It’s getting serious, so it was time for a road trip to get our surviving art prodigies out of the city to reconnect with small-town life. Destination: Cold Spring, NY. It was never explained why the producers chose Cold Spring for the challenge of finding a stranger to act as the subject of a portrait. Continue reading
This week I stand appalled. This episode was a good example of how a reality show can take a good idea and ruin it by trying to make a challenge unnecessarily difficult and by manipulating an outcome by offering a prize that is unrelated to the basic premise of the show. No artist on the judges’ panel was the least of the offenses this week. I guess the show’s producers couldn’t locate a high-profile underwear artist who would agree to appear on camera. Continue reading
I’m sorry for how late this post is. I’ll blame it on jetlag.
This episode of WOA was brought to you by Fiat. I don’t know about you, but I’m getting mighty annoyed with all the product sponsorships on this show. And my ire is not necessarily with having an episode sponsor per se but with having the challenges be so product driven.
This week brought us our second team challenge. The eight remaining contestants were arranged in teams of two and charged with creating a large-scale piece of street art. The judging was respectable with another artist on the panel, which always makes me happy, and I found agreement this week with the judges’ decision regarding top and bottom. Continue reading
This week the artists were challenged to create a piece inspired by a pretty broad source: a New York Times’ newspaper headline. The prize was $20,000 and the opportunity to have the winner’s piece on display at the NYT headquarters. Unlike the Entertainment Weekly challenge, no one from NYT appeared on the panel but I sensed their influence nonetheless. Continue reading
So far we’ve had two challenges that were fairly broad – do something related to motion and make a piece of Pop art – and two based on another piece of art work – the kitsch challenge and this week’s kid’s art challenge. Continue reading
Another SF open studios season has passed! Luckily, I’m here to recap for you. I’ve decided to put the last two weekends into one post as the venues I visited for each weekend were similar: Fort Mason for weekend 4 and Hunter’s Point Shipyard for weekend 5. Both locations offer large, multi-room buildings with a military past that now house artists and/or arts organizations and give you the opportunity to see the work of dozens of artists in one place. Continue reading
Episode 3 of WOA offered up a head-on collision between the integrity of art criticism and reality TV’s addiction to product endorsements leaving the integrity of art criticism in traction. Yay! And while they added an artist back to the judging panel this week, it was still very clear who made the final decision on the win. Continue reading
Sorry for the delay on this post. My lack of cable is becoming an issue! And my sister, Tina, is visiting, which has been a delightful distraction. Also, I’m having a difficult time finding photos from the show to accompany my posts. If anyone has any ideas on this one, please let me know. Okay, so enough with the apologies and excuses. Let’s get on with the show! Continue reading
My sister is visiting SF for a few days, and we will be checking out the open studios at Fort Mason (more on that later, of course). Before moving on to this weekend’s art festivities, I want to recount my only open studio visit for week one, which I almost forgot about. I was heading to dinner in the Castro and dropped in on Morris Taylor’s studio. Continue reading