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    Joined: Sep 2007
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    Val Offline
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    Originally Posted by Ellipses
    One way that I work on my empathy for others is to imagine myself in art class. Talk about feeling like a moron - I just did not get it and my projects were terrible.

    Oh, do I hear you there. I can't draw/paint something to save my life, in spite of many attempts since childhood. People who can draw or paint, etc., tell me confidently, "Oh yes, you CAN learn how to do this!" I tell them, "No, I can't. No matter what I do or how people try to teach me, I spend hours struggling to draw poorly what you could do well in 20 minutes while chatting over coffee." They often don't really want to believe me. Maybe it's hard to accept that something that can be so easy for them can be incredibly difficult for someone else.

    My lack of drawing ability (as well as disbelief in it, which continues to this day) gives me a lot of insight into what slow and very slow academic learners face in school. It must be no fun hearing, "Of course you can do this if you try!" by authority figures, and then struggling to do something poorly when everyone else can master it faster. I wonder how many children develop feelings of inadequacy when being pushed too hard by well-meaning (but clueless) adults.

    Val

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    You may hate me for saying this, Val, but don't give up. I thought I was permanently hopeless at visual art all through school (and I did try at it, often). Then one day when I was 21, I woke up out of a very vivid dream and started sketching stuff I'd dreamt about - and well. Something "clicked" and now I can draw. Weirdest thing.

    S
    StevenASylwester
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    zhian, it is good to be kind, but sometimes the greatest kindness is to tell someone plainly that they have no artistic talent when that is the undeniable truth of the matter. Consider the auditions on American Idol and the heartbreak suffered by so many people who thought they had talent when they had no talent at all. It is sad, and it speaks of wasted lives and pipe dreams.

    I am all for being creative and for making meaningful self-expressions, but so very much is lacking in the teaching of the creative process that most people never learn the language. In fact, most people do not even know that the visual arts are a language that is expressed in line, color, shape, form, and texture, and that the language can express purposely in visual balance and imbalance, and in visual harmony and disharmony, especially as those elements pertain to symmetry and the geometry of nature.

    Like the user of any language, the visual artist must have something to say � a reason to make a visual expression. Unfortunately, most people who wrongly imagine themselves to be artists never figure out that most basic of all basic things. Their so-called "art" is the stuff of gibberish nonsense that has no conceivable purpose whatsoever. It is comparable to the utterances of someone who cannot form a simple declarative sentence to describe a person, place, or thing.

    Schools should teach crafts, and should stress the value and importance of craftsmanship. A person with no artistic talent can be trained to be a fine craftsman, and that is a very worthy accomplishment.

    Val, forget drawing and visual artistic expressions. But do learn to make things. What an artist does is make things, and that is exactly the same thing that a craftsman does, too. So be a craftsman. Pick an appropriate craft for your interests, and then learn to do it well.

    I spent some time in art school myself, and I have been married to an artist for almost 35 years now. I have known my wife ever since we were both five years old and were across the street neighbors. We were classmates from first grade through eighth grade, and I have had a crush on her since fifth grade. My wife has been an artist since early childhood � her whole life. It is who she is and has always been. Making things is her language � her means of self-expression � and that language flows from her naturally. Truly, her artistic ability can be correctly thought of as a language fluency at a poetic level, which is the highest level of proficiency in my opinion.

    My wife's name is Koe, and the following is her website:
    http://koe-sylwester-artist.blogspot.com/
    http://koe-sylwester-artist.blogspot.com/2009_11_01_archive.html
    http://koe-sylwester-artist.blogspot.com/2009/11/introduction.html
    If you click on an image, it will enlarge.

    Val, both of my daughters are very creative. The oldest is a writer who finished writing her first novel at age 23, and the youngest is a visual artist who has been a visual artist since early childhood � her whole life � just like her mother. My wife and I recognized our youngest daughter's artistic gifts when she was a young child, but we had no idea about her remarkable genius-level gifts in the sciences until she was a freshman in high school. I will describe all of that sometime later at the "NASA Academy of the Physical Sciences" thread, because it is a good and appropriate story to tell.

    During the summer between her sophomore and junior years in high school, my youngest daughter took a Drawing class at the University of Oregon. During the previous summer, she had taken a Drawing class at Lane Community College in which she had made the following linked drawings:
    http://kingnapoleon.deviantart.com/gallery/#/ddq30c
    http://kingnapoleon.deviantart.com/gallery/#/ddq2vm
    The art professor at the University of Oregon who taught Drawing was so stunned by my daughter's ability that she seriously advised my daughter to immediately quit high school to enroll in one of the premiere art schools in the United States, and she recommended The School of The Art Institute of Chicago. The art professor was certain that my daughter would be granted early enrollment wherever she applied.

    Five months later during the spring of that daughter's junior year in high school, a chemistry professor at the University of Oregon told me that my daughter was easily in The Top One Percent of all the students he had ever taught during his then 20-year career as a chemistry professor at various universities in the United States, including at Princeton where he had earned his doctorate. That chemistry professor told me plainly in no uncertain terms that my daughter should now be majoring in chemistry at either Stanford or Harvard � and he told me this when that daughter was then a high school junior!

    That daughter had sold ten artworks before she graduated from high school � six of them to total strangers!

    My daughter's name is Liesel, and the following are her websites:
    http://kingnapoleon.deviantart.com/gallery/
    I strongly recommend that you browse through all six pages of Liesel's gallery. The artworks are posted in chronological order. If you click on an image, it will enlarge and Liesel's description of the artwork will appear. If you then click on the image again, it will enlarge one more time.
    http://www.etsy.com/shop/LieselSylwester
    http://www.etsy.com/listing/45558260/ruffled-chambray-shirtdress
    http://www.etsy.com/people/LieselSylwester

    Artists are very different from people who are not artists. Liesel has been very challenged by being both an artist and a scientist, because she is remarkably gifted in both and truly enjoys both, and because artists and scientists are very different from each other. However, whenever she has free time, Liesel's natural inclination � her joy � is to design, flat-pattern, and make clothing. She designed, flat-patterned, and fully constructed all of the clothing shown in her gallery website, including doing the hand embroidery and even the fabric dying in some cases.

    People should follow their joy. What that means for Liesel's future is still unknown. She would love to apprentice herself to the fashion designer Oscar de la Renta.

    It is a joy to be Liesel's father, but it is not easy.

    Steven A. Sylwester

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    Originally Posted by StevenASylwester
    because artists and scientists are very different from each other.

    How so?

    I don't see the difference.




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    I agree with Austin in that to make it so black and white is ridiculous. I'm an artist with degrees in studio art and art history but could have majored in math. I had professors begging me to switch my major to math, but for me it was simple and logical and art was the unknown. Many of my artistic friends have talents in many areas as well.

    I see a proud father and husband and kudos to you for that, but honestly I had to laugh at your comment about your daughter's early work and a guarantee of getting into the Art Institute of Chicago. Not saying she has no talent, but it is basic 'student' work ... studies. I have seen a dozen if not hundreds of work similar to those two drawings. I'm also not shocked by her love of fabric ... your wife clearly has it too.

    As for your description of art: really? Since you are being so vague I'm not sure who you are criticizing here. Modern art? There is definitely more to art than your little description. Even the best art historian has a hard time defining it and rightfully so.

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    Originally Posted by Katelyn'sM om
    I had to laugh at your comment about your daughter's early work and a guarantee of getting into the Art Institute of Chicago.

    I'll second that, and I want to add that I think this is a perfect example of why one should not presume to tell others what their gifts are or aren't or how they should or shouldn't seek fulfillment. If indeed your DD was advised to drop out of school and attempt to enroll in SAIC, that advice was clearly inappropriate.

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    I have had this discussion before, basically the value of talent vs. the value of hard work and what i believe is this:

    Talent, whether is applies to IQ, art, athletics or whatever, is simply a definition of where you start and how far you can go.

    What is far more important is your determination.

    Val, i believe it is just as rare for someone to have zero talent as it is for someone to be profoundly gifted. Hard work can bring someone of little talent to a level on par with the gifted if the gifted has no interest in the subject. Don't give up if you enjoy.

    Which brings me to a point that Steven made that i disagree with:
    Quote
    the visual artist must have something to say � a reason to make a visual expression. Unfortunately, most people who wrongly imagine themselves to be artists never figure out that most basic of all basic things. Their so-called "art" is the stuff of gibberish nonsense that has no conceivable purpose whatsoever.
    There is another reason for making art... the shear joy of it. For that reason alone art can exist. When i learned to draw, it was because I felt something, not because i had something to say. Art, like music, just envelops me. I don't have to care that you like it, or understand it, because truely I AM the ONLY one who understands what it means to me. The fact that some art can strike a sympathetic chord in another person, is icing.


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    PoppaRex,

    You speak volumes. Look up Rothko. You will find a kinder spirit there. He was a modernist and I always loved how he argued against the idea that the art could be about nothing. His argument was that of course there is a subject matter to every piece of art. It is the experiences and emotions that the viewer brings with them. Some might disagree with his theory but you can not deny that art is subjective and part of this reason is due to how the end viewer sees it.

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    StevenASylwester
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    PoppaRex,

    Please do not misunderstand me. Having "something to say" does not necessarily translate to a concept or to something that can be put into words � not at all. Both my wife and my daughter rail against conceptual art that cannot stand by itself without being propped up by indecipherable long-winded essays that are written in the nonsense of artspeak, which is a language that is taught in art schools across the United States. To earn a Master of Fine Arts degree today requires only a mastery of artspeak, not a mastery of any craft, any technique, or any skill actually used in visual expression. Simply, many MFA graduates today cannot draw, cannot paint, and cannot sculpt to save their lives. It is a travesty in my opinion, because the language of the visual arts is not artspeak, it is the language of line, color, shape, form, and texture used to make artistic expressions � even in photography � even in film and video.

    Yes, "the sheer joy of it" is why many artists do what they do, and much of what my wife and my daughter make comes from that place. But not everything. Consider:
    http://koe-sylwester-artist.blogspot.com/2009/11/girl-with-flower-tummy.html
    http://koe-sylwester-artist.blogspot.com/2009/11/howling-at-wall.html
    http://koe-sylwester-artist.blogspot.com/2009/11/antagonist.html
    http://kingnapoleon.deviantart.com/gallery/#/d170218
    http://kingnapoleon.deviantart.com/gallery/#/d1fj2px
    http://kingnapoleon.deviantart.com/gallery/#/dw4kdi
    http://kingnapoleon.deviantart.com/gallery/#/d13wqlw
    http://kingnapoleon.deviantart.com/gallery/#/dztvec
    http://kingnapoleon.deviantart.com/gallery/#/dodlxb
    http://kingnapoleon.deviantart.com/gallery/#/dmlvs4
    http://kingnapoleon.deviantart.com/gallery/#/dm6azl
    http://kingnapoleon.deviantart.com/gallery/#/dictyx
    http://kingnapoleon.deviantart.com/gallery/#/dd2dur
    http://kingnapoleon.deviantart.com/gallery/#/d8aly5
    http://kingnapoleon.deviantart.com/gallery/#/d7m0lu

    Liesel is now 21. The second-from-the-top image of hers above was made two years ago , and the bottom image was made seven years ago. None of the artworks shown were done in an art class or for an art class; they are all personal expressions done for personal reasons � and they came from difficult and painful emotions, not joyful emotions.

    My wife refuses to explain the imagery in her artwork because she does not want the viewer to think that art is about correct interpretations. Why my wife likes her own artwork and why she made it is irrelevant to why the viewer should like it. If the artwork does not speak to the viewer without an accompanying written explanation, then the artwork fails.

    Consider my wife's artist's statement:
    http://koe-sylwester-artist.blogspot.com/2009/11/introduction.html

    Unfortunately, much of today's "art" is the stuff of angry contrived political statements, especially in the realm of feminist art. Art can be political, but it suffers if that is all that it is. In my opinion, the best visual art does not come from the controlled and controlling rational mind that is fully capable of expressing itself in words, because then � at best � what is being produced is the stuff of article illustrations � mind stuff, not heart-and-soul stuff that touches the human spirit.

    Concerning artists and scientists: Yes, there is some crossover, but very, very little. Your average MFA art student has never taken Organic Chemistry, because your average MFA art student would flunk Organic Chemistry. Hell, your average MFA art student has never taken General Chemistry or Calculus. On the other side, your average Ph.D. scientist of any stripe has never taken a Drawing class, and has no meaningful appreciation for the visual arts because he/she has never really been exposed to the visual arts. On a university campus, there is almost no traffic between the art studios and the science labs; the paths do not cross.

    But I will state this: the best scientists are artists in their scientific work, and the best artists are scientists in their artistic work.

    Steven A. Sylwester


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    Val Offline
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    I think there's been a misunderstanding regarding what I was trying to say about my lack of ability to draw or paint. It's possible I wasn't clear, so:

    1. I'm definitely below average at drawing. Probably well below average.

    2. No amount of practice will change my innate abilities in this area.

    3. That's okay.

    4. In fact, it's probably a good thing for me.

    5. It's hard for people of above-average+ ability to truly understand what it means to be below average at something (like, for example, schoolwork).

    5a. By this I mean, really understand what it means to lack ability, not just notice that someone else doesn't pick something up quickly.

    5b. Similarly, many teachers who aren't gifted have a hard time understanding (or even believing) how quickly gifted kids learn.

    6. When I meet or hear about kids who have trouble learning, my lack of drawing ability helps me get them, in the way that we refer to those special teachers who get our kids.

    I agree with Steven that it's important to be honest about this kind of thing. A major problem with our school system is that it pretends that below average learners can be made average or above. This is wishful thinking, and it's the basis of most of our problems.

    HTH,

    Val

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