Art Spotting in 2024

Picture this: you're visiting some art gallery in your neighborhood or some new part of the world. You like something, whip out your camera and the moment is immortalized. But it's not that easy when it comes to remembering art you viewed online. Say you choose not to save it. It won't take long before the details would seep out of the sieves of your short-term-memory.

Saving things, while being a huge convenience, has its own annoyances. Before long the albums you have, either online or on a device, become chaotic (almost like this meme, and this, and this). What to do if ordering of pictures or cohesiveness is Super Important to you and you wanna visit them once in a while like a passer-by?

That brings us to this gallery. It is a shrine of sorts; a union of the old and the new, a love letter to curators and artists alike. Some notes on what I learnt while writing this post and what themes you can find or expect lack thereof:

• A 120 yr old artwork can look and feel as modern as ever (see Albert Bierstadt).
• Colorizing old pictures is a lot of work but the final results are so satisfying.

I really, really like art that emphasizes s c a l e.

• AI art is getting better, we all know that. But AI combined with Photoshop produces some delightful results. I've taken care of mentioning wherever the art is generative so as to make the delineation clearer between humans-vs-machine creations (I like both).
• Nudity can be tasteful but hard to pull off. Very easy to veer off into the trashy domain which is why ones who do it right are, well, wizards.
• I can take brutalism but only in small amounts.
• Using light-and-shadows to accentuate the subject will never go out of vogue. It is a technique near and dear to my heart and will be a recurring theme in the gallery.
• Fashion photography is a lot of fun. Self-portrait photography even more.
• Under-water photography is awesome.

Learning about key artists of different epochs/movements is a good starting point to weed out art that is not your jam so you can find out works that you do like.

• Ethereal AND dangerous warrior princess type women >>> We love them both and we love them plenty. Be prepared to see A LOT of them below.
• Wildlife photography is hard. That's why so few of those photographers exist.
• On gloom-core art: I sometimes check it out but I don't have a keen interest in it. I steer clear of demonic/heretical/nihilistic genres most of the time.
• Some recurring themes: landscapes, architecture, religious figures, oil-on-canvas and watercolor portraits, realism, sci-fi art, generative art, islamic calligraphy, illustrations, sketches, angels, some film photography and a whole lotta green!

I See You

Art spotting is not merely about focusing on what's in front of you. Other things are equally important such as how did the photographer, painter or artist create this work? What stylistic decisions did they take? How long did it take them to create it? These questions make attribution important to me. It's a way of saying: hey I can't see you in the picture but I admire what you did here.

Grab a cup of tea or coffee before you start scrolling.

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Whooooo! If you made it to the end, I applaud you :) In case you'd like to recommend some cool art or complain about how long this was, you can find me here.