Marion Milner, a celebrated child psychoanalyst wrote of her own creative anxieties in her book On Not Being Able to Paint (Heineman, 1950, but still available). Fear is embedded in much of the writing on… Feel the fear and paint it
“Frankenfolks” can be artists too!” Originally published in Art of England, Issue 86, 2011. Reproduced with permission. Are older people curiosities, especially the long-lived? Do we see them as ‘marvellous’ simply for their fact of… Frankenfolks can be artists too!
What is a magpie and what has it got to do with artists? #142830176 / gettyimages.com I have posted and written about how people learn to be artists by copying the art of other artists.… The Magpie Index to Assess Autonomous Creativity
Another early scratching of an early human endeavouring to capture the external world has been found in Wales (2011). What was this person thinking, and why did he or she even do this? What is… The mind in another cave
No doubt many in the arts community are concerned at rising levels of public sector austerity. For many their very existence depends on public funding of one sort or another. Few, though, will of necessity… How to swing the arts funding axe
I subscribe to only one art magazine: Turps. Actually, I subscribe only to a few things anyway. I used to want to get one of each, like some artists who need to have one of… Intelligent Life
Art of England (issue 68, 2010) has published a short piece of mine. It is about the ‘grants welfare state’ and proposes that artists should be funded more as investments, over a few years, leading… The Artist as Entrepreneur
Art of England (issue 66, 2010) has published a short piece of mine. It is some commentary on a conference in London on arts and health. This is an interesting area. Research is beginning to… Medicine for Body and Soul
An earlier post (End of Kodachrome and a way of seeing the world) I lamented the loss of Kodachrome. Steve McCurry, the photojournalist, has shot the final, last, roll of Kodachrome. The story is being… The last Kodachrome
I am delighted to see the further development of Sumi-e into strong abstraction. Chinese and Japanese brush painting has tended to bucolic, naturalist imagery, for obvious Pilgrim’s Journey reasons from its historical development. But some… Abstraction in China