I did this painting last night – was sorta depressed – and maybe hopefull, too.

Interesting … I seem to “own” the phase “iphone paintings” in Google – but with the Google Search Wiki in play – it’s hard to say how much weight rankings will have down the line as Social Media Commentary is factored in, more and more.

By the way, I wanted to compare the difference between my screenshot above, and a .jpg file, as I have noted, and so have others, that the way paintings look on the iphone vs. the way they look on a website or laptop, once transferred, are much duller.

But that doesn’t seem to be the case if I’ve worked on them in Piccassa first – just an observation.

This Thanksgiving Holiday wasn’t too bad – like I said in my last post – I tend to get depressed on Holidays but this time, I managed to work a lot of alternatives, often by meeting with friends and yesterday, it was Janice‘s turn, and at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Among the shows I saw – Art and Love in Renaissance Italy and a brief stroll into Beyond Babylon: Art, Trade, and Diplomacy in the Second Millennium B.C.- also took another look at The Philippe de Montebello Years: Curators Celebrate Three Decades of Acquisitions and the European Painting Collection – just to take a quick look at the Cezanne’s, which I usually do every time I visit the museum.   It’s also fun hanging out with friends and taking walks at the edge of Central Park.   Had planned to sketch from sclupture – but didn’t end up doing that.

But I did do two paintings on my iPhone yesterday – both of an orchard plant I bought on Thanksgiving day – and I tried to get the quality of these images to match, as best I could, the way they appear on my iPhone, as I’m creating them – though an exact match is next to impossible.   In translating from one format to another, something is always lost, or, better word, altered – but I think I got the images to be close enough, and sharp/crisp enough to match the feelings of the drawings on the iPhone.

This painting, I did last night, maybe spending an hour or two on it – I’ve been really wanting to paint the orchards since I saw the plant – but I did a sketch earlier yesterday, before I went over to the Metropolitan – and decided to leave it along and not try to improve it.

In fact, I wonder, now my paintings, done this way on the iPhone, can be replayed, what does finished mean, anymore? (by the way, the colors in the CollectingSmiles.com site are also more muted than the originals – but you can see the creation process of any painting uploaded to the site, if it was done in the Colors program).

Can’t anyone just stop the redraw at some particular point and say … I like it that way?

They can.

I just wish I could figure out how to monitize the work I do this way – I suppose I’m having the same problem focusing this issue as I am in deciding rent studio space, again, at the Brooklyn Artists Gym – do I want to do actual, 3D paintings (paintings on paper or canvas) or is it enough to create them on devices like the iPhone, and display them on my blogs?

Is there any real difference – if I’m not monetizing them that well, anyway?

Or is this the beginning of a new phase in Art?

I’m still trying to figure, this one, out.

At least, it seems that way – in Transforming Art Into a More Lucrative Career Choice

Also, a book by Daniel H. Pink which I’ll pick up – A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future seems to almost be the “textbook” on how to get there – to making Art Into a More Lucrative Career Choice

Art schools, too, are starting to step in. At the Ringling College of Art and Design in Sarasota, Fla., students can now major or minor in a program called “The Business of Art and Design.”

Larry Thompson, the school’s dean, said he was inspired to create the program when he read about Dan Pink’s book, “A Whole New Mind,” which popularized the notion that artists, especially those who can marry left and right brain skills, the analytical and the creative, will be in high demand in the coming years.

“I am committed to destroying the myth of the starving artist,” Mr. Thompson said.

I’ll buy the book, first thing tomorrow – as I’ll also be going over to the Metropolitan to see a few shows and have lunch with a friend.

There’s also a new book by Dan Pink out that my friend Valeria Maltoni reviewed recently - I have to check it out

Check out this video about Business Manga – Johnny Bunko
Johnny Bunko trailer from DHP on Vimeo.

I don’t really enjoy holidays that much – though this year, overall, I’m less depressed than I usually am around this time of year – maybe it’s all the friends and social life I have, a lot to be thankful for.

But this painting isn’t really about that – it’s about what I’m feeling – was feeling, over the last few days.    Poing being, Art exists for a lot of reasons, but the main one, the one I’m interested in, is to say that which can’t be said in words or any other way – but which you know is true in your Gut.

That’s what Manet had – that what I feel when I look at his paintings – his feelings – and when I look at Cezanne‘s work, it’s a great mind at work, re-architecting nature – but what strikes me is the feelings he had when he did it.

That’s what I hoped I captured when I took my video footage in Aix last year.

Anyway- here’s the painting – and then you can see how it’s done.