Ask HN: My Vulnerable Art

3 points by heigh 1 year ago | 4 comments

I really fear I might have messed up my chance to get people to view my post. I originally posted as SHOW HN, but really I want to ask. This was my original post:

I'm an anon that's made enough to retire, relatively young.

But, I still suffer very badly from anxiety and depression (it runs deep in the family. Most of my childhood was in phyc wards with my mum).

I'm an alcoholic and a somewhat drug user, which is how I cope, along with SSRIs.

However, I have made an effort to document my highs with free-style Photoshop. It's cathartic and even when I'm sober I appreciate it, a lot. Like it was from a different person.

I am very naive about this, but is my art anything special, or is it run-of-the-mill garbage?

I'm not an artist, have no links to that world, nor am I schooled in it, so would love any feedback from anyone who is.

My site is https://heighart.com/ and it's half-built. I will build it out more with my full collection eventually, I just keep changing my mind on the UI/UX.

gus_massa 1 year ago |

I took a look at your previous post. Nice abstract image, but I'm not an artist so I can't give a technical opinion. Do you have Instagram? My wife post what she draws there and has more views than in her web page.

On the web page site, the images take too much time to load and sometimes they update before they are complete. Is it possible to download them in the background? Perhaps the resolution is too high. Perhaps you can use a low resulution image and a button to get the full resolution one. Perhaps you can add loading spin at the begining until the first image is loaded.

I'm not sure about life after retirement, but it may be too lonely. Perhaps you can colaborate in some type of comunity service in some topic you like and with people you like.

not_your_vase 1 year ago |

Those strong bragging vibes might put off a handful of people, making them avoid your post.

  > I'm not an artist, have no links to that world, nor am I schooled in it, so would love any feedback from anyone who is.

This might not be the best place looking for art advice. This place is to show off your hello world script that has less than 3 segfaults, and leaks only a moderate amount of memory.

solardev 1 year ago | |

> your hello world script that has less than 3 segfaults, and leaks only a moderate amount of memory.

In Javascript, that IS art!

d--b 1 year ago |

My wife's a contemporary art curator, and I've been to a gazillion shows and fairs so I think I have a fairly well trained eye.

The website doesn't work very well. It keeps changing before the image finished loading, the menus don't work.

I'd say your art is all right. It's not garbage at all, but it's not mind-blowing either. It looks like early works, like from artists still in art school, which sort of makes sense, since you probably haven't been doing this very long.

My advice, since you seem to enjoy it, is to:

- keep working: art gets better with practice. You'll develop techniques and vocabulary of your own.

- go to shows: look at what's out there. If you go to big solo retrospectives, you'll see what I mean about developing one's vocabulary.

- meet people: don't go to openings alone, it's depressing, and you'll end up drinking. Since you have money, I suggest joining art classes, museum tours, etc. Eventually you'll meet some gallerists, show them your stuff.

Anyway, the most important thing is that these things take time, so take it slow, who knows how good you can get. Just be serious about it, learn how it's done, and practice practice practice. The greatest artists have one thing in common: work. The whole idea that people are born art geniuses is complete bullshit.

I think you should drop the idea of making a complex website. Just throw some of your pictures on a squarespace page, and it'll be a lot better.