Art/Design needs to Evolve

Evolve used for lack a better term. And for the record, this isn't a critical analysis of art today, this is merely the realization of what has to happen in order to make successful artwork. So I had a thought as I was in the bathroom this afternoon (what I may have been doing in there is none of your damn business you filthy perverts). It was about surfing of all things, like with a surfboard on an ocean. Shuffling through what little I knew about surfing, my thoughts eventually went to the Graphic Designer and personal favorite, David Carson. For those who don't know Carson, have a looksee below:


I recommend anyone who hasn't seen anything like this before look Carson up. Anyway, Carson did the designs for a now defunct magazine called "Beach Culture" which focused on surfing and other ocean related hobbies in California. Carson himself was an avid surfer in his younger days and might even be so today. But I digress, I need to prove a point. Carson did design work but he also included other passions in his life into his work. The chaotic and almost illegible type relating to the uncertain and liquid state of a tidal wave, or the brashness of youth coming through without a care in the world.

Now, this is just an interpretation of Carson's work, I'm sure he'd probably read this and tell me that I was insane. But art/ design alone doesn't work by itself, it's a piece of a final product. What you combine with art /design is the real interesting element. This isn't some revolutionary concept I'm talking about, plenty of people have come to their own understandings about this subject. But there are some people, mostly young aspiring artists and designers who think that if they work with the basic ideas of art/design alone, they'll be fine and the creativity from these sources alone will be enough. To be blunt, beef stew isn't beef stew with just beef. Beef stew with just beef brings grief.

We need more artists who can push the boundaries of their work by adding more into it. In the future, I don't want to see art that is just art. I want to see art that is a flurry of spices and seasonings all mixed together into their work. I want to see a painting, a portrait with the artist's love of soccer, their admiration for Russian Propaganda, their disgust of fast food, all coming in at once and turning an elementary example of art into something great. Of course, I am not proposing we make chimerical artwork, merely the sum parts of the influences used to create it. In that respect, it might seem easy to make a Frankenstein monster out of art. Cheap and lifeless are not goals I wish people to undertake. You still need beef to make beef stew after all, so use the spices sparingly and appropriately.

Being a student at an art school, I have been graced to see many talented artists' works hung on the white walls that cover the school and there have been a lot of different directions that these people have gone. But there is still more we can do. So that is why I say art/design needs to evolve. Even though design is less based on the personal expressions of the designer and more about problem solving, there is still a personal element that can be thrown into how to solve a problem if not the creation of the design.

So that's my rant, like I said before it's nothing new. It's just something I think that needs to be said.