Things I have learned in the art world

I am learning a lot of random interesting facts whilst poking around in the art world via http://www.kjh-artificer.com. Here are a few of those facts.

1. There is currently a project at the National Portrait Gallery to buy Van Dyke’s last self portrait. It was the last of three he did and he died the next year. All three have been in private collections but this one has become available so the NPG are trying to buy it so they can have it on display for the public.

2. Damien Hirst is being accused of plagiarism for the cover of GQ that he did with Rihanna. Did anyone see it? With the Medusa thing going on? Well, another artist said he did it first. A few other people said they did stuff that Damien Hirst has copied.  They’re making a film about it.

3. Sometimes people do lines and splodges that don’t look like anything but when you stand back, a picture forms. That is clever.

4. People in different places react differently to different things. Not sure why yet. The instagram audience love this one…

…but the Twitter audience love this one…

5. Social media has the snowball effect. Once you’ve started it rolling, you can sit down with a cup of tea and get 10 more followers by the time you’ve finished it. It’s quite exciting. The more followers you get, the more followers you get. If you see what I mean.

6. Sometimes you can journey all the way to a gallery that you know has a few Caravaggios and when you get there, two are out on loan and one is being cleaned and will be back tomorrow.

7. The Chinese artist, Ai Weiwei, is making a film about the case the Chinese government brought against him when they locked him up for a year. It’s called something like, The Fake Case and looks really interesting.

I was aiming for ten but I’m off to work in a minute. So seven it shall be. Have a nice day!