Creatively Thinking

"Is reality real?" Remember the age old philosophical question?  If a tree falls in the forest and no one hears it fall does it make a sound?  One can extend the question to does the tree exist, does sound exist if no one hears it no one sees it. Well if no one is around to hear it then no one hears it. But that does not mean it doesn’t make a sound.  It is an objective fact that the tree makes a sound.  Just as it is a fact that just because no one sees it it still exists.  It is real.  A tree is a tree, a sound is a sound. I believe that reality does exist within our perceptions.  We can’t make sound anything other than sound, we can’t make an object anything other than an object.  A tree is a tree.  A sound is a sound.  But we can create other things that we can identify as a tree, a sound.  We can make purple trees for example.  And sounds that sound like a falling tree but it isn’t the sound of a real ...

"Galaxy"  by Christine Alfery  22x30 Watercolor  How Do We Know It Is Art? To know something is to have knowledge of something. So how do we know something?  Do we used words, numbers to know something?  Words and numbers can be manipulated to suit desires and needs.  So we may know something that is based on desires and needs but that isn’t a kind of knowledge that can be valued and judged by all as a truth.  How we know something, our knowledge of something needs to be based on facts. Words numbers need not be related to something, they can be arbitrary and based on social conventions.  Facts need to be related to something, visible to all, they cannot be arbitrary.  Words often are based on social conventions.  If knowledge, how we know something, is based on social conventions such as words and numbers then knowledge is arbitrary. Knowledge with this kind of foundation, words and numbers based on social c...

Art needs to be valued.                 What should art be within our culture?  There is no question that there will be many diverse answers to that question.  Some see art as a social tool to manipulate a political agenda, others see it as something mystical that appears out of nowhere and is beautiful, others see art as historical showing the reality of a time.  However you understand or see art, art needs to be questioned as to how it is understood and used.                 Art today illustrates the enormous gulf between what we know, that is what is objective, physical, real and knowable and the mystical, the unknowable, superstition and imaginings.                 Art can be understood, judged, questioned through the knowable.  Art cannot be judged on the unknow...

"Rubies Rider"  Artist Christine Alfery "Mike The Mallard, Flash Gordon, and Jenny Dolls.  What has happened to the concept of "play?'" I was in an antique shop recently, just meandering through the antiques that allowing them to stir up memories from my youth, from my family, from my foundations.  There was a 7” doll that caught my attention wearing a little green gingham dress.  I became convinced that that dolly used to be mine.  I had a doll just like it and a she had a dress just like that one.  I gave all my dolls away during my last move as no one in the family wanted to keep them so it was a wonderful to come across this treasure that I sure used to be mine. I purchased the doll and she now is on my memory shelf.  This shelf is currently with inspirations. Mike the Mallard a ladder climbing fireman resides there.  Flash Gordan in his rocket power flying machine that has wheels that work when you wind up a key, along with an old ...

"The Story"  (Also known as "Trip To The Beach")  Artist Christine Alfery Art and Aesthetics One of the definitions of aesthetics distributed on a video by the J. Paul Getty Museum was the “ah ha” moment.  In the video, there was a classroom instructor who had distributed his teaching materials for the day, which included a glass of water and a small amount of color.  The students were instructed to drop the color in the water and not to speak.  The camera zoomed around to the faces of the students as the color hit the water, the aww was visible on their faces, the fascination held their interest for a long time.  After a couple of minutes, the instructor stated that moment was the aesthetic moment in the arts.  The aesthetic moment is about immediate pleasure and stimulation with the focus being on personal satisfaction, it is a focus on the self.   It is fleeting and not permanent. The aesthetic moment can never r...

"Tightrope"  Artist Christine Alfery Artists stylize reality.  Artists take the metaphysical, something that can never be anything other than  what it is, water is water, flowing water in a creek, trees, trees moving in the wind, sun rising, sun setting are all examples of the metaphysical.  Artists isolate what is important to them and they stress that importance in their work.  Their work is hand-made, their work if it is authentic, stresses the truths, the values the artist hold.  Art can be judged by the authenticity of the artist, the viewer recognizes this authenticity in the work and relates to it in one way or another, positively or negatively. Artists who create work from a subjective state such as I feel, I wish, I believe, these mystical beliefs have nothing for their work to be judged on.  It is impossible, because it is an I feel state and is subjective Should art be judged?  There is really no escape from makin...

"Release Me"  Artist Christine Alfery Acrylic on Canvas - 58x60 Art is a Sense Of Life. Art and aesthetic must be guided by more than emotions and feeling.  Art must be guided by more than, it makes me happy, it makes me feel good.  I say this because if art is just subjective then it has no identity because it can be anything and everything.  For me when I am creating, the goals I attempt to achieve, and they don’t always happen, are to have my work have speak to, relate to my sense of life. Some of the unique, marks I create, that relate to my sense of life and my life experience include, bridges, ropes, ladders, wheels, flying critters, wings and hills as well as smooth and chaotic lines, monochromatic colors, and bold colors. When I step back and look at a finished work I always ask myself, is this work a thing in itself, it is not the same as anything else. Is it unique because I created it, and it is my unique, original style and marks tha...