Artists talking online - following the blogs

I haven't posted for a while, but I am back on for some more frequent posting. I am going to stick mostly with art, poetry and innovation topics.

Searching the blogosphere today I was excited to find the blog called artists who blog. If you want to be inspired and you want to contemplate beauty, look to the dozens of interviews with artists and to plenty of artist blogs.

Since I am an artist without a lot of local contact with artists (gotta change this), the blogs are a way of connecting to conversations about art. I like it that many of the posts are about women artists, and many links are to women artists.

So, visit the site and enjoy. Try visiting Gypsy Girl's Guide. Thank you to Art Style Online for the image.

Art sales in a down economy

Watching art galleries close around the country and how the art auction houses are doing during the economy is reported carefully by those who would profit from a relationship with art sales. Some say art will continue to sell in this economy and it is the time to buy, but this may not be so true.

The Art Newspaper was straight on in its reporting on art sales by Sotheby and Christie recently. "Prices for 18th- to mid-20th-century American art plunged in May as Sotheby’s and Christie’s struggled to sell just 60% of their New York auctions, making $32.1m, down from $159.6m a year ago. 'There were fewer bidders than we’ve seen in a decade,” said Dara Mitchell, the head of Sotheby’s American painting department. 'People were cautious and really waiting to see where this market is going.'"

The NYT says: In Christie’s traditional early summer sale of Impressionist and Modern art held on Tuesday, desirable paintings were scarce. A desperate effort to pad the catalog with a sufficiently large number of works led to the inclusion of some mediocrities that never stood much chance to pull through. Inevitably eight of the 42 works that came on the block crashed unsold. Things could have been a lot worse if bidders had not been as ready as ever to pounce on any works, even modest ones, worth fighting over."

Thank you British Counsel for the image.

How Can We Measure Women's Happiness?

Russ Douthat writes in an op-ed in the NYT about a new study showing women are not as happy as they used to be.

He writes, "This is “The Paradox of Declining Female Happiness,” the subject of a provocative paper from the economists Betsey Stevenson and Justin Wolfers. The paper is fascinating not only because of what it shows, but because the authors deliberately avoid floating an easy explanation for their data."

One comment Douthat makes really hit home with me: "Or perhaps the problem is political — maybe women prefer egalitarian, low-risk societies, and the cowboy capitalism of the Reagan era had an anxiety-inducing effect on the American female."

Crowdsourcing to Find Creative Ideas

I am always looking for interesting commentary on creativity and innovation, and I saw this blog by Garrick Schmick of Digital Next at AdAge on creativity and crowdsourcing. Let's see what he says. Thank you to GeoCities for the image.

He writes, "We typically think of "creativity" as a singular effort with the Steve Jobs or Lee Clows of the world -- the solitary individual known as much for their personality as their work -- at the helm. But creativity has always been a social activity. Today's creative agencies are supposed to be hothouses of ideas with charismatic leaders and collaborative teams. Fostering a creative culture counts -- after all, Warhol's factory wasn't just a live/work loft. But what happens when the technology behind crowdsourcing makes creativity a social activity that knows no geographic bounds? Where does the creative produced by the collective take us? Do we visit wild new frontiers or does a herd mentality take hold?"

NOLA Finds 10,000 Scientists Hitting the Streets

Today's photo: pretty much what the skies looked like yesterday as we flew in to New Orleans.

New Orleans is still quite the vivid place I remember pre-Katrina - at least from the view of streets in the Quarter. Driving in from the airport we viewed some of the devastation to houses, ones imprinted in memory from TV coverage of the days that followed. I could see the water to the rooftops and the people and dogs waiting for help on the remaining corners not yet submerged.

There is still wildness and hardscrabble in the streets - the French Quarter Festival has brought the street party people with beer spilling from cups. Scientists here for EB 2009 are meshed in among the revelers - dockers mixed with patched jeans, polo shirts mixed with leather motorcycle jackets. Like tourists everywhere, I am looking for the best local restaurant everyone tells you not to miss. My affluence among hardship feels awkward, but it is what it is.