Upcoming Solo Show — fine artist Dennis Ryan

WHEN: March 25th to April 23rd, 2011
WHERE: Gallery On High, Pottstown, PA

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Upcoming artist show in Pottstown, PA, at The Gallery On High, called "A Journey Through Anxiety".

As a fine artist in 2010, I had my artwork in art shows, on TV, on the front page of the newspaper and even on the radio! And these are all great, but I have a feeling that this upcoming combination of education and fine art show will top all I did in 2010, because it could actually help people.

And the way it will work is: I will go to The Gallery On High's school component about a month before the show and I will give a talk... hold an education session for an hour or so. In a sense, this is where I sit down with folks, of various age groups, that have been diagnosed with mental disorders/mental challenges — been given the 'labels' (i.e. Schizophrenia, anxiety, OCD, depression — a lot of these people are even on medications), and I will introduce traditional art examples to them, even show a few of the popular artists of the last century, and then go on to promote that this is not the ONLY definition of what art is or can be. My goal of this talk is to demonstrate arts usefulness as a tool: to help alleviate anxiety, to express abstract thoughts, to access its therapeutic benefits. Especially with respect to anxiety; in addition to tools like communication (talking about mental issues with someone), medication, deep breathing, etc., art can be an additional - powerful - tool to help and/or simply exercise the mind (AKA mental health).

I will then talk about my process as an artist and show a piece or two of my fine art. The group will then start to think about how they can use these techniques to create works that can alleviate or desensitize their anxieties, mental discomforts and disorders. They will then make their art on (estimated) 20'' x 20" canvases.

I will return to the school for another 1 hour group session to see what they created and to talk about the successes of such.

So here's my synopsis of how the session will likely go:

1. What is Art - dispel the traditional thoughts and show diversity - visual presentation - projection... some images - Van Gogh, Close, Pollock (5 min)
   
2. My work, [it] as art, concepts - my process, how art can help the mind, any mind (example: to desensitize oneself to ones fears). (10 min)
   
3. My process - abstract thought/concept, sketch it out/development, ideas for implementation, create, final piece. (15 min)
4. Q & A - ask "clients" what 'thoughts' they would like to 'see'? Abstract - to - tangible. Out in the open... exposed... easier to deal with, talk about. How can best convey these with art? What mediums? What technique/style? (30 min)
5. Students start their pieces.
6. Critique, discussion and wrap up. (1 hour)

For more information on the show: http://www.galleryonhigh.com/events.html

3 Faucets Triptych has been accepted for upcoming show—O.C.D

A few months back I got an invitation to submit my art to an upcoming exhibition in NE, Minneapolis, Minnesota.

I came across your website through a basic Google search for artists related to this topic, and I enjoy your work quite a bit. I will be co-curating this exhibition and I feel your "OCD Art" series of works would be a perfect match. The show opens on Friday, November 5, 2010 and will run for approximately one month.

Since the show is right up my 'alley' and aims to help raise awareness and educate its audience as to what OCD is, I obviously said yes.

I just got word last week that my artwork was accepted and will span approximately 9 feet of wall space. I submitted a brand new version of 3 Faucets for this show. It is a Triptych (collection of 3 giclee prints of 3 Faucets hung together) that will drive home the obsessive compulsive concepts by having three in a row; to repeat the repetitiveness of the compulsions people experience.

A mock-up of the piece is shown below:
More information on the show:
Opening Reception
Friday, November 5, 2010 - 7pm-10pm
http://www.alteredesthetics.com/events/72
Altered Esthetics
1224 Quincy St NE
Minneapolis, MN
612.378.8888

Anxiety art — "1999"

Part 3 in my anxiety art series of paintings titled Irrational Exuberance 1999

Click here to see more picks of 1999 -- close ups on Facebook.

All three paintings shown together — 8ft x 4ft:

Fine Art — trim the fat!

Fine art has tremendous value, BUT...

"the days of the $300 million dollar sale are over"
And I say they should be! I've always believed globalization will determine true value for all things: labor, commodities, materials and even the fine art market. In a recession true value is determined very quickly.

NY art auction market in "free fall" for spring
This article suggests this fine art slow-down is because the sellers are holding their fine art, and not because there are a lack of buyers. Or maybe it is easier for the fine art investors to hold than to admit they overpaid to begin with.

...Allow me to step up on my soapbox...

$300 million at a single auction is a bit exorbitant. And remember, this is coming from the mouth of a fine artist.

Think about it – and it may sound cliché but – that amount of money COULD do so much for so many. That amount of money could change many, many lives. Yet it switches hands in exchange for a few paintings (at a cool $100 million each).

One things is for sure, in a global recession, possibly heading for a global depression, the fat gets trimmed from EVERYTHING! The true value of fine art is being realized.

Shameless self-promotion: For much more reasonably priced original fine art

Lancaster, PA – Amish or Fine Art?

Could the city of Lancaster be the next Soho?

I read an article in the local newspaper this past Sunday that suggested that Fine Artists are leaving the exorbitant, high-cost-of-living areas of New York City, Boston and Philadelphia to settle in areas around Lancaster, Pennsylvania. The article suggested that artists that normally show their work in places like Soho will now show in Lancaster.

Although the article could have been mostly a sales push for the galleries, the shift could be taking place, anything is possible (in theory anyway).

Come to think of it, on warm summer evenings, on the first Friday of every month elbow to elbow crowds are not out of the ordinary. Galleries and museums extend their hours on these Friday nights mainly for the many artist receptions and exhibit openings. The main walk on Prince Street is packed.

The city has a pretty successful annual Art Walk also. So the interest is here!

But is the demand?

The supply of the artists is definitely here. This area has seemingly tons of art schools churning out artists every semester at an endless pace. Talent is abound.

Is it possible that someday Lancaster will be known more for its Fine Art than for its Amish?

Mental illness can help create great art, no?

Psychological disorders are important to the content of my art. I say that these same disorders or mental illnesses, that I use as concepts, actually have helped artists in the past create successful fine art.

So I ask these two questions as illustrative examples:

1. Would Vincent Van Gogh be as famous as he is without a cloud of psychological disorders surrounding his life?
2. Would Pablo Picasso's 'blue period' painting - The Old Guitarist - be as interesting as it in fact is if it were not painted when Picasso was "blue" with depression?
   

The extra-ordinary states of the mind of someone who suffers from OCD, depression, bipolar disorder, etc., may have something to do with the extraordinary paintings, prints and drawings that come from the artists that suffer from them. It's not to say that artists with normal mental thoughts cannot produce arts of wonder... it is to say that many, many artworks from the past and present have been created by people who are not in a normal state of mind. Very successful, very highly valued fine art has been done by artists that suffer from mental incapacitation. It may be the disorder that creates a neurotic passion that in turn, in addition to talent of course, affords the art. And it may be as a result of these mental disorder that these extremely great works happen at all.

When one looks at the world through the glasses of the mentally ill... things look different! So to say that when someone like Van Gogh self chastises himself by sleeping on the hard wood floor instead of the empty bed next to him (because of thoughts of other human beings in the world not having a bed) potentially hinges the state of the mind to a higher, more romantic level that can see views, perspectives, textures and colors that normal everyday states of mind can not.

I've often found it interesting how many of the great artists and fine artists from the past have been associated with some form of mental illness. Two examples for this post are: Vincent Willem van Gogh - any number of his pieces; and Pablo Picasso - specifically his Blue Period.

From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Van_Gogh
"Van Gogh cut off the lobe of his left ear during some sort of seizure on 24 December 1888. Mental problems afflicted him, particularly in the last few years of his life...There has been much debate over the years as to the source of Van Gogh's mental illness and its effect on his work. Over 150 psychiatrists have attempted to label his illness, and some 30 different diagnoses have been suggested. Diagnoses which have been put forward include schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, syphilis, poisoning from swallowed paints, temporal lobe epilepsy and acute intermittent porphyria. Any of these could have been the culprit and been aggravated by malnutrition, overwork, insomnia, and a fondness for alcohol, and absinthe in particular."

From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Picasso's_Blue_Period
"The Old Guitarist is a painting by Pablo Picasso, painted in 1903, just after the suicide death of Picasso's close friend, Casagemas."

Let's think about these artists/artworks for a moment.

Now think about what these artworks would have looked like if these respective artists were on an SSRI (Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors) or other class of antidepressants. Would the artists/artworks be as interesting or successful if they had been dulled by a brain balancing chemical like Zoloft. What would the art look like without the contribution of the disorderly, unbalanced mental state at the time of creation? Without these mental attributions, would these pieces even be worth blogging about?