How female artists are often described

An artist in her own right

This text is inspired by the common description of women artists who are married to, or who are the partners of, male artists as ‘an artist in her own right’.

The text reads: Barbara Hepworth’s husband was an artist in his own right.

Barbara Hepworth’s husband was the artist Ben Nicholson.

The term ‘she was an artist in her own right’ implies that the woman was probably considered to be a lesser artist than her husband. In the case of Hepworth and Nicholson, it was Hepworth who was the more high profile artist.

This is a piece about discrimination, equality and the position of women in society.

Text-based art:

We’re all travelling at the speed of time

And we can’t slow down.

I like the concept of the speed of time, because in some ways it doesn’t make sense. It’s measuring something in terms of itself. What speed is time travelling at? Is it one hour per hour?

The passing of time is a very human concern, but personally I think that it may be even more concerning if it actually stopped passing!

And there’s always the dilemma that if time slowed down you wouldn’t notice, because you’re completely immersed in it (a bit like being in a train with the windows blacked out so that you can’t see how fast the outside world is passing).

Creatures like birds which tend to move a lot faster than we do sense time passing at a different rate. They look at us and see us lumbering along in a similar way to how we see tortoises moving. Similarly, tortoises see us as zipping around the place at dizzying speed. They probably can’t comprehend of the speed of birds.

Slogan on a T-shirt

I’m not a slogan T-shirt kind of guy.

A T-shirt with a slogan on it that contradicts what it says. It’s a bit oxymoronic.

The letter E (composed of lots of letter Es).

A bit of typographical design.

The letter E composed of a black rectangle with a couple of rows of small white letter Es superimposed on it.

Viral homophones

A piece of text-based art playing on the fact that the words influenza and influencer are near homophones (and actually are homophones if you’ve got the right accent).

Not only are they near homophones but they also have the following relationship in common: influenza is a viral infection and an influencer would like to be viral too.

A piece of text-based art with the words “Some artists are seriously singular people who can’t do anything else, and some are seriously privileged people who can do whatever they want”.

There’s a clichéd view of artists as driven individuals who are starving in their garrets so that they can pursue their art. Poverty is a small price to pay for the expression of artistic genius. This is the romantic view of artists.

While it’s a very valid view, especially when it comes to the artists who are driven individuals starving in their garrets, there is another type of artist.

These are the artists who are the offspring of wealthy and well-connected parents. A quick Wikipedia look at the biographies of a few famous contemporary artists will show you what I mean. In the UK where I live it seems to particularly apply to sculptors, maybe because to become a sculptor requires a greater investment in studio space, equipment and materials than is needed to become, say, a watercolour artist.

And even with watercolour artists being privileged is a great advantage, as apart from such perks as being well connected, a huge advantage of privilege is that you can afford to fail.

For social cohesion it’s important to have a common hate figure

Who shall we choose?

A text-based piece about what it is that binds groups together.

One of the points about social groups is that they exclude people as well as include people.

A piece of text art with the words “Facing up to reality has its drawbacks”.

It seems that practically everybody’s mental model of how the world (and the universe) works is held together by a scaffolding of assumptions.

These assumptions cover such matters as how the world was created, the place of humans in the universe, the nature of human nature, the political mechanisms that are necessary for a functioning society, the nature of society, the purpose of life and so on.

Most of these assumptions are the product of the human imagination and are more likely than not to reflect the way that people want the world to be rather than the way that it is.

Many people for instance believe in a God who created and cares for the universe. People believe this not because it’s true but because they want I to be true. Some people believe that the idea world is one without national borders and in which everyone loves everyone else. They believe this not because it could ever realistically be possible but because they like the idea and it makes them feel good about themselves.

Quiet

A text piece composed of a big speech balloon with the word “quiet” in very small writing.