Creativity in 'methodology', I'm confident, is as important as the creativity expressed in the final product.

Dear Robert,
I find it BLOODY RUDE that anyone would interrupt your train of thought. There is nothing worse than someone who interrupts in a regular conversation let alone in a lecture where people are spending their hard earned time and money to hear you. I would have been there to hear you and hear your vision about being an artist. There is nothing quite so lost in this world than being a good conversationalist. Being a good conversationalist is being a good listener and is far more important that mouthing an opinion. I know that I have more to learn that teach. Who did this horrid man think he is by interrupting you? He is a very lucky man that I wasn't in the room. I would have asked him first of all shut up, then I would have told him to leave and finally I would have personally escorted him out and given him a stern etiquette lesson.
Maybe that was is just me,
John Ferrie

I agree rudeness is never in fashion.
I had a jr. high art teacher do the same thing after she joined in a adult watercolor class I was teaching. She went from student to student bossing them around.
I let her stay for the session she paid for, then I refused to the adminstrator to let her back in my class, she worked for the same school board.

Funny how we artists are constantly seeking the "correct" way to achieve uniqueness! I can simply regard my personal correctness to be that I am never truly correct. We are incapable of making such judgement, just as we are incapable of knowing which came first, the chicken or the egg. Unfortunately this is the stuff wars are based on.....my religion versus your religion, my ideals versus yours!

Isn't this what the Impressionists (and others before and after) tried to say through their work...eh, well, that is until the Modernists came along.....and on and on as we "go and grow."

In art making, and otherwise, we need to make choices, but we don't need to dictate the "proper" process, techniques or the end-results. We are fortunate to have a sea of choices in this age of highly sophisticated technology. We can refer to our computer, photos, intellect, intuition, two eyes and two hands to do the "best" work we can do, but we can also say correctly that many of us without such choices will still do the job well. Some of us may have use of one arthritic hand or no hands, poor or no education, poor or no eyesight, own no camera or computer, and STILL can create amazing pieces of art! What's "wrong" with this picture? No...it's what's RIGHT with this picture. Perhaps it's okay to say that anything is possible as long as we are open to receive and learn from it....without regard to who we are and where we come from.

There is nothing more boring than someone proclaiming the “right way” and then ridiculing “the other way” and finishing off with a huge pat on self’s back and a variety of sorrow or disgust for the “other side’s” perils. That kind of stuff bores me to death, edging with major annoyance. There is a big difference in sharing experiences and using the “right of way” to set oneself up higher on the imaginary ladder of authority. I think that this is what you are addressing in your letter and it really strikes a cord with me. I very much enjoy hearing about different experiences and approaches, but I have no time to read those “odes to myself” which sometimes crop up in discussions. Anyways, what we say and write is a choice as well, and so is what we read.

As usual, you are right on target for my present dilemma. I was asked to take part in a group show of artists in my local area. The gallery director chose the theme of still life. This is not my thing so I thought it would be fun to try something different. Days were spent hunting out various objects that had meaning to me, with interesting shapes and colors. Hours and countless hours spent in arranging and re-arranging objects. A visit to the local outdoor market expanded the possibilities, flowers bloomed and wilted, fruits and vegetables withered and rotted under the lights. Every time I got what I considered an original, compelling set-up, I spent more hours doing careful pencil and pen sketches, then more addition and subtraction and re-arrangement ensued.

Finally, I got one successful painting and six total dogs, err... wipe-outs, throwaways, messes. Another OK painting awaits finishing as I ponder the folly of overworking it. Now I'm onto my ninth set-up and I long for the casual, loose, thoughtless days of plein air. Still Life is so contrived! All this control is not helping! So I threw some stuff on the table, grabbed an empty canvas, and I'm well on my way to the best effort of the bunch so far. It helps to NOT THINK.

So yes, I would vote for spontaneity! Having said that, I'm well aware that I needed all those over-considered, unoriginal, formal compositional set-ups, laborious drawings, tight and utterly hackneyed paintings to get to the loose and carefree little underworked gem now sitting on my easel.

Two of my personal favorites, Kahlil Gibran & Julia Cameron's The Vein of Gold and The Artist's Way. I read The Artist's Way fifteen years later, since the first reading. I was coming from a whole different place the second time. We keep learning. The Art Spirit by Robert Henri is a grand book too! I enjoy your letters so much. Thank you.

I must say that your words speak the underlying truth behind all the rhetoric. But, I have another burning question. You have created a department in your web site for artists to display his or her work in a gallery. I have participated in several group gallery sites and found that the only folks that are looking at my pictures are other artists. The only comments, replies, and feedback has been from other artists. I think they are simply comparing my work to theirs or maybe trying to find inspiration for their own work. I find myself doing the same thing. None of these folks have any interest in buying.

I am looking for buyers, agents, gallery owners, and collectors. I am getting the impression that the real buyers are not interested in wading through hundreds and thousands of images to try to find something they like or something that they think is important enough to invest in. Where are these folks looking? Or are they relying on magazine articles and gallery owners and other so called experts to make the decisions for them about what is important enough to invest in.

Ovationtv.com has been great for peer critiques except the other artists participating, out of politeness, only give positive comments. This gives a great boost to the ego but is not really an honest appraisal of the your work. One must also understand that no response is truly a negative response.

I am now trying facebook. I am using an indirect approach knowing that there are several gallery owners and avid art collectors in our fair city that take part in the social exchange. I am hoping that through this social playground, the real buyers might take notice. We will see.

My question is: Where are the buyers and how does one get noticed by them? Where do I place my concentrated effort to either find the buyers or find the person that can find the buyers for me for a commission? Is there a direct approach? I am looking for specific solutions not generalities. I have a city full of opinions. I need concrete directions. Sorry if I sound demanding. Its just the frustration blowing out.

Thanks for the Titian reference. Another confirmation as to why I love his work so much. When we visited the Prado Museum in Madrid it showcased a number of well known Spanish painters, and while I favoured Valazquez, it was Titian I was drawn to, particularily The Bacchanal and Venus Delighting Herself with Love and Music. That Venus knew how to party! Did not know that he used his assistants drawings, what a great idea. Get right to the color, post haste.

I would like to address 3 comments from above"
Fred Asbury - Who is a buyer? I am and I make my choices by wandering into every gallery I can find. What attracts me, I buy if I can afford it.
John Ferrie - Rude or what? It is not up to you to chastise such an individual. Rather, it is the sole province of the lecturer to do so. I speak from 35 years teaching graduate and medical students and giving many many seminars on my research. My philosophy has always been to encourage comments and questions and deal with them in the sense of learning.
Dyan Law - I agree concerning the "correct" way to achieve uniqueness. There is no correct way - it is what you choose to do and how you choose to do it, forever trying to satisfy yourself. You are the only true critic of your endeavors - that is, except for my wife and my mirror.

I am consistently amazed that artists - or anybody - have the gall to pontificate ideas beyond their own mind and force them on others. Are they just so dim witted that they think we can't see through them? Are their listeners so dim witted that they follow a nitwit? Art is as free as our imagination, and making it just as free in terms of setting up, getting it done, etc. I once took a class (to use the press) in etching where the teacher told me that what I was doing was impossible and would fail. After I pulled my edition, (and he gave me a 'b' in the class) he asked for one each of my print editions. I told him," sorry, they're all sold". Like heck I would give away my work to that guy. He was getting paid to run the class (for some 30 years) , but sure didn't know much about making the art actually work. There are efficient ways to do things that we can share, but to outright condemn a success as a failure for pride's sake is just plain... well, nitwitty.

We all use a method of some sort be it comprised from our heads or from a myriad of artists we have seen, learned from or had contact with. A method is only a way of approaching the painting or finding a way to express your idea or a way to say what you want to say in that painting. I use what works for me that “way” may change with each painting, Sometime I stick to the tried and true way, some times I break all the rules. It depends on what I'm painting and the importance of the piece. Not all my work starts out being for sale. In fact, only with my figure work or portraits do I start out with a tried and true safe method. But here too I have to say I push the envelope some days.
The idea of a 'one system’ fits all approach comes from those who work a certain way, achieved a bit of notoriety and others want to learn their methods in order to paint "like them".
I say whatever way you paint, if it works for you, do it. If you want to stretch out, study another method. The more ways you can learn to get the job done, the better an artist you will become. Every artist worth his salt will tell you they teach only one way, their way, but it isn't the only way.
The one truth I have found is in the end you will still only paint like YOU
Paint no matter how many different teachers you come into contact.
Enjoy the process. It’s the journey, not the destination that’s important.

I run into the same problem once in a while at the figure workshops I attend each week. I am a blender. Always have been, always will be. When doing shading and shadow, I like the way it looks after I've taken a blending stump, tortillon or Q-tip to the paper and pushed the graphite around to achieve the look I'm going for. And every now and then, I am told by one of the others, usually the art school grad, that I shouldn't blend. I smile and continue on my merry way. Who knows? Maybe a couple hundred years from now, my drawings will be selling at Christies for millions, as superb examples of the blending of graphite and charcoal. Maybe the BBC will do an episode of the Great Artists series about me and how I really brought the technique of blending into the mainstream in the world of art. So, I shall continue blending, smudging, pushing and just, generally moving graphite, pastel and charcoal all over the paper with any tool I can get my hands on.

Being a newbie to painting, I took some classes and 1) teacher at a Community College brought in flowers and said paint 'em, then went back to her desk and worked on her own stuff, no critiques, no method demos, no NOTHING 2) 2nd class was from a nationally known painter at a workshop and he said - "Leave your white space, do what I do, make it square and layer your glazes" - then left us on our own after his demo of his painting, and then critiqued at the end - these were both beginner classes and I was so upset, I swore I would never take another class, just practice, practice, practice and read books, and do what is pleasing to me. What a ripoff some of these "Teachers" are or can be.

David Benjamim-Thanks for supporting my comments regarding "correctness". You are most welcome to visit my studio/gallery in Pipersville, PA and/ or my website and bring your wife too! Also, I have plenty of mirrors. (www.dyanlaw.com)

I asked my daughter, years ago when painting together, "What do you think art is?" She was five at the time and answered, "Art comes from inside when you don't have words to explain." That seemed the right answer for me - and so, in painting, regardless of abstract or figurative, art is the completeness from within. As for structuring a work of art, it seems one structures according to their own way of being - I work until the work is done. Sometimes a month or two, sometimes a few years on each painting. If it doesn't feel right, I just keep on going. And I've learned to erase, then add more. What an experiment life becomes in the studio.