Art: subjects and subjectivity

After checking on the progress of the renovations at our gallery, Artists on Ashley, and going by the art center to see what won the prizes at the "Spring Into Art" exhibit, it seemed only natural for Pam Scruggs and me to pay our fellow painter Lucille White a visit.

I had not seen her in a couple of years. She's staying at Heritage House nursing facility these days, a consequence of a broken hip, but I was glad to find her as beautiful and vivacious and entertaining as ever: she still has, at almost 96 years old and will laughingly tell you, "all her marbles."

Pam, who goes to see her regularly, had gathered up 25 or 30 of Lucille's paintings and hung them in Lucille's room, and the staff and other residents have loved it.

Lucille has long been a favorite subject of talented Valdosta artist Faye Bridges Hyatt, and these four portraits of her are currently on exhibit at the Annette Howell Turner Center for the Arts.

Also at the Turner Art Center are the juried works and winners of the enormously successful "Spring Into Art" show. The center has a wonderful hard-working staff and board of directors, and this show has become a BIG event. Several hundred (500?) pieces of art were submitted this year by very fine artists from around the country, and it's neither easy nor inexpensive to enter these juried competitions, especially if your work has to be shipped.

Art is so subjective, and everybody has a different criteria for what's "good" and what isn't. Personally, I LOVE abstract and expressionistic art. Some is great and some is atrocious.

Having said that, I was dumbfounded at what was awarded the coveted prizes in this show. I don't dislike these pieces; I just question their place in the hierarchy of things.

Fourth Place Winner:

***IMAGE REMOVED BY REQUEST*****

Second Place (appropriately titled "Why?"):

******IMAGE REMOVED BY REQUEST**********

And First Place:

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First prize went to a crude pencil drawing on the dirty back of a page torn out of a sketchbook, with a big black smudge across it.

And here's a closeup of the winner of the blue ribbon:

**********IMAGE REMOVED BY REQUEST************

I don't know who judged this show, or what he/she was thinking. Maybe this was his idea of cutting edge, avant garde creativity. Maybe he has a warped sense of humor. Maybe he has advanced macular degeneration. Go figure.