 So Fuzz and I are in the studio today. I'm getting cat hair all in my painting. I said, okay, I don't mind. And we're asking a really important question. How do I know if my art's any good? Art's one of those things. It's not necessarily right or wrong or black and white. It's kind of hard to tell sometimes whether or not you're making art that people are gonna find good. So in this video, I'm gonna offer you five criteria so you can base for yourself whether or not you think your art's any good. So before we get started, let's play a guessing game. Here I'm showing you three different paintings, each done by three different artists. One of them is worth a lot of money and done by a famous artist. Another one is done by a four-year-old and the third one is done by a gorilla. So which one is which? Piece one, piece two, piece three. I'm gonna tell you at the end of this video. Now, in the process of this conversation, I'm gonna be making my own piece of art. And you can let me know in the comments if you think that my art isn't any good. So the first criteria is, is your art original? You can make the argument that no art is ever original because art is always influenced by something that came before it, but there is something to be said about art that is proprietary. It's different from something that comes before it in some sort of way. It's got a twist to it. So if you are, for example, just emulating another artist's work, that can be beneficial in that it will help you to see what it takes to get those techniques down and to create a specific look, but eventually you wanna move beyond that because if all you ever do is copy somebody, then you're a copycat. There's no value in copying someone else because they're reaping the rewards of the value because it was their original art. For you, you wanna be able to get good enough at the techniques that you see that appeal to you in order to be able to then move beyond that, evolve with it somehow in order to create something that is truly and uniquely your own. Now, if you actually create something that is really, really truly original and really out there, you may have some people actually hate it at first. Like Einstein said, if at first an idea is not absurd, there's no hope for it. And everything that's new kind of looks weird at first. Take, for example, Manet's Dejeuner Serlerbe. That painting was absolutely hated when it came out in 1863. It was refused by the Paris Salon. It was refused by the Salon de Refusé and there was all kinds of controversy about that piece. Of course, now it's a celebrated piece in the Musée d'Orsay in Paris. And I don't know how much money it must be worth by now. The same goes for Jackson Pollock with his poor splatter drip technique. Back in the 40s, when he was doing it, nobody had ever done that before. It looked completely weird. It looked kind of amateur, to be honest. And in 1949, his piece number five from 1948 sold for $1,500. It was the only piece that he sold. And people thought that that person who bought it was kind of crazy for wasting their money. Well, fast forward to 2006, and that piece by Pollock sold for a whopping $140 million, which was the highest amount that any art piece had ever fetched in history. So just because you make art that is so original that people don't necessarily appreciate it now, doesn't mean that it won't be appreciated later once people come around to see your point of view. Okay, number two. Does the artwork incorporate the principles of design? So the principles of design are things like balance, emphasis, movement, repetition, unity, contrast, and proportion. They're the ways that you use line, shape, color to create appeal. And chances are, if you've made art that you think looks good, you've probably used the principles of design without even realizing it. And people who have sort of an innate sense of artistry use these things just because it feels natural to place things where you place them because they look good that way. If something doesn't follow the principles of design, it has like an off-kilter randomness to it. The composition, you can tell there's something not quite right about it. It's a little bit jarring and a little bit off. So if you wanna get better at the principles of design, you can just look at examples, like really explicit examples of where people have done a really good job with, let's say, repetition or contrast or unity, and look at what they've done and try to replicate some of those techniques. So how do the principles of design relate back to whether art is any good? Basically, the principles of design bring order to your composition. And that sense of orderliness is generally appealing to the eye. So number three, do the materials that you've used have integrity? Are they good quality products? This is like similar to if you're making a recipe, you wanna use good quality ingredients so that your recipe will turn out and taste really good. Same kind of idea here. If you're using good quality paints and other things, then you're probably going to come out with a product that actually looks a lot nicer. The money that you put into your materials really does have an effect with the overall outcome, at least in my opinion. So today I am using gold and acrylic paints. I'm working on a nice wooden panel from a company called Apple On God Trek. And it's very, very sturdy. I'm using some really nice brushes, which I do spend a lot of money on my brushes because I just find that they break down really easily if I don't put enough money into my brushes. And then I get like little bristles in my painting and I don't like that. And when I'm all done with this piece, I'm gonna be coating it in a product called Art Resin. It's an epoxy resin that makes everything look really shiny. It's kind of like clear nail polish for your artwork. And I'm using that brand because that is the epoxy resin that was basically designed for artwork. Poxy resins tend to yellow, actually some of them really badly over time. And so Art Resin is the one that has been tested to show the least amount of yellowing over time. So if you don't use good quality products to begin with, your artist won't last. So it's important to think about. Even really good quality art products will break down over time. If you've ever been to an art museum and you've looked at oil paintings from like 100 years ago, you'll see that they have little cracks in it. And that's just because nothing on earth is ever gonna last forever. But pieces that we really wanna stay around for a long time because it has inherent cultural and educational value, like the Mona Lisa, for example, conservators will actually go in and restore the painting. Like in 1809, Mona Lisa had its entire top coat of paint stripped right off of it because it was aging and it was showing age. It was looking more amber-y than it was probably intended to. So conservators have a role in going in restoring art. But I think ultimately like, what's the point of making good art if it's not going to be around for a while for people to enjoy? So if you start with good materials, then you're giving your art the best chance to have a really long life, good longevity. Number four, does the art have a message or is there a point that's trying to be made through this piece of art? Now this one is not really a necessity. It's not like art that doesn't have a message is no good at all. I'm not saying that. But art is one of these things that is really subjective. And so sometimes if there's a bit of a narrative that can be wrapped around this piece of art, it helps people to understand it better. And in turn, it helps people to attribute value to the piece. So when I say narrative, this could be in a bunch of different ways. There could be a narrative with respect to how the piece is actually made, the process of building this piece of art. There could be a narrative surrounding the artist themselves, which is like how you brand yourself as an artist. If you have a story to tell, like you're like a regs to riches type artist and now you've hit the big time. Well, people are going to appreciate that story and think of that story when they look at your piece of art. And in turn, they may just like your piece of art better. And then there's also the narrative surrounding what the art focuses on. So for example, art that is a little more conceptual, art that wants to speak to some psychological, sociological, ideological message. All of that context can add value to art. But again, it's not to say that if you don't have a point to your art that it can't be good. Lots of times art can stand on its own just because it's really strong with those principles of design that we talked about. Sometimes the message that an artwork communicates isn't even a nice one. Sometimes it can be rather nasty, but art exists for all these different purposes. So for example, 1917, Marcelle Duchamp exhibited a urinal which he signed his name to, signed add name on his name and put it in an exhibition. And that was a straight up comment on the state of the modern world at the time. He was a data artist and their whole mandate was to show how ridiculous art really was and how ridiculous the world was. This is at a time of World War I when the world was sort of upside down. And so his art was very much in context of the time and it was making a comment on the state of affairs at the time. So by putting a urinal in an exhibition it was almost to say art is art and that was their slogan, kunst ich scheiße. So in that case, the message wasn't glamorous, not at all and it wasn't beautiful but it was still a compelling message. And I think sometimes compelling is a good metric or having art that is interesting one way or another is a good metric to go by. Now we can contrast that with an artist, a contemporary artist like Mike Hammer for example who fully admits he has no point to his art in the sense that there's no political comment, there's no sociological intent or anything like that. His art is blobs of paint stacked upon blobs of paint that are there for purely aesthetic value and he makes no problems about that. It stands on its own merit based on the principles of design and it's still, in my opinion, it still is good art. So just to underscore that point again you don't have to align your art with a message or a narrative but sometimes it can help others to perceive your art as being good. Finally, style. Style is something that is really a matter of taste. It's not like one style is necessarily better than another. It's not like we have a hierarchy of styles but style is something that you should commit to one way or another and that's up to you as the artist. So if you are painting figures and your figures happen to look kind of rough and ragged it's not to say that those figures are worse or not as good as someone who can paint figures in high realism. It's just they're stylized differently. So whereas in high realism the criteria for excellence is a real close likeness that is not what you're looking for as a criteria of excellence when it comes to a different style like abstraction. In abstraction you're going for something completely opposite something that has no likeness at all something completely non-representational. So whatever the style is that you're going for I would suggest just committing to it one way or another and whatever that is is what it is it comes down to taste and opinion from there. So there you have it those are my five criteria for judging whether or not your art is any good. I think that you could tick off a few of these boxes you don't have to tick off all five boxes to consider your art any good but that's just it artists objective. There's no hard and fast rules here and you might have your own criteria. If so I would love to hear it. Oh and before I forget I have to reveal which of the pieces belongs to which artist? So which piece belongs to a famous artist? Which piece belongs to the gorilla and which piece belongs to the four year old? Well, number one is the four year old. Number two is the gorilla and number three is the famous artist Carl Apple. Now you might have your own opinions after this whole video about which piece is better or which piece should be more valuable or what have you but I think ultimately now that I think about it I think art is just good if it makes you feel good. So if it makes you feel good then I must pick an art, right? So comment, subscribe, stay happy and be creative and I'll see you next time.