keeping it Going On Instagram

Unfortunately, the Bodies exhibit would not allow us to take photographs, so we couldn't make it work there.  However, With the grade seven Japanese exhibit we had the students complete
their responses using Visible Thinking routines.  It would be inappropriate for me to send out the the student Instagram posts, but I put of a couple of their responses on my Instagram.  Recently I also made a post all on my own.  check out #mralleniscool.

http://instagram.com/dplusinternational

Journal that started with a friend and a web site

Being that it is summer I am have the time to think a little more abstractly about things and I have been toying around conceptually with what I am doing here.  a friend of mine works in the online education field and linked me into his web sites.  I had a read through and drummed up some questions and ideas.  Below are my notes, below that is my response.

• What kind of certification do courses need to practically benefit students?
• What is important to students in the future in regards to thinking skills and technical skills?
• How does one engage students?
• The current system of education is outdated in places but it is such a system that it cannot be completely uprooted.
• Teach students skills that allow them to apply techniques to the required courses.
• Educational gaming.

The united states has the AP system which is designed to allow students complete college courses before they actually enter college.  That aside I am certain that every state has its course of study and and universities have their own standard requirements.  There is a push towards STEM which makes me a little sad because it further reinforces the idea that the arts are for flakes and rich people and is a totally superfluous endeavor.  On all these accounts I am in complete disagreement.  One doesn’t need to have the goal of being an artist in order to study art.  How many people learn to dance; swing, line latin, whatever in order to have fun and exercise?  How many people play baseball for fun, how many children and adults are playing catch in the back yard?  Is it because everyone is working towards a career as a big leaguer?  I suggest no.  By this same argument studying the arts doesn’t have to mean one wants to become an artist.  The arts can be used to to better understand oneself and how to better understand other people and the human condition.  A further support of this lies in a comment I heard a director make “A good film allows people to understand the point of view of the character” we all want to know what it is like to be a hero, or a cancer survivor or even a bad guy.  I am getting a little off topic here but to bring it back it is not these skills that are explicitly looked for in a high school or university education.

Think skills are the underlying methods by which we attain technical skills.  A science teacher friend of mine said “Teach the students how to ask a question, and they will learn the methods so that they can answer that question”.  Teaching art skills or really thinking skills will never directly pay off because it is difficult to test, and I am not entirely opposed to testing to be honest, it can be an effective sorting mechanism.  So what we need to teach students is effective thinking skills and show them how they can be applied to acquire or use the technical skills that make money.  To go on with the hackneyed axiom “The world is changing very quickly and the skills we teach students today may not be applicable tomorrow” but there is a lot of truth to it.  Definitely communicating and sharing is the direction things have been moving in the last ten years.  So my argument is that making connections is quite an important thinking skill to have.  when one sees an object or a technology or even thinks an idea, the mind should be looking for way aforementioned thing is connected to its environment and other things.  In my own teaching practices there are several units where connection between ideas is required.  A partner teacher of mine wrote a unit in which she requires students to look at one specific tradition in the visual arts and then connect it to one tradition from modernism on.  That kind of thought process can be executed in any discipline.

Educational gaming:  Although I do not know much about it, I believe this is one strong way to develop students’ minds through a medium they are already familiar with.  fortunately/unfortunately my parents never got hip to the video game concept and unlike many of my peers my gaming experience is limited to Atari and Nintendo.  But so many people engage in gaming and truthfully I am quite encouraged by the amount of art I see being put into gaming these days.  Games now have designers that create whole worlds and story lines and the world of gaming creates communities that ten years ago did not exist.  I’ve had a couple of silly ideas like online Cadaver Esquis and brainstorming and association.  A new thought I had sprung from the new google Artwork catalog.  My idea is to start communities where people curate their own exhibits.  Look to curators and gallerists to create challenges based on how they put exhibits together and then allow the players to fulfill those requirements.  In fact it does not even need to be limited to just visual arts.  For example take a concept and look for items from a variety of disciplines that highlight that concept.  

Well, I don’t know exactly how to end this entry because there wasn’t really a point to prove to begin with.  It’s a journal exercise of sorts from which I examined a web sight and recorded my thoughts.  Hopefully it drums ideas for those of you who took the time to read it.  As always I am open to your thoughts idea, questions and comments.

Process

I thought I would outline the creative process when creating this painting as it highlights some of my methods.

• I wanted to expand my graffiti practice so instead of just writing my name I looked into typography and thought to practice all the letters of the alphabet.  My first was ABCD and then I recited the alphabet until I found some letters that had a nice mnemonic device.  I decided upon LMNOP
• After a couple of sketches I thought shorter would be better.
• Back to research, looking more at I Love Typography and read articles about some font developers and what makes an easily readable font.  IN this process I also seized on some color words..
• Adjusted the design to just LMN because it fits better on the paper.
• I drew each letter in a box, actually I drew the box first.
• Looked at the underdrawing on the paper and thought it was too simplistic.  so I reflected back and reviewed some sketch books to add to the design.
• Began painting and in the process and reviewed the color wheel during the process.  Added the little circles and octopus later during work.
• Reviewed the final painting and decided I like the design but it's too small, it needs to be wall sized.

Idea Generator

So I am playing around with this, check it out, try it out.  Hopefully something great or at least entertaining comes from it.  If you are so inclined, comment with some feedback.

Magazine Development

I have been working more scientifically (not really scientifically mind you) and have begun compiling evidence for creative thinking exercises.  Below is something I have written up in a report and I thought it would be nice to share.

Task Description:

When embarking on this unit I asked the students to think about the content of their magazine cover and I wanted them to follow a certain protocol when developing their ideas.  I instructed them that this method is not the only method but one I had found successful for students.  I also instructed them to put their idea development on paper, I believe this is most beneficial because it allows the mind to focus one one thing, new ideas, and allows paper to do the job of keeping track of ideas.  The concept here is that one should put as many ideas down as possible and then when they are documented, choose the best or most appropriate.  The student followed the following protocol:

1. Make a group of nine circles on you paper and in two minutes time fill in each circle with one thing they like.  It could be in the form of  words or sketches and that quantity is better than quality.
2. Then I asked the students to review verbally the previous lesson about the design of a magazine covers and make another circle brainstorm of topics they found interesting.
3. After the students had filled several pages of ideas I asked them to pick one of their ideas and brainstorm in a list sub-genres of this topic/item.
4. Finally the students were required to discuss with the classmates at their table their brainstorms and have their classmates give honest response to what was a good/interesting idea, what would be most suited to the student and alternative solutions.
5. Once the students had an idea they were happy with they could begin sketching out possible designs.

This is not a very involved process and in total time it lasted about thirty minutes.  My intention was to show the students how they could use what was already in their mental vocabulary and then developed that concept more robustly.  Then to make editing decisions that would best suit their skills, interests and third party opinions.  What is missing from this picture here is that the students had already been thinking about magazines and they had been given the unit introduction which definitely influenced their decisions.  On the opposite end some of the student reflections are missing so it is difficult to evaluate their exact opinions on how the creative thinking exercises assisted them.

Student A followed the in class method well.  She gave herself a variety of options when beginning the idea and choose clothing.  Where the idea for fashion for pensioners came from I do not know.  I believe it is related to her desire to do something different from the norm.  I do not recall specifically if this conversation took place between myself and this student, but several times I did discuss the issue of not having a magazine only about fashion but to choose a particular demographic to target.  Her choice is clever and entertaining.  This student’s trimester grade for Criterion C Thinking Creatively is six out of eight.

Student B used a slightly different method, choosing from a more limited brainstorm but then expanding upon that brainstorm and setting a kind of to do list for herself before beginning on the design of her magazine cover. This student’s trimester grade for Criterion C Thinking Creatively is a six out of eight.

Zen, The Sword, The Brush and David Lynch

I have taken a break from writing for a bit so that I could do a little bit of research, reading, making art, playing music and celebrating Christmas.  But now I am back and want to spend a little time making some connections between what I have been reading and making art.  This is slightly off of the normal creative thinking topic that I normally write about, but it’s related and worth an examination.

I recently changed schools and classrooms and I share a very large space with two other teachers.  They have made a point of collecting old books that are heading for the recycle bin, particularly if they have an art slant to them.  The book I picked up is entitled Zen and Japanese Culture by Daisetz T. Suzuki published in 1973.  I have, in the past read several text about Zen, some I’ve retained, others I haven’t and this one I am hoping I retain for a while to come, this is in part why I am writing this article.  To date I have only finished the first four chapters, the nature of what Zen is and its relation to sword play.  If possible I will attempt summarize nearly three hundred pages of material into a short paragraph.  The sword is an instrument of life.  It administers justice but puts its bearer the in the position where if not executed properly will result in death.  The swordsman trains the techniques, learns them by heart, puts himself to the utmost physical challenge.  Why?  because the swordsman must get to the point where no mind is used to execute his maneuvers.  When the mind stops to rest on a thought during a fight it will hesitate, it will not flow it will think and that brief pause of thinking is enough gap for an opponent to strike one down.  Beyond just knowing the maneuvers a swordsman must learn to let go of his thoughts and allow his subconscious to make the right moves, to be aware of the body’s actions but not allow the conscious mind to control them.  To say that the swordsman needs to be fearless is not stating the situation strongly enough.  He must have no concept of death, he must be beyond life and death so as to not interrupt the subconscious mind at work.

Aside from physical training the mind needs to be trained to access the subconscious.  Practice in not thinking while employing simple daily tasks is important.  Meditation is also of great importance.  By sitting and quieting the conscious mind one reaches into the areas of the subconscious, it creates a stronger link to the waking life we live everyday.  Through this conduit one can live one’s life beyond life and death.

If we are to substitute the sword for the brush I believe we will see that the same correct actions will come about.  The arm and the hand will move in correct, precise order.  The need to make decisions will be unnecessary because the subconscious knows what to do.  But to reach this state the same physical and mental training needs to be put into action.  The artist must train, push through strain and mental hardship.  I hate to use the word hardship because it sounds cliché, however, I believe we are all aware of the suffering artist stereotype and in this situation there is a valid connection.  Exactly what manner of hardship is difficult to say.  My opinion is that the artist push their skills far beyond what they believe is capable.  She must work tirelessly on things that are difficult, challenging, incomprehensible.  Also she must lean to reach into that subconscious, to lose herself in the painting, or sculpting or whichever art  form is being executed.  I believe not only the correct actions will come about, but also new ideas, ideas that cannot be accessed in the conscious state.

David Lynch talks about this, he describes it as “The real big fish”.  The great ideas/big fish are in deep water and to get one fishing line into deep water one needs to still the shallow.  I really like this metaphor and whether you like his movies or not I think most will agree that his ideas, stories and imagery are among the finest examples of creativity in the last fifty years.  I wrote an article a while back about the graffiti artist and movement and I still believe that this connection between movement and art is there.  The graffiti artist must know his art because it is executed on a grand scale.  The movements must be correct and precise and the body must not hesitate lest the line or the fill has a hitch in it that disturbs the entire work.

I will leave you with a verbal painting, something I have been meaning to work out visually.  One rectangle on top of two squares and another rectangle below the squares.  In the top rectangle a scene from Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon where the two heroines are discussing the relationship between swordplay and calligraphy.  In the square to the left a graffiti artist at work, the square to the right a photo of Chinese brushes and a calligraphy workbook and in the rectangle at the bottom the following quote: “Therefore do not get your mind stopped with the sword you raise; forget what you are doing, and strike the enemy.  Do not keep your mind on the person who stands before you.  They are all of emptiness, but beware of your mind being caught up with emptiness itself.” Suzuki 1973

Daniel Pink, Autobiography and a Little More

At school today (I'm a teacher) Daniel Pink came to give the keynote address.  I watched his TED previous to watching him speak and I was a bit turned off because he seemed to spout the same thing a lot of people talk about regarding the right brain and creativity and the need to change schools.  The first issue here - right brain - I find annoying because recent research that I have encountered says that the brain is dynamic, not just hemisphere and I feel this description is just simplifying the complex issue of teaching.  However, his keynote address made up for what I expected to be a mediocre performance.  What I appreciated most is the data he presented us with concerning what the science and technology industries are looking for in education and how the policy makers in education are defining the system.  I will allow you to review what he said, since he said it and the information is readily available and my point here is to expand upon it from my point of view.

If you have been following this blog for the last six months you will see that I am working at creating exercises that can be employed in any situation to allow one to develop new ideas.  This informal research started out to assist my art teaching, however, upon consideration I have determined that it is applicable in many situation and I just have not worked out the details.  In fact, part of the reason for me writing this blog is so that others can try some of these concepts out and see what results can be obtained.  In this respect I am a punk/communist/Buddhist e.g. no one owns a guitar chord or idea, this should be owned by all and try it for yourself to make the best out of it you can.  Some of the exercises I have written about in the past are brainstorming plus, writing from a point of view, motion as a creative thinking skill (this one is weak but kudos to Will Percy for turning me onto an article about a motion classroom that helps students think) and story mapping.

Last night I put my money where my mouth is so to speak by employing one of my techniques (mind you I did not invent these, they came about over the course of my experiences, some synthesized, some dreamed up and some just from conclusions I've drawn).  In an effort to make my own art work stronger I brainstormed two categories to make art about and ultimately would like to combine them.  The first autobiography the second what I fantasize or dream my life to be.  I forced myself to write non-stop for a given time period for each of these categories, even if I did get off topic, and then review the results.  What I found was some thoughts that pop up once and again but I never focus on and some ideas I think about have finally been put to paper.  From there I put titles at random on the top of sketch book pages and while I may have no visual vocabulary at present and am requiring of myself that I make two sketches of each title.  What has piqued me most is that I have a problem to solve and generally speaking it is a fun problem for me to solve.  Will it make my art stronger?  I hope so.  Something nice that did come of it was my affinity for art materials and then a collage from art supply flyers that will be a drawing or painting soon.

An implied charge in Daniel's address today was that it was up to us, the teachers, to figure out how to educate students to think creatively, holistically, recognize patterns and develop systems and things people need.  Hopefully this is what I am doing, at the very least, it is what I am attempting to do.  I am beginning to consider how this work can be made into a tangible and I am looking for people who would like to collaborate with me on this endeavor. My initial thought is to create tablet computer apps (I even have some hand-drawn interfaces for these) or to work with people in a variety of industries and have work sessions where we try out some of these exercises an see what results present themselves   If you yourself are interested or know someone who might also be, by all means get in touch and let's see what can become of it.  I am going to do something bold here, I will put both my phone number and email address. - 2167540879 - china.devin@gmail.com.  This is because I am not sure if you can get the info from my blog, but I hope it shows how sincere I am in this endeavor and how much I trust humans' good nature.  Waiting to hear from you

Point of View

Over the past week I have been writing an additional supplement for my grade eleven students about how to analyze art.  The course they are studying requires that they pay the most attention to the study of art, which I find quite fascinating  especially for a high school student.  They will be assessed most heavily on their research and exploration.  While they are required to make art the importance is on what they think about and what I can find in their sketch books.  In my graduate studies I happened upon a course which discusses the fundamentals of analyzing a work or art.  In brief there are two main types of analyzing, formal and stylistic.  formal deals with how a work or looks and stylistic is about interpreting its meaning.  for the longest time I felt that what critics were interpreting in art, while entertaining to read was based so much on just one's subjective opinion.  Ultimately I have trouble with subjectivity, at least as it being the sole basis of evaluating a work of art.  There is such a thing as good and bad art, but this good and bad is difficult to pinpoint and left me the weaker of the arguments.  Another thing I find quite annoying in art is that shock and/or entertainment value seems to be how people immediately recognize a work of art as good or bad.  I myself am guilty of this but I have gotten better at enjoying the immediate pleasure derived from an eye catching work of art but also forcing myself to look deeper to see if the piece is really of value.

Let me tie this together now.  Through my re-review of stylistic analysis I was able to put together two practices I have encountered over my work as an artist and art teacher.  What we have already been talking about, stylistic analysis and what a colleague of mine dubbed 'The Idea Generator'.  Let us talk stylistic analysis first.  I am actually going to write about more specifically contextual analysis.  The idea that one adopts a certain standpoint when interpreting a work of art.  The common contexts I have come across are Marxism and Feminism.

Let's start with Marxism.looking at the work of art from the standpoint of artist as worker and patron as gentry.  I told my students to ask questions like 'What does this work say about the life of the artist versus the select public that enjoy it?'  However, I feel this does not go far enough and I have individually substituted the artist as creating a product and the public as consuming that product.  So when we look at a work of art, we are the consumers, how does it influence us when we consume it?  I am quite pleased that art is now more in the public realm than before and we can even ask 'How does the public consume the art?'  How does it influence our clothing, our food and our computer games.  I'm not a gamer but I am aware that a lot of popular music is now used for the soundtracks.  So next time you are at the gallery ask yourself "When will this show up in my breakfast?'  Have a look at Takahashi Murakami's work with LV to get the idea.  Feminism works in a similar fashion only we are reading the art from a woman's point of view.  Ask yourself "What story does this work tell?" "How do women understand this?" "What is the role of the artist in relation to their use?"  Beijing based artist Megumi Shimizu has a performance piece where she reverses Yves Klein's blue model work with red and a boy, and when I saw it that boy must have just been eighteen.  The reason I am writing about this as a creative thinking skill will become apparent soon.  We are putting ourselves in a context or a perspective and applying thinking skills from those perspectives to imagine meaning.

The Idea Generator - I read that Bob Dylan book a few years back.  In it he discussed placing himself in a character's position and then writing from that position.  I've seen art teacher Richard Todd do this and he even made a graph for it.  Take a concept and brainstorm what that concept means from and old/young position, a old/new position, mother/father, student/teacher, commercial esoteric, analogue/digital, baby boom/generation y.  Really two terms that are unlike in some way.  The IBO does this when they ask students to think from different areas of interaction.

So try this for me.  Seize on a thought you find interesting.  The run it through different contexts to see what new comes about.  Add interpretation and also new meaning.  See where the contexts take you.  If you are an artist, make art about it, if you are a thinker build a syllogism around it. See what becomes.

This painting is from some time ago, but since I have not photographed any of the recent painting I've executed this will have to do.  I placed it here because in the past month and a half I have been painting a lot of pine trees (some other varieties as well).  The reason has a bit of a explanation.  I recently moved back to the USA after nine years in China and one in Korea, by far China has the stronger influence.  I was quite struck by some contemporary Chinese paining (by this I mean ink and wash painting, you know the classic style of birds and flowers and landscape etc. but the painting I was looking at was of a contemporary subject matter).  The power of the black ink was almost palpable.  That week I purchased paper and brushes and ink and had a go.  A complete fail but there was potential and I adopted it to how I was working.  Shortly thereafter I moved to China and after about six months I started studying the traditional techniques and I spent about a year and a half with two different teachers.  Another year or so after I stuck to the tradition, then it faded.  About three years ago I began to take it up again and this leads to the painting above as well as why I've been painting pine trees so much recently.

After I accepted the job in Georgia I began making plans to use the Georgia countryside as inspiration for traditional Chinese paintings.  Even though I am in the city (Atlanta) there is no shortage of pine trees (and others) to serve as inspirational pieces.  This past week I was on a school trip (I'm a teacher by profession) and lucky for me we spent the week at a YMCA camp where I had ample opportunity to view and draw.  I bought a brush-pen and sad to say I am complete shit with it but that's ok, the shape of the trees and leaves are there so now it is just the work behind working it out with a brush, and I am quite looking forward to this work.
      P.s. - the first attempt was also shit but I am working on it.

For those of you who are still reading I'll give a brief description of some of the techniques I use. You are welcome to give them a shot and let me know how you get on.  Some of the traditional rules to follow: Compose square-ish painting in a kind of C shape and long-ish paintings by an S shape.  There should be good rhythm between black and gray tones.  There should not be too much black.  By the way the Chinese can never be pinned down by how much is enough and how much is too much.  Unfortunately the trend seems to be whoever is talking to me always has the correct amount and I never do.  Anyway - whatever.  The brush is supported between the thumb on one side and the other four fingers opposite the thumb.  Once I saw in the Asian Art Museum (San Francisco) that there should be the distance of an egg between the palm of the hand and the shaft of the brush, but none of my Chinese teachers ever said that.  Paint with the paper flat on the table or floor the the brush, more or less perpendicular, at least when you start.  The reason for this positioning is because the combination of wrist, elbow and shoulder give you every available angle from which to make a mark.  The beauty of Xuan Zhi (rice paper - which oddly enough has little to no rice in it) is that despite its fragility it can really take a lot of ink and water and color.  For instance you can paint in some gray, then add color, then let it dry and add black, then add some more color.  Or - this is one of my favorite techniques - make a nice think inky line and then wash the brush and add water right to the mark allowing it to bleed.  This effect is something that is looked for in 'good' paintings.  Another nifty trick (anything that entertains me I equate with good) is to load the brush with both color and ink in different parts of the brush then make a mark - cool two-tone effect.  Among my favorite strokes, and one you can see in the painting above, is the wavy, downward  line (my own description not an official term, my Chinese was pretty poor when I was taught this and I never learned the proper terminology).  Set out the edge of a shadow on a mountain or cliff and then alternate gray colored ink, water or even a little color in a wavy, downward stroke.  Another fun stroke is the hatchet (I now this one because my teacher drew me a picture of a hatchet when he demonstrated).  This one works best with think, black ink.  Load up the brush and turn it sideways against the paper and then with force shoot the brush in either direction that gives a full width streak.

When approaching a Chinese style painting (the Japanese and Koreans do this too) the Western style general to specific, light to dark method will not serve you well.  Just get yourself in a quiet mindset and go at it with no fear - like a Samurai - There will be varying levels of success at first but when you reach that place where you can actively make decisions without having to think will yield some pretty wicked paintings and a good experience for you.  If you are going to go the traditional route work on parts of the painting that are nearest the viewer and work your way back into space.  If you are doing non-traditional subjects then fuck all, just see what works for you.  These techniques are really applicable to all subject matter, I really like to paint octopuses and jelly fish and one never finds those in Chinese painting.  I have no problem with this seeing as I am not even a little Chinese, I'm all American in blood at least.

So there you are, a ramble about something I have contemplated for the last ten years.  I'll post some of my current paintings as soon as I get an SD card for my camera.

In China one of the ideas I got from her (Tracy, who was visiting my school yesterday) was that artists are arguing about globalization in art and retaining Chinese-ness. There is a question about whether or not China should stick to its old way of doing things, teaching art making skills, so as not to loose it Chinese-ness. I think China is also feeling like someone is trying to take it over (China has been terrified of that since WWII) the Chinese, always very, very nationalistic, don’t want to be accused of toadying or copying other powers. I told her that China has a good system because it teaches skills but it lacks because they don’t teach anyone how to think. This is a big problem in China. This is why I am excited about punk rock here because that is the group of people in China that have had it with being told how to do things and are expressive, they may lack skills but they make up for it in creativity. The trick is how to get these programmers (computer programmers are a very avant garde group here), punk rockers and hip-hop-pers into the visual arts fold; or extend visual arts beyond, what it is right now in China, an elitist club. The articles I’ve studied about post-modernism have argued such a shift, even Andy Warhol was getting away from that as far back as the sixties, and since in China visual arts is still a select group, it is very difficult to do. We need more exhibitions like the Fuck Off exhibition at Li Liang’s gallery in 2000. This isn’t to say things have to be extreme, but they can be anything so long as its researched, expressive and done on purpose. And if we could blur the distinctions between who gets to participate in high art and who doesn't then I feel that we in China would really be creating a new idea.

Above photo is from Eastlink Gallery's Fuck Off exhibition. There is some really wild stuff there and while very little of it is salable, the exhibition was a visual success.
http://www.eastlinkgallery.cn

Mode of Expression

Just wrote a lesson plan I think is great about different art styles and how artists use their language to express their view of the world. The idea is to have the students :

1. Understand their view of the world
2. Learn about painting techniques Ab/EX, Realism, Impressionism and Pop Art
3. Create a painting that reflects their view of the world/situation in one of those styles

It is helpful for me as well because it allows me to explore these since personally I have been working in the Cold Abstraction vein the last year or so.

I did some personal brainstorming today about my work because I have been focusing on finishing a larger painting and haven't done any deep creative work lately. While sketching/writing out ideas about the moon a news report came on the BBC about telescope makers and reflective qualities. This really intrigued me and I learned about the spook fish (if I heard that correct) that has eyes that have a strong reflective surface in their eyes used to catch more light. The get this by layers of protein and cytoplasm. This immediately calls to mind Chris Offili's paintings which are so thick with varnish that the painting has several layers that are all translucent. This effect is something that I've been going for in my own work. I did accidentally twice but despite experimenting with layers of varnish and supports I haven't been able to deliberately reproduce it.

I've always been drawn to the work of Wolfgang Laib, James Turrel, Anish Kapoor because I feel their work all has that other-worldly sensation to it and I want that same kind of experience from my own. I have not yet succeeded.

I found this still functioning elevator in Shanghai this past summer. It takes one up to probably one of the older contemporary galleries in Shanghai. I first visited in 2004. At the time I expected Shanghai to be country's art center. I spoke with Li Liang who is the proprietor and he assured me that it was Beijing. I a lot of good it did me since I lived in Tianjin at the time

This gallery is still there although I didn't think it was as impressive as it was the first time I saw it. Now that art makes money in China, artists are being less experimental. Fair enough, everyone want to eat and artists are no different. Perhaps it's the buyers who are at fault. If the buyers are more interested in experimental work, then the artists would produce it. Supply and demand. Ai Wei Wei has got it right, use design and architecture, functional things for money. Leave art as expression.

I've often thought that through one's expression they will have ideas and concepts that are applicable in the real world. I have realized that market economies are good for the world as a whole. As ideal as I think communism is, it won't ever be practical because no one person or group of people can know the entire story and thereby make decisions that are good for the whole. So we need to supply what is needed. It is creativity that allows us to see what is needed, or beyond that, what will be needed. I look to design most particularly because I see that it's design that will make life more efficient. It will save us time and resources, make work more enjoyable and easier. Good design will only come from good creative thought, e.g. good art.