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#21
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A necklace I am proud of :)
Abrasha wrote:
People who make this kind of crap, make a great deal more money than I do. Oh, get over it. People die. The populace votes Republican. People believe in dogmatic religions. Volcanoes erupt. Species become extinct after asteroids hit the Earth. The Mafia is still around. Hicks are riding around with guns in their trucks. Stop being a big baby. |
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#22
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A necklace I am proud of :)
On Sat, 14 Jan 2006 18:19:57 -0800, in rec.crafts.jewelry mbstevens
wrote: Abrasha wrote: People who make this kind of crap, make a great deal more money than I do. Oh, get over it. People die. The populace votes Republican. People believe in dogmatic religions. Volcanoes erupt. Species become extinct after asteroids hit the Earth. The Mafia is still around. Hicks are riding around with guns in their trucks. Stop being a big baby. Yikes. All that? Now you're making ME wonder whether slitting my wrists wouldn't be a goodidea too... (grin) Seriously though. I didn't read his post as being any sort of big baby. I saw it as explaining the source of his frustration with the current state of affairs in the market. And that seems to me to be a quite legitimate issue that faces a lot of artists. Not something to be flippantly dismissed, IMHO. It seems especially interesting to consider it in the light of an artist like Abrasha, who from all appearances, seems to be doing all the things we are all taught to expect should lead to success. A good web site. Great work. Lots of publicity and a long show record. Good galleries. etc. etc. As I asked before, how do we all need to change in order to adapt to this new face of the market, if indeed it's even all that new? Peter |
#23
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A necklace I am proud of :)
"Peter W.. Rowe," wrote in
: On Sat, 14 Jan 2006 18:19:57 -0800, in rec.crafts.jewelry mbstevens wrote: Abrasha wrote: People who make this kind of crap, make a great deal more money than I do. Oh, get over it. People die. The populace votes Republican. People believe in dogmatic religions. Volcanoes erupt. Species become extinct after asteroids hit the Earth. The Mafia is still around. Hicks are riding around with guns in their trucks. Stop being a big baby. Yikes. All that? Now you're making ME wonder whether slitting my wrists wouldn't be a good idea too... (grin) Seriously though. I didn't read his post as being any sort of big baby. I saw it as explaining the source of his frustration with the current state of affairs in the market. And that seems to me to be a quite legitimate issue that faces a lot of artists. Not something to be flippantly dismissed, IMHO. It seems especially interesting to consider it in the light of an artist like Abrasha, who from all appearances, seems to be doing all the things we are all taught to expect should lead to success. A good web site. Great work. Lots of publicity and a long show record. Good galleries. etc. etc. As I asked before, how do we all need to change in order to adapt to this new face of the market, if indeed it's even all that new? Peter I think he needs to get over it too. Just because he doesn't like her stuff and has a hard time paying his bills doesn't mean he has to cuss some other people for doing what they like. I personally don't care a lot for the beaded stuff, but my my wife can make a pair of earings out of it and only have about $2.00 in it and sell them for $18.00. She is only giving people what they want. If they didn't like them, they wouldn't buy it. Maybe he needs to go somewhere that people like what he is doing. -- Larry S. TS 52 |
#24
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A necklace I am proud of :)
People who do this sort of work seldom get paid what they are worth.
Look at tedsrosaries.com I couldn't come close to making a living with that stuff, but if ain't bad stuff, IMHO. Stop trying to make a living at it and bitching when it doesn't do that. Have fun and get a day job in the meantime. ted ----- Original Message ----- From: "Peter W.. Rowe," Newsgroups: rec.crafts.jewelry Sent: Saturday, January 14, 2006 8:26 PM Subject: A necklace I am proud of On Sat, 14 Jan 2006 18:19:57 -0800, in rec.crafts.jewelry mbstevens wrote: Abrasha wrote: People who make this kind of crap, make a great deal more money than I do. Oh, get over it. People die. The populace votes Republican. People believe in dogmatic religions. Volcanoes erupt. Species become extinct after asteroids hit the Earth. The Mafia is still around. Hicks are riding around with guns in their trucks. Stop being a big baby. Yikes. All that? Now you're making ME wonder whether slitting my wrists wouldn't be a good idea too... (grin) Seriously though. I didn't read his post as being any sort of big baby. I saw it as explaining the source of his frustration with the current state of affairs in the market. And that seems to me to be a quite legitimate issue that faces a lot of artists. Not something to be flippantly dismissed, IMHO. It seems especially interesting to consider it in the light of an artist like Abrasha, who from all appearances, seems to be doing all the things we are all taught to expect should lead to success. A good web site. Great work. Lots of publicity and a long show record. Good galleries. etc. etc. As I asked before, how do we all need to change in order to adapt to this new face of the market, if indeed it's even all that new? Peter |
#25
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A necklace I am proud of :)
Peter W.. Rowe, wrote:
Seriously though. I didn't read his post as being any sort of big baby. Not this one, perhaps. His attack on the newbie was. I saw it as explaining the source of his frustration with the current state of affairs in the market. I was pointing out to him that he has a choice of how to handle his frustration. I must know 30 painters and several sculptors and ceramicists with the same frustrations. The brash one is the only one who makes a habit of attacking newbies for the pure _meanness_ of it. He gave the newbie no reasons except that he didn't like the piece. That's not an argument, that's an appeal to his own 'authority,' which _I_ certainly don't accept. Hundreds of fields don't pay well. If one is interested in getting paid well, one should choose a field that pays well. The world is the way it is. Some things can be changed. Attacking newbies out of pure _meanness_ isn't the way to change it. And, as to his "good" website, have a look at this: http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=ht...abrasha.com%2F -- mbstevens http://www.mbstevens.com/ |
#26
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A necklace I am proud of :)
"Peter W.. Rowe," wrote in message ... .. As I asked before, how do we all need to change in order to adapt to this new face of the market, if indeed it's even all that new? --------------------- I didn't, I got out. The current fashion is for cheap disposable jewellery made from base metal and baroque stones. It's easy and boring to make, and sells for pennies. If I wanted to sit with a pair of pliers knitting with wires all day I'd go back to electronics, it's more fun and it pays better... -- William Black I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Barbeques on fire by the chalets past the castle headland I watched the gift shops glitter in the darkness off the Newborough gate All these moments will be lost in time, like icecream on the beach Time for tea. |
#27
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**PETER** A necklace I am proud of :)
Yes, it explains, but does not excuse a one line put-down (always a
dangerous response to people who do not know you, but especialy in print where it can seem crass). Abrasha's predicament is not uncommon. I spent my entire working life as a retail jeweller, the latter half at the top end of the London trade. In that time I have seen the new designer come and capture the imagination of the time: he has exhibitions, he and his work is featured in the glossy magazines, and he spawns a host of copies. Then a new star appears and he vanishes from the public consciousness. Ten or fifteen years later something brings his name to mind, and you find that he is still in business making much the same things as before for a very small but loyal band of patrons who just about keep his head above water. In the mean time the same same thing has happened to the new star. Of course the ones who always win are the copiers. This is becaue they have no emotional capital tide up in the designs and are prepared to move on when fashion and the market demands it. The same applies to the retailer. I have often seen pieces that I liked very much, had interesting and original design, were very well made, but which I had to decline because I could not have resold them to my customers. In my experience most artist-craftsmen have only one style. If they are very fortunate, that might last them their working life, but in most cases they are passe in five to ten years if they do not re-invent themselves. Also too many artists ask what the patron can (should) do for them rather than what they can do for the patron. (Imagine Michaelangelo's fate if he had got really uppity with Pope Julius). I looked at the website cited by Abrasha. What is he complaining about? The design? That is purely a matter of opinion, a value judgement. The quality of craftsmanship? Having seen illustations of his work I would say that he has an unquestionable right to comment. The fact that it is selling? I'm sorry, but that is just green-eyed jealousy. In your last paragraph you ask how craftsmen can compete. For the straight craftsman there will always be a demand for top quality work. The artist-craftsman has to learn to change his style to meet the fashionof his day, and to listen to the demands of his patrons. It would help if part of their training included some basic salemanship and PR. I have known some top-rate craftsmen where I would want a whole Western Front of trenches and barbed wire between them and the public. Looking back I wonder if things have really changed that much, although craftsmen certainly earn better money now in real terms than they did fifty years ago. Regards Ben Smith "Peter W.. Rowe," wrote in message ... On Sat, 14 Jan 2006 16:00:44 -0800, in rec.crafts.jewelry "Marilee J. Layman" wrote: Did you read this all the way to the end before you approved it? Yes. Carefully, and with interest. To be sure, I can't say I greatly approve of the profanity used, but it's not prohibited in the charter, and frankly, were I writing such a post, I might well have felt inclined to say much the same. Though I might have worded it differently. Yes, it's an angry and rather depressing or depressed posting, but it seems a pertenant part of the ongoing discussion, and in fact, a whole new aspectto that discussion. Perhaps even the most valuable point made yet in the thread. Frankly, I'm glad Abrasha shared the increased insight into his prior postings and reactions to the other posts, explaining just why he feels as he does. And given that, I must say that I feel I owe Abrasha a sincere apology for misinterpreting his prior posts. I'd thought them dismissive or eliteist regarding beginner work, and now see I was wrong, totally, about what he was reacting to. So Abrasha, I apologize. Please forgive my lack of understanding. Really. And I sympathize as well. You're in a position faced by many artists with integrity in their work, as well as the large number of other small retailers faced with things like competition from Walmart or Costco, including many jewelers who now find their livelihood threatened by mass marking of cheap imports, knockoff copies of good designs for less, and a general perfusion of mediocrity into the marketplace that makes it more difficult for people to sell quality work. I'm reminded of similar concerns expressed already when I was in grad school in the 80s, by my major professor. One of his practices was to totally refrain, despite numerous requests, from doing the common workshops one finds, including those short courses at places like Haystack, or the like, some of which have fine reputations. He felt that as a professor at a full university level program, he has students who were paying full tuition for multiple years to learn from him, and that for him to go do workshops giving away even a small part of that knowledge to those taking that quick route, would be a conflict of interest, against the interests of those full time students who'd then have to compete with the workshop students. As such, on the very few occasions when he'd bend his own rule (such as a workshop in CAD at a SNAG conference one year) he'd require participants to the workshop to be those who already held a find arts degree of some sort, ie those who had already "paid their dues". He illustrated these concerns with those semi pros or advanced hobbyists who'd take a couple workshops, learn one or two neat tech tricks and dive right into production without any training or real care in actually making new work, but rather just doing lots of what they'd been shown. We see such folks doing PMC work, granulation, Mokume, wire wrapping, and who knows what all other narrow technical niches, and sometimes doing them very well, but to the exclusion of a full understanding of the field or even the history of what they are working with. And having learned it not by actual research and experimentation, but by being spoon fed the methods, they also end up being the ones who post oddly simple tech questions to this group or Orchid, on matters that they could easily solve themselves with just a little experimentation. But they've never learned to think this way, wanting to be simply shown the answers someone else has already found, rather than earning their own way to the knowledge. Such people are common on the craft show circuit, and on the web and other sales venues, often sell for less than those truly comitted to doing worthy unique work, and take dollars away from those more committed artists. The lack of training these people have in design, art history, and arts ethics often means they lack some of the inhibitions in doing yet more knock offs, and they sometimes, ironically, seem more prolific and sucessful than the much more fully trained graduates of full arts training programs. And one unfortunate consequence is that even the well trained artists with really good work, may have to downgrade their own work ethics just to be able to compete in the marketplace with the poorer work out there. It seems to me that this situation is not going to change markedly. This level of competition, whether from some well meaning but unsophisticated beginner, some marketer who's sole aim is to make lots of money without regard to quality, or simply from the big boys like Costco and Wal mart, is simply There now, and won't go away. So the question for many of us then becomes one of how to compete. It's no longer, it seems, enough to just produce really good work and hope the world finds it's way to your door. There's so much info out there flooding the awareness of the public that a merely hopeful artists is going to get lost in the clutter. What we need is to consider how to compete, and how to better market ourselves. We need to increase the number of consumers who understand the difference between really good work and kitschy or commonplace but still attractive work, and are willing to pay for the difference. And these people then need tobe able to find us. So then. Here's the question for the group. How can someone like Abrasha, or other fine artists who's integrity and skills with their craft lead them to put quality first, and thus produce a really high end product, but in perhaps more limited quantitites, suceed in today's marketplace? It's not enough to just have a good web site, since as anyone who's looked at Abrasha's can see, he's done that part already. So what else? Peter Rowe |
#28
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A necklace I am proud of :)
On Sun, 15 Jan 2006 06:31:01 GMT, HareBall
wrote: I think he needs to get over it too. Just because he doesn't like her stuff and has a hard time paying his bills doesn't mean he has to cuss some other people for doing what they like. I personally don't care a lot for the beaded stuff, but my my wife can make a pair of earings out of it and only have about $2.00 in it and sell them for $18.00. She is only giving people what they want. If they didn't like them, they wouldn't buy it. Maybe he needs to go somewhere that people like what he is doing. What's she paying herself for time? -- Marilee J. Layman http://www.livejournal.com/users/mjlayman |
#29
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**PETER** A necklace I am proud of :)
"Peter W.. Rowe," wrote:
And I sympathize as well. You're in a position faced by many artists with integrity in their work, as well as the large number of other small retailers faced with things like competition from Walmart or Costco, including many jewelers who now find their livelihood threatened by mass marketing of cheap imports, knockoff copies of good designs for less, and a general perfusion of mediocrity into the marketplace that makes it more difficult for people to sell quality work. ---------------------------------------------------------- Welcome to capitalism at it's worst. Art has become just another product in the line, but with many infant-problems cause it's a relatively new product on the market. That's the way I see it. ---------------------------------------------------------- So the question for many of us then becomes one of how to compete. It's no longer, it seems, enough to just produce really good work and hope the world finds it's way to your door. There's so much info out there flooding the awareness of the public that a merely hopeful artists is going to get lost in the clutter. ---------------------------------------------------------- How to compete? My thoughts are, first popularize modern art. It seems tome that to the vast majority of people who buy jewellery these days (myself included), concepts of modern art are totally undistinguishable. And to be honest, I'll never pay top dollar for something I don't understand. To be honest again, and without any wish on being rude, some pieces from Abrasha's site would (based on the first glimps) lead me to install them in my car, thinking those are some parts I lost along the way, rather than think they're parts of a designer jewellery collection. It's just the same as with a painting I once saw, made out of two lines and a dot. I was spinning my head trying to see what was that the author was trying to express, but I could have stand there for a century and not figure it out - cause I don't understand modern art and no artist is willing to explain his work and his inspirations. They forget we're not all former art school students. But that doesen't mean that we have no interest in art what so ever. ---------------------------------------------------------- What we need is to consider how to compete, and how to better market ourselves We need to increase the number of consumers who understand the difference between really good work and kitschy or commonplace but still attractive work, and are willing to pay for the difference. And these people then need to be able to find us. So then. Here's the question for the group. How can someone like Abrasha, or other fine artists who's integrity and skills with their craft lead them to put quality first, and thus produce a really high end product, but in perhaps more limited quantitites, suceed in today's marketplace? It's not enough to just have a good web site, since as anyone who's looked at Abrasha's can see, he's done that part already. So what else? ---------------------------------------------------------- As you, Peter, said in one of your posts on this topic, beginners don't explain their work and level of skill when they ask for opinions or advice so they risk being ridiculed. Just the same, artists often don't seem to think they need to explain their work to the public, from inspiration, ideas, manufacturing processes, craftmanship skills necessary for the work, materials involved etc., because it's art, and obviously think people need to blindly buy art even if they don't have any understanding of it. I don't accept that. Those artists, just the same, risk being missunderstood and having problems selling their work. Take for instance a package of sugar or salt (I'm sure you have it somewhere near) and look at a bunch of information provided with it. See what I mean? And that's a basic product which costs very little. Another thing with modern art is simplicity. And I think that's one of the more important issues. I personally am not a fan of simplistic design so something needs to be interesting in other ways to attract me. For instance, contain what I call "gems with a character" like amber, opal, emerald, sunstone etc., that can make even the simplest piece look unique and awake imagination of the viewer. And again, I'm sure pieces that look simple can be quite complex to make, but how am I suppose to know if that's the case. When people like me see a typical piece of modern jewellery, first thought is (honestly again...) "what idiot would pay such a price tag for something as simple as that?". That's because people are used to the fact that art is something not anyone can do (and today's art visually suggests otherwise) because of the complexity and necessary talent - take for instance Rembrandt's "Night watch". You don't need a PhD to see that it took yearsof work by a true artist to complete the piece. To sum up, that's what I think today's artists should learn; to take art from simple, to simply amazing (God I really need to go back to writing poetry). Marijan |
#30
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**PETER** A necklace I am proud of :)
"m4816k" wrote in message ... That's because people are used to the fact that art is something not anyone can do (and today's art visually suggests otherwise) because of the complexity and necessary talent - take for instance Rembrandt's "Night watch". -------------------- I could rattle on for hours about the formalisms and imagery in Rembrant's 'Night Watch', which isn't the original name by the way. The fact that the postures of the musketeers are from a drill book and not from life and so represent an idealised image, the fanciful helmets, also not from life but to add a 'classical element', the social pointers, such as the black clothes worn by the captain, the significance of the pole arm carried by the lieutenant and many many more. The picture carries many more 'coded messages' than most modern art. -- William Black I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Barbeques on fire by the chalets past the castle headland I watched the gift shops glitter in the darkness off the Newborough gate All these moments will be lost in time, like icecream on the beach Time for tea. |
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