If you are a lurker so to speak, why? are you just the learner.

why do you post your art on line. why do you not post it?

Personally, I believe that we all are continuous learners, so I often lurk. There are many reasons I do not post my art, and only the least of which is how personal it is to me. Another is the art genre' changes with my mood swings, and strangely the darker the thing I do, the better it is, but much of the things I produce cannot be placed in a general viewing capacity, either because of violence or some other graphically objectionable material. Who objects, is merely the flip of the coin. I do not like someone applying their interpretation of what is or is not acceptable to my definition of free speech. I will not encroach upon another, nor put them down. I find almost all art appealing. I just refuse to subject myself unnecessarily to criticism that I really do not want. so , I do not post. I will if it were required of me. Such as this place called e-caricatures, they demand at least 2 submissions before they will give you admission to the board. If you challenged me, now that is a different story, i am still full of enough immaturity and bull doo doo to step up when challenged, but that is a different thing all together. My children have long since stopped saying "I dare you" to me.

I post my drawings online for many reasons. Perhaps the most important ones being that I recieve a lot of encouragement from comments, I believe other people enjoy my work and that I have inspired others to draw.

BRB

I suppose I was wondering , mostly why a person would not. Hence my post. I was thinking to myself , "...why don't you post some of your stuff..." I realized I no longer enjoy putting it up. My house is full of it as many neighbors as well. heck!

I do not like someone applying their interpretation of what is or is not acceptable to my definition of free speech. I will not encroach upon another, nor put them down. I find almost all art appealing. I just refuse to subject myself unnecessarily to criticism that I really do not want. so , I do not post.
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Well by making this post you are indeed subjecting yourself to some form of comment ( or criticism?) !

True, everyone can have their own definition of what is free speech, so if one is one an island alone and in company with the winds and the trees and perhaps the birds, anything goes. But being in a cultured society certain norms are expected from all and being refined, thoughtful and understanding in speech is what is best.

Art interpretation generally rests with the beholder as for instance my daughter likes abstract art and does her painting. I look at them and wonder..."what does she see in this?" I have to tell her that abstract art is not one of the areas of art that I admire.

Then there are the nudes which almost all artists indulge in as if it was their lost and found desire that rises them to greater heights. I like to ask artists at art shows what they find so interesting in painting and drawing nudes and putting them on display in their booths. Generally the response is that thay find the work inspiring. The male hudes should cry foul for those are hardly ever put on display in the art booths at art shows. Yes...free speech in the form of displays.

I am a lurker but I do read the posts. I am by no means an artist but if I were one, I would not have any qualms in posting my works because on this site I have read so many wonderful help, advices and praisworthy comments, that any artist would welcome. It begs the question...why draw and paint if not to let others see your works?

Carl

"no man is an island..."

You are absolutely right, however I qualified why subject myself to anyone else's opinion. I suppose the type of thing I meant, well let me further explain, I am getting chemo-therapy and I suppose I am suffering more then maybe I should allow my self to indulge in, and I have 11 children that I am worrying about, so my art takes on a different form, even by my own estimation, I find it good ,, but the dementia, if you will, thatI am suffering brings out too much depressive poop, no matter how good it is. so, I do not post it, however if I were I would only post it in the thread titled critique. not anywhere else that it may be indexed.

maybe if you did post you would feel better

You know.....you are probably correct. I do know that it is wrong to give into depression no matter what causes it. but it is difficult. I am doing art , I am not afraid of the critique, I am afraid of being "subjected" to too much "SUBJECTION and objection.

I would love to see your art.

BRB

I also would love to see your art, and being immature minded at the moment myself..."I dare you"...hehehe

To be really brief, I post my art to show off.
My drawings aren't really good [Compared to some people, I'm awful] but I'm proud of it and it's mine.

I think I can understand something of what you mean. When I was going through chemo, I think my art was very much a part of what kept me going day to day (aside from my faith). My first cancer, I wrote and drew in the handmade book (pictured below) while sitting endlessly at the Cancer Center getting treatments. I had made the paper and book in class with my students.

I then turned to drawing a great deal while in the hospital a month for an induction chemo for my second cancer. Afterward, spending those long hours sitting in the Cancer Center, I would ask for pictures of the nurses children and I would draw pencil portraits almost everyday. Altogether I probably finished between 40 and 50 portraits. I believe giving myself those little faces to look at and draw everyday placed my focus on something aside from the obvious.

I guess I post my drawings because I believe God blessed me with this talent for a purpose - maybe just for others to enjoy, maybe for my own health; for His glory, I know. Whatever his reason, I love creating art and it blesses me to share it with others. I am also blessed by the sharing of others.

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I always accept dares...You know that saying our moms or significant others said when we were growing up..."well If they jumped off a bridge..." I jumped off the tacony palmyra bridge when i was 16 , along with 8 others, from the jersey side. course...that was a long time ago, considering I will be way older next week.

challenge accepted!


Marc

Some of the art that I do is "Pin-up" art old time illustration cheese cake, some are provocative but out of almost 300 over a period of more then 25 years, they amount to only a hand full. But Inre to
things being dark , I have always worked from an instinctual on the spot momentum, like the original grimms fairy tales, you know they were actually very gruesome, and I am detail oriented, so it becomes very graphic, at times. some of it depicts casualties of war, some Gothic, vampire, werewolf concept art and like I said it may be influenced by my mood, or perhaps the medicines, derivatives of the "poppy flowers are a cancer patients friend" thats meant to be in fun, its not a football; for someone to grab and run with. I am very greatful to be alive. When I first contacted Brenda, I was in the "Cancer treatment Centers Of America" at Baltimore, and I was very ill and angry because I had been misdiagnosed , and if caught earlier , Lots of pain could have been avoided, But I acquaint everyone with this to show that it drastically affected my work, There were hundreds of scenes of mayhem and graphic renditions of vampire/werewolf gore, all the anger I had showed and still shows in all my work. as an adult I thought I should not subject this ...wholesome place to my psychological battering. In fact I should not have brought my illness into any conversation but it became necessary to have everyone grasp the true meaning of why I don't post, Strangely, I almost always encourage a person to publish in direct opposition to this thread. I tell anyone and everyone to get their work noticed by whatever means. Just not me.

I would love to see your art too.

We all have better and worse moments in our life, ( for some worse than for others...), but in my opinion, when we are going through those BAD moments, it helps when we get a friendly comments, and we do get allot of that here...most of them put a big smile on my face and help me forget my problems....

Maybe you are just beeing a little hard on yourself, like Venus I also dare you

And if someone says sometinhg you don't like...just ignore it and go on...That's life!

Wish you the best

Clara

I post mine just because I post mine...no particular reason. Sometimes it is just encouraging to see that people sometimes do like them!

I post mine not because I want to be an artist or something, but because I want to communicate with others. I gave up being an artist over 5 years, the ONLY reason I've started to draw again is to communicate with people on the internet. That's why I'll post any old thing anywhere. Producing art and communicating in real life have been a happy by-product.

If I become an Artist with a capital 'A' again on the way? Well, I've just begun to think that that might not be such a bad thing anymore.

It's not just about getting better at drawing etc., it's getting those things that can be best or be only expressed as images out there. It's like rubbing shoulders with people. Some people like to swim with the dolphins, I want to swim with the humans...

dolphins are smarter then us!!! alot of the things I have done, are somewhat explicitly gorey, I am nothing if not realistic. I have had things censored before, not for erotica, and never on deviant or elfwood, livejournal. I have been afraid to post, truthfully. Art to me and for me, is so, so deeply personal and revealing I have been worried that perhaps, I may lay bare to much without any real intent to do so, you know like when my kids text to me"TMI" and i realize I need to be quiet and ...less informative...........


Marc

Newcomer jumping in here ... (turning shy mode off for a moment)

I don't post my stuff online much and this thread got me to thinking about why. And since I'm trying to become introspective that turns out to be a good thing. :-)

Here's the thing. I've never had the luxury of going to school to learn (something I still want to do but know its not likely to happen). Why don't I post more ... or really, at all ...? Because it honestly never occurred to me. I know that what I am capable of producing is nowhere near in the league of work I've seen others do. These days, I live in an area where I don't know the language (so courses in a classroom aren't a possibility) and am always looking for new options, ways of improving and growing as an artist.

I know that I need to be challenged but I also know that I need solid feedback so that I can learn to see the mistakes for myself and figure out how to make them better. I've tried private tutors but they all seem to fail for the same reason -- they give me projects to work on but give me almost no feedback regarding my mistakes or advice on how to make things go better.

Though its a lot of money, I think I'm going to enroll in the Famous Artists course. I've heard from some artists that the instructional method is sound and that the feedback I can get will be invaluable. Found this site by accident and I love the lessons that are shown -- especially the one for "Old Tree". Want to try and work with this some, see if I can get a result even approaching hers. :-)

(Turning shy mode back on again)
Tori

I have said time and again that I do not post for whatever reason...But I used to and I have to because "Venus" has challenged, So I must...hah! But I do art work each and every day. I have been blessed in that , though I did not have the money personally, I was able to get tutition anyway. Many of the people I know and on here are self taught, your art is you. persue what you do in the manner you choose. I have heard things about similar schools as well. If I had to , or could afford to take another degreed' program I would choose either "Ringling brothers" in Florida, or the cartoon caricature course, at that college in Washing state, I forget the name but I remember exactly where it is, or that masters class in France, that only accepts like 12 people a year. However, these classes offered here are as wonderful and as great a quality as any I have ever had or been exposed to. Yes it is offered online, sure there is a lag in time, but it is the same or greater caliber, in many respects you receive a greater degree of personal attention from all experience levels and all genre's. I wish you well.


Marc