Art can do many things. It can bring joy, pain, frustration, understanding; almost any emotion one can experience to the viewer. It can serve as an inspiration, it can be used to educate or to incite. Art can do many things, but it does not have to do many.
There are two things art should do , not necessarily in tandem. It should say something and it should look good. How useful and profound its message and/or how good it looks separates good art from bad art, but anything, I believe that is called art should have at least one of these things. While that is not where I get my inspiration, it is my guideline.
I also have to experiment. This computer technology just screams for playfulness and exploration. From making something that looked as if nothing electronic touched it, to fractals that only could have been created using a computer, experimentation is definitely one of my joys.
Inspiration for me sprouts from many places, but in keeping with my guidelines, it comes overwhelmingly from two things. Things that I feel have to be said, and things that I find beautiful.
What do I find beauty in? That’s a simple one. I find beauty first and foremost I think in the female form, often in quite Rubenesque renderings. I find beauty in my Trinidadian heritage, in colour, patterns and textures, in life, in sex and sexuality.
I am also inspired by things that I just have to say or ideas about different things that are percolating in the brain. What things do I have to say? I’m a Black Trinidadian male in Newark, New Jersey, in the United States of America. What don’t I have to say?
David James joined Pixels on August 24th, 2013.
