Those of us of a certain generation will be familiar with this refrain (and may have repeated it ourselves so often that it feels like a truism): Utah supports the performing arts much more than it does the visual arts. There are historical reasons for that belief: Unlike […]
I learned the feeling of modernism—before I could define it—by walking the Fine Arts & Architecture complex at the University of Utah. Designed around 1970 by Edwards & Daniels Associates, the complex rises in stacked planes and shadowed seams, a 140,000-square-foot maze of studios and galleries where […]
December 31, 2022 marked the last day in my studio space of 20 years. 20 years. Thousands of images created, breeding grounds for over 80 shows, tens of thousands of hours of work, collaborations with curators, gallerist, collectors and friends, hundreds of studio visits and tens of thousands […]
“Without the public, these works are nothing. I need the public to complete the work.” – Felix Gonzales-Torres “The true artist helps the world by revealing mystic truths.” – Bruce Nauman I was born in Cuautla, Morelos, a small town south of México City, about an hour drive […]
So a Cowgirl in the UK gets up in the morning and bangs her head on the ceiling; groans out of the bunk bed, as the mattress could be called a little challenging; the bed was one of the pieces of furniture for a film-musical made in 1967 […]
Call me crazy, but I dream of going back to school — this time to earn a BFA in painting. I already have B.A. and M.A. degrees in speech and drama, but acting and directing are no longer my passions. I want to paint really well. Am I […]
As a professional artist and photographer nothing strikes fear in my heart more than hearing, “Would you mind taking our picture?” or, “Amanda is the photographer, let her take the picture.” How do I tell my grandmother that I am used to photographing non-moving desert landscapes with a […]
Photography 2.0: an essay by Jackie Brethen Leishman on the occasion of Pixelism, an exhibition of works by Brett Sykes at the Thanksgiving Point Art Institute Photography is often overlooked in the discussion of fine art. Only recently have some photographs demanded the high prices/notoriety the other art […]
In business, we are told, location (and its close-cousin, presentation) is everything. The business of selling or presenting art is no different. Rich, recession-proof patrons will fly a thousand miles and spend unseemly amounts of money to purchase art in meccas like New York or Los Angeles, even […]
It’s late at night and I am trolling the Internet looking for something cheap, a foreign born lovely that goes by the name Diana, Holga, Savoy, Lomo, or even the sweet American Brownie. NO, I am not talking mail order brides, but toy cameras. I have a problem. […]
In “Criticism in the Moment” (January edition), Geoff Wichert provides one critical perspective on the state of today’s art criticism. The essay is thought-provoking, and I rather enjoy Wichert’s prose. However, though his focus is LACMA’s exhibition Magritte and Contemporary Art: The Treachery of Images (through March 4, […]
Over the past year, I received several invitations from BYU art professor Joseph Ostraff to tag along with eleven students on a field study project in New Zealand. Five days before the plane took off, I finally decided to go. I was a little hesitant to accept the […]
What a foolish question. Of course, artists have to sell their works in order to make a living – you know, pay the bills, feed the family, and have some fun in life. However, marketing a product, be it art or automobiles, can have a major influence on […]
Exploring the concept that freedom is the basis of all creativity, whether in the consciousness of an artist or in the process of nature. “An artist has to be free to create whatever he or she wants.” Ric Collier, Director Salt Lake Art Center “In wildness is the […]
I spent February and March of this year in southern Africa. Round River Conservation Studies, an international wildlife conservation organization, invited me to their research station in Namibia. The project splits its three-month semester in Namibia between the Cheetah work near the Waterburg Plateau and the Rhino research […]
Why is art so damn expensive?!”
Apart from the obvious answer — that artists are the most important tier of society, providing the community the lens with which to look upon their souls, and should be appropriately compensated for their all-important work — we decided to examine this proverbiaal question and see if we couldn’t find an answer or two.
