thrive. So will their collectors.

In November Sotheby’s will hold an important sale of Impressionist, Modern and Contemporary art. The global nature of the art market has previously bolstered sales even though the USA was experiencing the financial stress of the housing markets and oil prices. Now that the financial crisis has gone global, the next auctions and art fairs anxiously awaited.

People have always differed vastly in their opinions about art and artists, but now thanks to the web they can easily access images and express their views to an international audience through web sites and blogs.

Google is my personal “Post Conceptual Art” post concierge. It sends me an almost daily update – for free –on any and all articles and blogs that use the words Post, Conceptual, and Art. So far, almost no one but me is stringing those words together, all in a neat little triad of new meaning. Some use the term wondering what Post Conceptual Art can be. Mainly Google sends me links to sites that use all three words in a paragraph, but not in a row.

Last night I should have ambled off to bed, Google emailed me a report that linked to a blog article entitled “Art and Meaning” and used all three words in a paragraph. It was a new blog to me, not one of the regular art blogs I enjoy. How could I resist? With a click of the mouse I was at Albert Sonntag’s Legal Blog. Legal blog? Huh? Well, “Art and Meaning” is a unique and interesting post by an attorney who clearly appreciates art.

Albert Sonntag discussed his take on Cy Twombly, Abstract Expressionism and great artists. Sonntag and I seem to share a fascination with the “scribblings”, or strokes of artists. However, I had an instant strong response to his comment: “…I think that he [Cy Twombly] will soon be considered to be one of the two or three greatest artists of the second half of the twentieth century, rivaling Mark Rothko and Robert Rauschenberg.”

Although Cy Twombly, Robert Rauschenberg and an influence on my art, Mark Rothko, are certainly three of the best, any discussion of the greatest artists of the second half of the twentieth century that fails to mention Andy Warhol, Salvador Dali or Jasper Johns immediately seemed off target to me.

What makes artists revered as great beyond their own time? What do all the greatest artists have in common?

While artists today who have learned how to be provocative and grab headlines gain recognition and financial fortunes through aptly playing fame game, will their work remain be heralded in the future? Why? Or, Why not?

What do undisputed masters, artists who would be counted as certainly some of the greatest ever, such as Giotto, Da Vinci, Michelangelo, Rembrandt, Velazquez, Turner, Monet, Cezanne and van Gogh have in common?

Well, for one thing, these artists’ works bring in the crowds to museum shows. Clearly, they meaningfully communicate to people today. Wandering around in great museums that encompass the history of art, such as the Metropolitan, one realizes that the artists who best communicate in a non-linear way, call that spiritual, emotional or psychological, have the power to withstand time. However, many lesser known artists of the past and present also have this ability.

Great artists, certainly every one in our sample group of greats, had a distinctive style. Their works are easily distinguished from others of their own time. Although some of their actual signatures are famous, their works are also their signatures, portraying visions that are uniquely their own.

However, many great artists convey emotional or spiritual visual content and have a unique style but do not quite make it onto the topmost peak reserved for the greatest. What else distinguishes the greatest artists?

The work of every great artist mentioned in our distinguished group found new ways of painting, portraying light, perspective, color and/or space. They used strokes in new ways; they chose subjects that were different and sometimes controversial. They pioneered new ways of making art. This made their work influential.

The work of the greatest artists has inspired and influenced the work of other good to great artists. Their work continues to inspire and even provoke artists today. This seems to be the one attribute that only the greatest artists share. New schools of artistic thought and/or art movements can be traced back to their work. This places them in an ongoing historical context.

Copycat artists always abound and even flock together as they can earn a living seeming to plough a popular pre-ploughed field, so there are many artists today who are Warhol, Dali, Twombly, Rothko, etc., knock-offs. We even have Rembrandt, van Gogh, Monet and Picasso knock-offs. Apparently more people have artistic talent than artistic vision.

We are too close to the last half of the twentieth century to have any true perspective on how and if the next generations will relate to the works of the artists of that time. We are just beginning to learn of their influence on innovative Contemporary artists.

To discover the greatest artists of yesterday we need to find the great artists they influenced today – and tomorrow. Artists who truly innovate based on the innovations and work of previous great artists, while communicating emotional or spiritual content in a unique style that inspires other artists are and will continue to be the greatest artists whose works remain relevant and meaningful for generations.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art houses some of the best paintings by the world’s most revered artists ever and one dead shark suspended in a large container of liquid. Possibly to help keep the tiger shark company and so it feel less out of place in its temporary new home, up on the Met’s roof there is a huge metal statue of a balloon puppy.

The tiger shark artwork is Damien Hirst’s The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living, which is graciously on loan to the museum thanks to The Steven and Alexandra Cohen Collection. The statue on the roof, Balloon Dog (Yellow) is part of a show of Jeff Koon’s works. Neither work is handmade by its artist. Both works are the result of cutting edge technologies, which took far more time and money to develop than was originally estimated.

In an earlier time, before contemporary art and maybe even not long after Modern Art, both Hirst and Koons would probably have been painters. Both have produced drawings and paintings that show their talent and skill. However, the ongoing technological breakthroughs that allow many contemporary artists the freedom to explore new visual presentations and materials have and are assaulting painting, drawing and printmaking.

The Impressionists began what became Modern Art based on new scientific understandings about light. Those same understandings also helped inspire and develop still photography and soon after film. For the first time in humankind’s history artists were displaced from recording current events, scientific discoveries, news and painting portraits of people who wished to be remembered. While this encouraged Modern and now Contemporary artists to explore new forms of art, materials and ways of communicating visual understandings, many painters struggled to compete with photography by offering non-realistic image work, following the ideas of the Cubists, Abstract Expressionism or Word Art or, like Andy Warhol incorporated photography it into their painted art and prints.

The art that continues to do best at auction continues to be paintings, and this is also true for Contemporary art. There are splendid contemporary painters, such as Cecily Brown, Chuck Close, George Condo, Odd Nerdrum, Dana Schutz, Kehinde Wiley, just to name a few alphabetically off the top of my head. These artists take us into their own unique visual worlds through the strokes of their brushes. However photographers like Vik Muniz and William Wegeman are moving into this arena, by setting up their own compositions to photograph, which may include tableaux scenes of costumed models.

Andy Warhol proclaimed that each person would have 15 minutes of fame. He also strove to remove the handmade quality of art, trying to make it mechanical, in part reflecting the popular media images of his society. I doubt he ever conceived that everyone could have an opportunity to be an artist for 15 minutes, but due to today’s advances in technology it is.

Several new companies are thriving by using software much like Photoshop to turn digital or film snapshots into paper or canvas works that look like paintings. This goes beyond the Pop Art portrait take-offs on Warhol. At least two companies have received a good deal of media coverage as they give consumers easy online ways to change photographed images into works that seem to have brush strokes, are abstracted, look Impressionistic, water colored, or of course, appear as Pop Art. Beyond the images of their loved ones people are encouraged to create works on paper or canvas that are still lifes, landscapes, cityscapes, etc. The online process takes about 15 minutes.

Another company, DNA11 takes a sample of a persons DNA and through bio technical imaging creates a unique image of it. The client-artist is involved in selecting the colors, the size and sometimes the support, for instance paper or glass for the custom work. Is it art? Well, MoMA carries the kits required to begin the process of collecting the DNA plus samples of the art in its museum shops. Swabbing, mailing back the DNA sample and selecting colors and size online can be completed in 15 minutes.

Technology allows artists and “15 minute artists” new ways to create images. Seeing the photograph of ones’ child transformed into a Pop Art poster, one’s house as a watercolor, one’s parents as an abstracted oil painting or hanging a colorful image of one’s own DNA over the sofa can have can have personal visual meaning. Giving everyone the potential to create art that has visual meaning for others, such as one’s friends and family is innovative.

From the history of art we know that the painters who we revere as artistic masters now were innovative in their own times. The Met houses works by many of the painters who pioneered new techniques, ideas about subject and/or use of materials such as Bosch, Da Vinci, El Greco, Klimt, Monet, Picasso, Seurat, Turner, van Gogh, and Velasquez.

Innovation is a hallmark of a great artist.

However innovation, even through technology is not enough. An artist must be able to convey meaningful visual content to many people. A great portrait painter like Rembrandt more than captures a likeness; he shows a revealing look into the soul and personality of his subject. Seurat used points of color to depict how our visional perception translates a impressions of color and the gives them form and even meaning. Van Gogh did not just paint cypresses; he turned them into writhing yearning life that struggles toward the heavens. Over time, the more people an artist can move and inspire with meaningful content, his or her unique and innovative way of seeing, the more the artist is recognized as a master.

The innovative technology that allows anyone to transform a photograph so that it sort of resembles a Rembrandt, a Seurat, a van Gogh or a Picasso, always leaves out the emotional content that great painters are able to convey.

Damien Hirst brings death into our museums, places of work and living rooms. Although the media brings war and fictional violence and death to us daily, on a personal level our society hushes it away into sterile funeral parlors, which embalm and decorate bodies so they appear more lifelike. Hirst brings us dead butterflies, sheep, sharks, etc. as art. Possibly the only way many only in our society will actually confront a dead body without dismissing its relevance is as art. Yet the technology that allows him to do this also deprives him of adding his own emotional content. Any emotional content is a reaction of the viewer.

Jeff Koons takes the unnecessary kitschy stuff we love to acquire – pure commercialism— and blows it up on a sumptuous and grand scale. As viewers stand before Balloon Puppy (Yellow) the glossy finish on the work skews and mirrors back an image of the viewer and his immediate surroundings. We are in our stuff; it is us and it incorporates us into itself. This is brilliant Pop art, but again any emotion belongs to the viewer and is not conveyed by the art.

Of course, neither of these works is a painting or handmade.

We look to paintings and artwork that is handmade to be innovative, give us new understandings about ourselves and convey emotional or inspirational content. Yet how can painters, even using the newest media such as watercolor pencils, the newly developed acrylics, canvases, etc., compete with the opportunities for innovation that technology offers other artists – or now anyone who want to make art in 15 minutes?

Strokes are not the focus of technologically produced art, including photographs. Strokes basically imply handmade, or if reproduced or created via a computer as originally human made through direct focused effort of someone’s hands. The technology that gives a photograph the look of an Impressionist painting cannot actually show or make strokes; it simply simulates them in pixels.

Post Conceptual Art, which uses symbols for each and every stroke to create imagery, offers innovation through its strokes. The symbols are painted or drawn allowing the artist to add intrinsic meaning to a work, convey narrative imagery and imbue a work with emotional content. It takes the skill of trained artist to create Post Conceptual Art as technology cannot take a photograph and turn the image into layers and layers of symbol-strokes. Can this new theory be one of the answers for painters today struggling to make their art relevant in a world – and art world – filled with technology?

While painters struggle to innovate or uniquely adapt to new ideas for and of painting that can ward off the continuing onslaught of technology, one truth from history is clear. The history of Western Art shows that although people may continue collect the art touted in their own time by “experts”, in the long run the work of innovative artists who communicate meaningful visual ideas is more apt to last and have meaning for future generations. Communicating innovative and meaningful visual ideas with emotional or revelatory content is the job of an artist, including artists who are painters.