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Even the separation of art from craft is largely a post-Renaissance concept, and more recent still is the notion that art transcends what you do, and represents what you are. In the past few centuries Western art has moved from unsigned tableaus of orthodox religious scenes to one-person displays of personal cosmologies. βArtistβ has gradually become a form of identity which (as every artist knows) often carries with it as many drawbacks as benefits. Consider that if artist equals self, then when (inevitably) you make flawed art, you are a flawed person, and when (worse yet) you make no art, you are no person at all! It seems far healthier to sidestep that vicious spiral by accepting many paths to successful artmaking β from reclusive to flamboyant, intuitive to intellectual, folk art to fine art. One of those paths is yours.
David Bayles. Art & Fear- Observations on the Perils (and Rewards) of Artmaking (pp. 12-13). (Function). Kindle Edition.
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