{"id":7750,"date":"2021-04-12T16:35:51","date_gmt":"2021-04-12T16:35:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/artsnb.ca\/web\/?p=7750"},"modified":"2021-04-19T11:49:09","modified_gmt":"2021-04-19T11:49:09","slug":"what-does-it-mean-to-own-art-to-have-art-to-buy-art-to-sell-to-show-how-do-we-value-art-how-do-we-access-it-who-is-it-for","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/artsnb.ca\/web\/2021\/04\/what-does-it-mean-to-own-art-to-have-art-to-buy-art-to-sell-to-show-how-do-we-value-art-how-do-we-access-it-who-is-it-for\/","title":{"rendered":"WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO OWN ART? TO HAVE ART? TO BUY ART? TO SELL? TO SHOW? HOW DO WE VALUE ART? HOW DO WE ACCESS IT? WHO IS IT FOR?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Written by Bonny Hill<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Featured artist series \u2013 Bonny Hill<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
<\/div>\n\n\n\n

From Marcel Duchamp\u2019s Fountain<\/em> to Banksy\u2019s street art, to the recent establishment of NFTs (non-fungible tokens), contemporary artists have been exploring postmodern issues of elitism, originality, and authenticity. Some of my recent work and much of my work going forward delves into an exploration of art consumerism and marketing in a rapidly changing environment. Folks are buying \u2018art\u2019 in big box stores and on Amazon and Wayfair. Public and private galleries are shifting to digital sales and virtual exhibitions. The global pandemic that is COVID-19 is presenting new virtual spaces such as Zoom and other video conferencing platforms that present fresh possibilities for showing and monetizing artists\u2019 work and boosting gallery sales.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I love art that is accessible. I use humor, irony, parody, and paradox to engage a wide-ranging audience on some level.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
Grouping of several S.C.A.M<\/em>. pieces, Acrylic latex on canvas.<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
<\/div>\n\n\n\n

I Don\u2019t Know Anything about Art. I Just Want Something Nice to Hang Over My Sofa to Match My Living Room<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

artsnb Creation Grant – Category B, 2010<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The idea for this work came to me when my mom made the statement that has become the title of this show. I started by painting an image of her sofa which I then hung over it and painted a painting of that and so on until the paintings of the paintings got so tiny that I couldn\u2019t see them anymore. I loved the paradox presented by using the Drost effect: impossibly, the image continues infinitely. The rest of the work grew from there and is intended to engage the viewing audience in a dialogue about the idea of being a consumer of art.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
Sofa Studies – a view of I Don’t Know Anything About Art. I Just want Something Nice to Hang Over my Sofa to Match my Living Roo<\/em>m, at Sunbury Shores, 2015<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
<\/div>\n\n\n\n

Much postmodern art reacts against elitist, avant-garde art that is accessible to a very small, entitled audience, and that makes the rest of us feel left out when we don\u2019t \u2018get it\u2019. In pieces like This is a painting.<\/em> This is a pillow,<\/em> I wanted the viewer to realize they really are the same thing  \u0336  some paint on a piece of cloth  \u0336   so why is the painting all precious and mysterious while the pillow is just a common, mundane object? In another pairing, two identical canvases proclaim, \u201cThis is Art\u201d and \u201cThis is Craft\u201d. The first piece has painted text and the second is embroidered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some of this work also raises issues about originality, authenticity, and elitism. For the Real Winners <\/em>series, I put real paint over big box store giclee prints purchased at yard sales to turn them into real art: whatever that is. I try to be non-judgmental about artists who sell their \u2018one of a kind\u2019 pieces to be printed in huge numbers. I do hope that the artist is fairly compensated, and I suspect that much of the art is made on assembly lines by people or machines applying various gel mediums and selective brush strokes over mass produced prints. Buying art at the same place you buy mattresses or dish soap certainly establishes a democratization of art. We clearly want to have art in our homes, and if we settle for a copy of something that we value and if the original artist has made the choice to sell copyright, who are we to judge?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Several smaller pieces painted with common latex house paint on cheaply made canvas provoke introspection about issues of preciousness (This Canvas was Made in China, but the Painting is Real; If You Like This One, You Should See the Next One!;<\/em> or, You Can\u2019t Get This at Walmart).<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\"\"

Quiet on the Set <\/em>series–<\/em> all 12″x16″, acrylic on canvas
My Little Sister Could Paint This
This Matches the Drapes Perfectly
This Piece is Very Affordable
This Painting is Really Good
You Can\u2019t Get This at Walmart
I Get This
This Piece Would Look Perfect in Your Hallway
You Get This (No really! You get this! Take it off the wall and take it home with you!)<\/em><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
<\/div>\n\n\n\n

The most recent pieces in this series have been made over fabric stretchers and come with a matching pillow. Many have the commercial paint colours listed on the back so the consumer can match the paint colours to their space. In fact, customized spin paintings made on a pottery wheel are available to be created in commercial house paint colours selected by the consumer or their designers. Contemporary Toille <\/em>uses classic French toile fabric re-interpreted with more contemporary themes (golden arches in the background, infants using iPads, etc). Instead of trying hard to make art that matters in this series, I really enjoyed making S.C.A.M. \u0336 Shamelessly Creating Art that Matches.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n

 I Don\u2019t Know Anything About Art. I Just Want Something Nice to Hang on My Wall for Video Conferencing.<\/em><\/strong>               <\/p>\n\n\n\n

artsnb Creation Grant-Category B, 2018<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
Meta<\/em>, at the Saint John Arts Center, 2021<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>
\n

In January of 2021, I was preparing to hang my most recent work, Meta<\/em>, at the Saint John Arts Centre (SJAC). Meta<\/em> consists of a series of large canvases that, from a distance, “read” as photo-realistic studies of close-up views of paint, and from up close appear to be painterly, non-objective arrangements of paint with lots of surface interest: work that invites the viewer to look both at and through the surface of the canvas. I was very interested in exploring the self-referential aspect of using the material to depict the thing being depicted.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>
\n

In the midst of the second wave of COVID-19 and the real possibility of a return to galleries closing to the public in my area, I was thinking a lot about the explosion of Zoom and other video conferencing platforms and the impact of this movement on private art acquisition. To address this interest, I included an interactive, conceptual piece in the exhibition. I Don\u2019t Know Anything About Art. I Just Want Something Nice to Hang on My Wall for Video Conferencing <\/em>was essentially a list of instructions inviting the viewer to \u2018shop\u2019 for a Zoom background and to post using hashtags, #superniceartforzoom and #snaz. SJAC created a video to introduce the idea of supporting visual artists and galleries by featuring art on Zoom calls and broadcasting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(Photo: #SNAZ with Jared Bett’s work: Honolulu Escapism 2<\/em>)<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\n