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Artdillon's gallery still exists but the latest picture displayed is 18 October 2012 ... not good news!

Lizzi

I agree , not good news. Some amazing art has disappeared. It is sad. Will we ever know what happened?
I would like to say thanks again for all the warm and wonderful birthday cards I received yesterday here on TD. I had a happy day with friends in Toronto and here in cyberspace. You can never have too much birthday!!!

bugoy1

When I joined, almost everyone welcomed me with open arms. It was wonderful to get comments from so many of you. I have enjoyed so much of the Art that everyone has made. I've made hundreds of comments and been given many more in return. However, there was only one person who never made a single comment in return and that was ArtDillon.

chelydra

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chelydra

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marg

Well..

..we've had a couple of TDers who have deleted all their drawings and left - and then come back again.. and some that never came back (normally for rather final reasons)..

.. and we also have lots an' lots of TDers who are self-opinionated, self-centric xxxxxxs - [including me ]..

.. and we have a lot of TDers who are trying to cope with various physical, mental and dependency issues..

.. and there are loads of Tders who have moved on, for whatever reason, but will no doubt remember ThinkDraw at some time - hopefully with a smile..

All I know is that there is no way that every 'established' TDer can comment on every up-and-coming talented new TDer - sometimes I find someone ages after they've been hitting the favourites - it's just I don't have the time to spend on TD at the moment.

Sorry about the waffling on.

If you're in touch with Artdillon at all, chel, please give him my very best respects and I look forward to seeing him and his brilliant pictures again soon.

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I'll second that, marg.

puzzler

Looks like I got back just in the nick of time then!!

marg

puzzler.. you probably just got out of the nick in time, you mean ?

.. but you're in time, which is the main thing..

.. just have to work out which time.. bear with me.. I'll be back..

Lizzi

The absence of Artdiilon has left some holes in the gallery. Top Five for March would have looked a bit different than it does. I hope that s/he will return. Congratulations to all the March winners!

puzzler

While Marg is off on a quantum leap somewhere, I've been reading back through Channel Baldur and realise that I missed your big event Baldur. So my Very Best Wishes to you both, for continued happiness in your future together. (Yes that was a rare moment of sincerity from Puzzler - I'm going for a lie down.....)

chelydra

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puzzler

Wow! If I disappear again, will someone eulogise about me in a similar way please? My Achilles heel is that I am just the figment of Mar's imagination. You'll never see us in the same room at the same time.

puzzler

That should have said Marg's imagination!

Lolla

Losing to a "GOOD" artist is an honor, but losing to "Cheating" is a whole new ball game! Celebrate my 2nd year on ThinkDraw and still trying!! Miss 25+ followers already, hope some of them will return ....... I NEED votes Guys!!!! Wish ThinkDraw a healthy future! Love!!!

chelydra

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bugoy1

Thank you, Chelydra. I wasn't sure the issues involved. It's sad and frustrating to hear.

In some ways I wish the top 5 had more addicting power. My students who make the top 5 tend to never draw again. My hope was that once they had some success they would want to stick around. It just hasn't happened that way. CadenTanner, Swimmer42, Sir Nicholas, NotCaden (obviously a friend of CadenTanner), Pud5, Qhall72, Michaela, Christian Garcia, Emily Miles, and Dood67 all made the top 5 at one time. Then they quit. I know that they joined ThinkDraw because of my encouragement and the 15 points of extra credit. But how do I keep them around past that? Eventually they will leave my class. I was hoping that Think Draw would give them a good excuse to continue their artistic expression.

Any suggestions?

Normal

Well, dang it! Here I thought it was fun having BOTH Marg & Puzzler around.

As to the Dillon Problem, I also noticed a surrogate, but did not pursue it as Chelydra did. Possibly because the voting is so unimportant to me that I did not even participate for a year or more. Guess my self-image is just fine, no matter how I do in the Art Department. I love and enjoy all our friends here and the many varieties of talent.

Normal

Ah - PS to Bugoy: Great of you to introduce and encourage your students to join us on TD, but any real impulse has to come from within the individuals.
Best bless them and let it go! Who knows, down the road we may see one or two again.

chelydra

Bugoy—I've had the same experience with drawing students. When people just weren't getting it, I wouldn't waste time with half-hearted complements but do everything in my power to get them to see what they weren't seeing. When they eventually came in with some major breakthrough, I'd respond with spontaneous enthusiasm and never see them again! Guess that's what happens when winning approval becomes motivation, taking precedence over a truth-seeking inner need, with those endless eureka moments as we explore what's really going on below the surface of what we see. The first success comes, praise follows, and that's that. The approval moment, not the eureka moment, was what they thought they needed. Students come into an art course apprehensive about whether they're good or bad — one or the other, pass or fail (measured in praise or grades or TD votes).

Maybe the answer lies in treating students as full equals, as traveling companions, saying "wow, look, there's a moose on that hillside, don't move, look harder, quick before he disappears into the woods!" But saying it in a way where the concern is not someone else judging whether or how soon you see a particular moose (or some aspect of depth or color or line) but whether your eyes and minds are open wide enough to enjoy the sights on this lifelong journey. Not winning vs losing, but opening up vs remaining closed.

I read your art history response (on the other thread) a couple of times, but didn't get a sense of what's really going on or why. Even the inclusion of more non-European art seemed more about following political trends than about exploring other ways of seeing. You emphasized the bureaucratic process of updating the state curriculum—ever wonder how a course you created as an individual might look, if there were no government committees breathing down your neck? I owe a lot to an art history course that was designed to maximize the eureka moment experience — the most unforgettable one came after a month or two in Egypt, Mesopotamia, and the archaic period in Greece. Then suddenly the Discus Thrower bronze exploded out of the screen! Everyone in the class of art school freshman almost gasped — Omigod, that's what it's all about — we see it now! I'd had one equally intense art history eureka, when my mom subscribed me to John Canaday's monthly art seminar book series. My artistic ideal at age 11 was to make every detail look "real" until the volume with Van Gogh's Starry Night arrived. WTF!!?? There aren't even any details! Yet it was more real than any so-called realism.

I don't have any specific suggestions about how to keep students involved in TD past their first Top 5, except for the same general idea that the learning process itself is the only reliable motivation and it's a process that never ends. TD is good for things like negative space and color theory. The way pictures are built up from shapes is a bridge between 2-D art and sculpting. Maybe try giving a series of specific lessons to learn and problems to solve via TD creations—coordinated with the rest of the course in a meaningful way. Show them Matisse's semi-cubist improvisations based on old master still lifes to explain the idea of a "free copy" and have them try free copies of great paintings in TD — that might help art history lessons come alive.