Blog Posts - ARTIST - Eva Lewarne

Rotten Banana As Art

12/20/2019

For a curator to post with duct tape a rotten banana on a museum wall and price it at $120,000 is a statement in itself that says …”we don’t value today’s art; artists are worthless and have nothing to say of value and what they produce is rotten, stinks and doesn’t last."

And maybe I think they are right!

Anyone that shits on a canvas now is an artist. No training or education or study of art history needed. All you need really are good connections and a good looking demeanour with a charming personality and people will throw money at you no matter what you produce. Like Jeff Koons, who bamboozled high society into making him a millionaire by pretending bunnies are the rad fad of today’s art world.

The digital age is a great facilitator of producing kitsch. You don’t need to draw anymore, just produce a trace on your Tablet in Art Rage. And if you have money you can print it life size and sell it in Miami. Painting is so hard to sell these days because it still smacks of art school and effort and talent, except of course if you are wedded to abstract art, where none of that matters.

I think I never bought into total abstract art because it felt like I was cheating people, pulling the wool over their eyes, even if I had a degree from College. That is just me. I am sure a lot of talented and educated artists have produced wonderful abstract art. But unfortunately a lot of uneducated untalented people could also do that and did.

I stopped teaching art to adults because they learned one thing and then produced a million abstract pieces that they sold to decorators. Voila, they were now artist with no intuitive feel for it or anything to convey of any meaning. Art became a wall decoration and not what it was meant to be, a statement of a personal vision. Now people when they see art that expresses something real, walk away from it. As do the galleries looking for slick products to sell.

OCADU is trying to produce Creative Thinkers, not Artists, thus so much verbiage oral and written is produced about stuff that you really can’t talk about without having gone through a personal intuitive process. Creative Thinkers are born and not made, as they are yet to discover.

As a culture and a society we are at a place in art, that is fair to express with a rotten banana, a creative expression of it indeed.

Capitalism Gave Birth To Monsters

12/13/2019

We are living in a dark age where monsters thrive... We have discovered the truth of Capitalism which is a ploy to kill Nature and exploit people through promising them the American dream and the binding of women, who had the closest relationship with Nature, keeping them down...where religion has even become perverted, wanting to be a corporation making money...as did health centres and other public institutions, where art is a meaningless commodity and artists the biggest near homeless community. Where art administrators make more money and get more grants from government than artists, who are there just to be exploited by them.

Trump is just a lackie of the Corporate environment...when it is one business there is still integrity but when they form monopolies they become divorced from the human element...and after awhile people are just a number on a spreadsheet!

Just Another Artist

12/3/2019

Art and the artist have slid down a steep tunnel since Rembrandt was declared a genius. Initially the solitary genius was creating from a spiritual transcendent base, solitary, and inspired, like a prophet, in touch with the unseen, his consciousness foreseeing the future. He shunned the marketplace fleeing from temporal entanglements. Selling was selling out. An artist either had patrons, or like Van Gogh nobly starved or were given donations, not unlike religious institutions from family and friends. Some of course had money to begin with.

Soon after the war industry became more dominant as countries were rebuilding themselves. So now an artist was no longer an oracle but a professional, like a lawyer of doctor, who went to school to learn a skill. A profession is not a vocation but also not just a job. Professionals could be made, you did not have to have an inborn talent but could acquire enough skills to become n artist. As a professional an artist had to maintain a set of standards like beauty, discipline, etc. Artists were expected to enter the marketplace but only in the refined circles of academia, commercial art venues, or galleries.

However that too changed, with the advent of fewer resources and higher costs of living, the artist is now not even a professional but an “entrepreneur”. Now we’re all supposed to be our own business, our own agent, our own marketing, production, and accounting departments. Entrepreneurialism is being sold to us as an opportunity.

Artists are no longer seeking patrons but customers. They no longer have time to put in the hours to hone their skills, they are too busy networking, cold calling and being business people. Art has changed drastically from an inspiration or even a craft to a consumer good. So artists are at the mercy of what consumers like and what can sell and their minds are invaded by this.

In the light of these changes, standards in art are secondary to what consumers prefer and what sells. Aesthetics as such which took over from spiritual inspiration now need to yield to the common denominator, what will someone buy. Galleries too, no longer look for inspiring, original artists but ones that make what their clients will purchase.

Everyone’s opinion has equal value. We no longer need educated art historians to tell us what is good art. As a result the whole notion of good versus bad art has disappeared. Anything anyone can sell is deemed to be good art. The customer is always right.

Artists who still believe they have something of value to contribute to the world, something to say are becoming few and far between and very rarely are shown in present day galleries. Museums are prone to display traditional work because they are confused like the rest of the world about what is art. And people like Jeff Koons, skilled manipulators and entertainers, are playing the game that was once reserved for Wall Street.

THE FAMILY AND THE NEW WORLD ORDER

10/27/2019

After watching “The Family" on Netflix it has become clear to me that this brotherhood of powerful men around the world who invoke God as their leader, Jesus to be exact, are at war with everything Jesus stood for. They are also at war with women, who according to them can only play a subservient role in society by supporting their "brave men" in upholding traditional values, keeping women bare foot and pregnant in the kitchen and bedroom and maintaining power and leadership roles in ruling the world order. They pray together, have Prayer Breakfasts and say that if you are one of them a brother, you can do no wrong because you are chosen by God himself. So whatever you transgress it is all ordained by God. No wonder Trump said he is the chosen one. Because that is what he has been told by The Family, and even if he murders someone it is of no consequence in the bigger scheme of things. Meaning in the The Family's playbook of world domination.

As far as I can see, Trump, Scheer and Harper are a part of this order. There is no other reason fro Scheer to keep his American citizenship and his US Air Force Base, while Harper travels the world in some capacity spreading Christianity and fascism.

Only intelligent women and feminist men can fight to keep our freedoms and democracy. Otherwise we will all be slaves of this New World order.

Oh and by the way, Putin is a friend of this Family since he allowed Christianity to grow in Russia again.

It appears that all you need to be a Brother is oodles of money and power and the right philosophy of life, namely, anti-feminism, keeping women subjugated, be anti-gay, anti-abortion, and be loyal to the Brotherhood. Of course this also excludes members of any non-Christian culture. Hence Trump's wall and his loathing of immigrants.

I think this group is the manifestation of what in the Bible has been spoken of as the rise of Ant-Christ, because everything these people do and stand for is the opposite of what Christ actually taught. He did not hang out with powerful and rich leaders. In fact he was vehemently against money-lenders in Temples; he supported women and never said a word about gays. He hung out with the poor and preached compassion.

We live in very dark times, and need to be vigilant to not get caught up in the rhetoric and underhanded hate that is posing as righteous indignation. These men are very very rich and very very dangerous because they adhere to the belief that only if you are one of them, a loyal are you worth anything as a human being. This is not unlike what Hitler believed that only if you are Aryan and preferably German are you worthy to remain alive.

Food and Chemical Companies

10/25/2019

We, like sheep, have never taken the Food Companies to task. And we need to because it turns out that the chemicals are causing our cells to mutate and create cancer, a disease of capitalism. The capitalists are slowly killing us with food.

I bought a can of beans in maple syrup. I love maple syrup, when I tasted it however it did not taste like maple syrup but some kind of chemical. After reading the ingredients with my magnifying glass,I saw that maple syrup was listed practically at the end, preceded by modified corn starch and artificial flavour.

The food and chemical companies have been partners for a long time. They sell chemicals that are close in flavour to the real thing to Food companies who can use it more cheaply and have their food have longer shelf life than real food. Maple syrup is more costly so they put in chemicals. Practically every drink, including juices besides canned food have chemicals in them.

There is a war in the world between democracy and authoritarian fascism.

10/24/2019

I had to unfriend someone today on FB who was disturbed that I posted about Conservatives in Canada leading Canada towards Trumpland politics by bashing Trudeau to the point in the media that children are modelling themselves on their parents and bashing children in school that are pro-Trudeau!

This person does not want to believe that Rebel Media is racists and promotes violence towards immigrants and women. That in fact Trump and our Cons (Doug Ford already spoke about being a Republican and loving Trump) are doing exactly what Hitler started out doing in Germany.

I do not have the energy to convince mindless twits that there is a war between democracy and authoritarian backward fascists a foot.

Canada Needs A Change of Image

10/16/2019

Political correctness on steroids is the antithesis of greatness. If we are focused on grammar while reading poetry we will miss the essence and soul of the words. Political correctness not only kills the joy of life but it is a devise that tries to silence criticism. It is an invention of the uncreative mind to rein in and keep in check the creative ones. It is politically incorrect to be different, original, not tow the line or be yourself in favour of making the group look good. Political correctness is a form of making sure that no one stands out.

That is death in the art world for an artist. To feel that somehow by being different from the status quo you are undermining the very fabric of your culture. Political correctness is in fact a form of disguised discrimination of the minority by the majority. It is a way to control others without actually contributing anything intelligent or creative yourself.

Political correctness shuts down creative debates on any subjects, and it doesn’t allow you to vote differently on art juries from your peers that are watching who raises their hand for which artist. If you cast the wrong vote, you are out of the politically and artistically correct crowd.

Yes, in Canada even the art world has embraced political correctness and it is stifling truly creative artists. If you veer a bit too much from the fad of the times, you are immediately shunned as an outsider artist, often synonymous with being uneducated or unschooled, even if you have a masters, and guarantees that you will never receive an art grant or be shown in a commercial gallery. And let’s face it only a few artists are wealthy enough to pay to have regular shows in for-rent galleries. And those artists are often actually unschooled.

Political correctness in Canada has seeped into the very fiber and area of life and culture and the thought police are re-writing history, removing art from museums and banning, knocking down inappropriate sculptures of historically inappropriate people while burning books. Instead of actually having a healthy, tension ridden, juicy, feisty dialogue between equals that might possibly lead to real change of mind, to a creative resolution.

Political correctness is the way of the child that throws temper tantrums and breaks their offending toys and screams when you try to engage it in dialogue. Political correctness masks the truth. Behind those phoney smiles hides an attitude of total disregard and callousness.

Instead of being politically correct and re-writing history we need to engage in differences of opinion and ideologies discussed respectfully, critically and reflectively. We need to start appreciating our differences and uniqueness and make Canada stand out in the world for its greatness and not for its politeness and political correctness.

It is time we allowed people who are great to be themselves, to support our inventors and creatives and to appreciate that people are intelligent enough to handle a painting of a nude young girl in a museum or looking at a sculpture of a Founding Father that was politically incorrect and realize what actually happened.To leave literature alone and keep teaching from brilliant books in school and not just the politically correct ones.

In art terms we need to stop funding and supporting arts administrators who are the loudest about political and creative correctness and start supporting the artists who are great and recognized to be great by the international art community.

About Political Correctness

10/16/2019

Political Correctness reminds me of a teacher who corrects a child’s grammar while they are bleeding and trying to explain what happened.

Political Correctness is a deflective mask to shield lazy, un-compassionate people from actually wanting to know what the other thinks and feels. Once they can go tsk tsk, they feel satisfied that they have done their bit for humanity and justice and all the racial problems of the world. Feeling satisfied and self righteous the politically correct police no longer have to actually delve into inequality of wages, and status in not being promoted or obtaining the better jobs, or being shown in museums, being made CEO, or the feelings of the other, you know the real stuff of the world.

Once you can tell your neighbour who actually cares about injustice and is irate, that they have said the wrong phrase or made the wrong gesture or painted their face inappropriately these self-righteous morons can sleep easy without lifting a finger or spending a penny in actually helping people to lift themselves up or chastising their bosses for real human rights abuses.

Political correctness needs to be stamped out to make room for authenticity of speech, and relationships. For the realization that we are in fact all human beings in all the same ways that matter, that we are all deserving of fair and just treatment!

About karma in this society...

10/12/2019

I think you have to believe in reincarnation to embrace the concept of karma otherwise you end up blaming cancer patients for negativity and negative thinking which is unfortunately what is happening now in the west...this does not lead to compassion for yourself and others but smells of judgemental pilgrimism. In fact it just puts more pressure on people to be pro-active in strengthening the ego's hold on life, the opposite of eastern philosophy of wu-wei.

The Gift of the Dreamer Is a Double-Edged Sword

10/1/2019

To lack the ability to imagine and to dream is an easy road to contentment. Like the cow that chews grass all day, everyday, we are encouraged to dumb down, be positive, be happy and forget the still divine voice of our dreams and visions.

Our industrial and corporate society has been encouraging us to be content and happy with buying the products of pedlars and merchants, at the low low price of giving up our dreams and imagination. It has been drummed into us that artists and dreamers are flakes except for the few geniuses who made the business world more profitable for the pedlars. Even the art world has played into this with Pop Art and meaningless Abstract Art, playful and innocuous, not motivating anyone to change themselves or the world or expand their perception of life.

Education is focussed more and more on producing adults with no creativity or imagination, just survival skills in the marketplace., using fear of being poor and deprived as a motivating factor. Even art colleges that are rapidly becoming universities are forcing young people to analyze rather than create. They no longer foster the development of imagination and do not provide the proper tools for expression of creativity.

The nature of dreams is a double-edged sword. The price of our imaginations is to live with a constant presence of discontent, a need to share it with the world, a need for transformation. And it means you are going against the grain of the society you live in and ultimately do not fit in it, are rejected by your peers who have accepted the myth of contentment and positive thinking that brutally shuts down your small voice of imagination that says all is not positive and needs to change.

It is a privilege, to be able to dream, and it is a complete mistake by the world to put down the dreamer, to attempt to pacify the imaginative mind, for it’s by that very power that the future can be made a brighter place.

But industrialists and corporations who run our world don’t want a brighter place, they want the status quo that has made them content in the fake world of money, material goods, and comfortable lifestyles and gold toilets.

They would rather kill dreamers than change, so in the art world they exploit artists by asking for fees from them to show their art, thus keeping them hungry or promoting those artists that have bought into their ideology and paint decorative meaningless artwork that reminds people who own it of abstracted cows chewing cud in a idyll setting.