Time Design

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As every artist has discovered, there is an urge to overdo. To wretched excess. We have a tendency, even an obsession to make something happen because we are able to, and that frequently is sufficient reason all by itself. Eventually we learn that what we think and feel has to constrain what our craft allows us. So because we can blur, draw, color, shape, flow... wuddever... well, we shouldn't do it if it doesn't contribute to what we want to communicate to our audience.

Which brings me to things Florentine. Here's a small selection of The Duomo... the cathedral of Florence which occupies about four city blocks. Growing up I never really took to Florentine art. I found it over designed. Over crafted. Too busy. I've got to admit that this feeling didn't go away as I looked at the massive Duomo which took centuries to complete. And each generation of new artists added gee-gaws, and whrilygigs to the great piece. Frankly, and this will probably make every serious student of art gasp, I think the thing is too much bordering upon garish. Even in small snippets like this it appears to me more like the guy whose body's been totally tattooed - by a melange of different needle stickers.

Is it art? Sure? But art's appreciation remains a matter of taste. If I'd been the dictator I'd have told these folks to stop a little more than a century into the project. But.. wuhdoIknow?

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Here's the original image that came out of my camera by the way. Maybe I'm guilty of over design myself? Odd because I threw out so much, and cropped the thing both through my lens and here in my studio. Ah well, you tell me...