Detour Project

I said yesterday and I'll say today, I was and am proud of you all and the work you did. It was a tough competition and if you got chosen pop the champagne corks (at least until they do the final round Thursday) and if you didn't, pull up a piece of sidewalk and sit next to me.

This happens all the time in the art world. I'm sorry to say. Inclusion in a gallery show, in books, and going up for gigs is part of the process and naturally so is not being chosen, and really, that's the only part of this whole amazing world of professional art that truly sucks.

It's the reason I have a 200lb heavy bag hanging in my commercial art studio. My fine art studio is close enough to the liquor cabinet that I don't need one in there.

You do your best work, you pour HOURS into it and then you don't get chosen. Sometimes it's just sheer numbers. I don't answer open calls-- competing with 15,000 other artists for one spot just isn't my bag and I have enough to do to pay the bills.

But last year I did one. The project was very involved and I really figured it out. I worked things into it no one else thought of and even though I knew there were a LOT of entries, including Veronica's, I thought she or I had a pretty damn good chance.

So we waited, and waited. We checked the blog they had set up and on the announced day of the winner they posted an extension which REALLY pissed me off. I had hit the deadline and they extended it!

So we waited some more; and the revealed the winner-- and it was such a piece of crap I couldn't believe it. Just some squiggly lines that probably took about thirty seconds in Illustrator.
Then they showed the Top Ten and they were all crap. I say this with all modesty that Veronica and mine were infinitely better-- better executed, more thought, and actual pieces of art.

What they chose were pieces, but they weren't pieces of art.

So as I sit here and encourage you to take a positive slant from this experience if yours didn't get picked, and how everyone's a winner-- I still think of the project I lost out on last year and want to hit the bag.

So I feel for ya. It's a big sidewalk, I'll slide over.
Andy