What is Art Today?

In the beginning

From cave paintings through the Middle Ages to the Classical period in the 1700s, most artists aimed to make their work look as realistic as possible and employed a large amount of skilled techniques to achieve that result. The best gained fame. A few standouts are Rembrandt, Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Jan Vermeer and Caravaggio. Some schools have the same aim today, with some going to extremes. Recently in London I viewed the finalists in a UK portrait painting competition, and even though I had many decades’ experience of working with art and photography, close-up I could not tell that the winning painting was not a photograph. Many art-for-artists-magazines’ competitions lean heavily towards awarding the most realistic paintings. The Australian Guild of Realist Artists, most traditional art schools, and the bulk of art sold at suburban art shows still aim at variations of realism.

Creative adjustment

A welcome