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I am quite choosy about what TV I watch. I have to admit that I get completely taken in by X Factor.

Have you seen “School Of Saatchi”? It’s a sort of X-Factor for artists. Or it could even be The Apprentice for artists. Anyway, it’s odd because there are various experts judging and some things strike me as odd. This was typified by a female contestant who rigs up strange “sculptures” from found items. On one of the shows, she hung a whistle from a handrail and on another there were odd metal shapes which looked like a collection of , well, odd metal shapes. Could you call it sculpture. Could you call it art? This question has of course been asked before but what I find odd is that it seems to depend on what the artist says about the piece. Then a decision is made on wether it is art or a pile of junk. Surely art should speak for itself.

At WASPS where my studio is, the ground floor is rented out sometimes to graduating art students. Last year we had a dead bee hanging from a clock and a bath filled with mud.

All I can say is, after a week, the mud smelled like the devil.

Give me the Mona Lisa anytime and well done Joe McElderry….

A few weeks ago I received an email from Martin Elliot,  the photographer of “Tennis Girl”. It simply said “My compliments”. I easily get star struck and this poster is legendary for me. I remember it always being in the poster browser in John Menzies for what seemed like most of the seventies when I was a kid.

I wrote back to Martin who asked for a copy of my Andy Murray bum painting which seemed to appear everywhere during the summer of 2009. Martin replied “I would like it for my scrapbook – I’ll fit you in between the Ricky Gervais and Frank Skinner versions!”

So, off my print went and today I received a signed print back from Martin. What a guy, I am so chuffed. All this came about during working on paintings for my ArtDeCaf(now Braewell Galleries) solo show last June. The painting had been very serious an in a minute of lightheartedness “New Balls Please” was born.

Anyway, it’s on with the more serious painting in the studio at the moment but I won’t forget my homage to Andy Murray or the smile it seems to have brought to so many peoples faces. Just as Martin’s print has brought to mine.

Well, that’s it. all this years art events are over. The last day of the Parade Artists’ art exhibition was yesterday. A massive thank you to all of you who came along and browsed, chatted and purchased paintings.

Also, I completed my last painting commission for Christmas and it is safely at the framers so there is definately a relaxed sense of satisfaction around in my studio.

I feel it’s time to slow it down a tad now and chill over the coming weeks. I have to admit to being a bit of a “bah-humbug” type guy so whilst the shops are crazy busy, I will be painting at a more leisurely pace. I am not anti-Christmas, just anti-too-much-consumer-commercial-hype-stress etc.

Things are alraedy in place art-wise for pretty much the first 4 months of 2010 and it is looking really exciting – more news to follow.

More news on that soon.

New Female Painting

Today was the second last day of the Parade Artist’s weekend at the Wasps Artists Studios in Glasgow.

These events are marketed by the artists involved and it can be a bit of an uphill struggle as the marketing budget consists mainly of enthusiasm rather than hard cash.

The first weekend of the event was well attended but today it seemed that the bite of recession was more evident. This is also apparently THE shopping weekend before Christmas so perhaps that’s the reason why people were elsewhere.

Not being one to sit and stare into space, I just had to get my easel down and start some new work. It’s amazing how you can lose yourself and I completely forgot that I was in the middle of a public area. Comments from other artists included several “I don’t know how you can do that with everyone watching” to the usual “can you guess what it is yet?”.

This reminded me of my first painting demonstration at Park Gallery earlier this year which was quite an experience. The paint was sliding off the canvas ….because of the heat. Hard to imagine now in the nippy Glasgow air.

Well, it’s been a good week painting. One of those well-balanced weeks when i have had the opportunity to work on a variety of painting.

This painting, with the working title of “A Mother’s Love” is a big canvas that I have been working on for a few weeks (you can see it in the earlier stages below). I can’t explain how fresh this paintijg feels to me. It may not seem that way to the viewer, I don’t know but the whole process and the meanderings of the method of painting has kept me coming back to the painting in between working on commissioned paintings and other new pieces.

I also think there is a definate knock-on effect and the enthusiasm can be infectious from one painting to another.

Tomorrow is the start of the last art event of the year for me, the second weekend of the Parade Artists exhibition in Glasgow and the above piece will be on display to get the public’s initial reaction.

It’s one of those weeks when I have been quite happily painting away on various art commissions and other paintings and then I just go completely off at a tangent.

I have noticed recently the aggression and anger surrounding the discussion of art and painting. People becoming incredibly animated, almost to the point of rage at times, just because they don’t like or agree with a particular painting.

So, despite being “warned” by various gallery owners that I should not paint celebrity artwork and should steer myself more to the “fine art” side of the line, I treat myself now and again and this week I have also been working on a big new Marilyn Monroe painting.

Can’t you see how it makes me smile?

After the upset at the weekend with the stolen artwork (see below), today was a much happier day at the Wasps Artists Studios.

A few studios down from me, artist Gillian Orr was really getting into her stride with some new paintings of Angels……sounds corny, but they are fab. The office were getting ready for their big move to the new premises at the Briggait (not that we are all happy to see them go) and my new studio mate, Maureen Rocks-Moore got her keys.

I have been thinking of sharing the studio for a while. Lots of artists do it, some to split the rent and some just for company. For me it’s the latter. After several years which sometimes felt like solitary confinement, I decided it was time to move someone else in and when I heard that Moe was looking for a space, the descision was easy. Moe was in the year below me at college and is another Interior Designer turned painter.

I hope her dog(above) gets on with my Kilties and ladies with big hair.

Just to show how serious it can get at the Parade Artists exhibition, pictured is Scotlands 12th most elligible batchelor Frank To and the ever professional photographer, Ian Marshall. This was before the exhibition opened- I believe Ian is practicing facial excercises for the over 45s.

So, big thanks to all of you who came along to the Parade Artists’ first weekend in Glasgow. Saturday seemed really busy and a bit of a whirlwind. Today was a gentler pace and it was lovely to be able to spend time chatting with some of you about the new art and life in general.

With the pace picking up a bit for me it is beginning to look like this may be the last event such as this that I am able to do, which is sad but a necessity I am afraid as the planning is quite mammoth. Also, there was an event today which i found so distasteful that I think will make not taking part in future events easier for me. Overnight, the art is locked in an area which only artists have access to. Today, it became apparent that a piece of artwork had been stolen.

The artist who’s work it was was understandably upset but this also affected the rest of us who thought we were running a mutually supportive collective. People can be low.  This affected the day for me and changed me in ways which looking back I am quite shocked at. Funny as it is now to look back at it , may I apologise to the parents of the young children who were playing with the baloons used to attract attention to the entrance area…..I would not normally take balloons from 3 year olds but as the title says, it’s been a long weekend!

With the recession, there is no doubt that the art world has been hit and for some strange reason, I have been “recession-proof”. I don’t know why, perhaps it’s just where I am in my career. Don’t get me wrong, I am not rolling in money, but I am doing ok. Believe me, I know a lot of artists who are on housing benefit etc just to get by. It can be tough, but I watch fellow artists continue to paint there way through the hard times, which surely can’t last forever.

I visited Edinburgh Art Fair yesterday and it was an interesting experience. Over the past few years, I have got to know quite a few gallery owners and it was strange in a way to see so many I knew under the one roof. Last year, the saying was that the “best seller at the Edinburgh Art Fair was the coffee”. Well, it seems that this was the case again. Every gallery I spoke to seemed to be genuinely shocked at how poor sales were. For a gallery owner, this must be hard. Exhibition stands are expensive and then there’s all the transport and advertising costs. The recession is definately still with us but I left the art fair feeling completely ok.

I think that’s because like many other painters, I do it because I love it and feel somewhat protected from the sharp, front-end of art sales. Artist’s need sales, otherwise they could not continue to paint. It’s a balance and today I was in the studio painting, feeling excited by new work which I am creating and Edinburgh Art Fair is already a memory.

So, I would like to say a public “thank you” to those of you have have bought my artwork  and prints over the years and also to those of you who have suported me with emails of encouragement, filled in the guestbook or replied on the blog. Believe me, in a negative world, it all helps.

Last week, I heard a fellow artist’s work described as “shit”, and a piece of mine was described as “f***ing horrible”. There was more of this negativity at Edinburgh: one gallery even said that the place was full of “crap art” and that at least they vetted the galleries at the Glasgow Art Fair. Art snobs are great fun, especially in a recession!

So I shall remain thick skinned thanks to your support and hopefully sensitive enough on the inside to keep painting in a manner that people appreciate. If I ever become an arrogant art-snob judging “lesser beings” then please let me know

Saturdays are becoming a more frequent time for me to paint. This was unusual in the past but there is something I quite like about painting on a Saturday afternoon.

This new painting is on a big 40 x 30 inch canvas. It was one of these “see it in your mind and attack the canvas moments” and I dont really have any idea where this female art is heading at the moment.

A coupl eof visitors to the studio have commented that this artwork looks like someone else painted it. It was me…honest!

Off for a nosey around Edinburgh Art Fair tomorrow.