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Art Terms: What is an Emerging Artist?

man painting pictures
Photo by Ari He on Unsplash

At Embrace Gallery, we like to give you information to help you understand the art world so you will be comfortable buying art for your home, workplace and as gifts.

Today we will consider the career stages of an artist. I’m sure you have heard the terms describing where an artist is in his or her career: emerging, mid-career, or established artist. The progression of an artist’s career is much more important to the artist than the art collector, but it is good to know how to think about these terms no matter your role.

One would think the term “emerging artist” refers to young artists just out of their MFA programs and “mid-career artist” to ones who have developed their talents to a certain level. But there are many older artists who are just beginning to achieve a basic level of skill, and many unique and talented artists who never get much attention from galleries and art publications because they spend all of their time creating. What level an artist has attained in terms of his or her career has more to do with marketing, business savvy and development of a unique or signature style.

There is no agreed-upon definition for the stages, but the following themes come out over and over in the literature:

Emerging artists have been busy practicing, experimenting with styles, various media, and subjects. They are starting to hit their groove and define their own particular style or brand. They are getting out into the community, sharing their work, entering juried shows, networking with gallery owners and managers and getting some recognition. They are beginning to understand what it takes to get their names out there, and are committing time to the business side of their studios.

Mid-career artists are producing enough work for several shows each year. Their styles are continuing to emerge as they grow as artists, but their work is recognizable. They have good fan bases. Mid-career artists have gallery representation, work hard to keep their names out there, and know their value. They often sell prints along with original artwork.

Established artists have a style that other artists emulate. They often have studio assistants, and employees running their business. They are making a good living from their art that commands top dollar and is increasing in value. 

We hope you are enjoying this little bit of art education that we provide. Take some time and look through our gallery. If you have any questions, do not hesitate to contact us. If you are local to the Aiken, SC area we would be glad to arrange a studio visit with our Aiken artists. If there is an art topic you would like us to cover, please let us know in the comments.

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Learning Art Terms: What is Impasto?

textured paint surface in white, blue and green with a raised circle
Detail of Kure Beach by Carolyn DiGiovanni

Impasto, the Italian word for mixture, means a thick application of a pigment to a surface so brush strokes or palette knife marks are visible. It can also mean a raised decoration on ceramic.

Artists can use either oil or acrylic paint for impasto technique. Oil works fine by itself, but acrylic paint needs a thickener added to it to make it viscous enough. An artist layers the paint on with a brush or a palette knife, almost sculpting with the paint to add raised detail. Because the paint is so thick, some impasto paintings can take weeks to dry.

Examples of famous artists who used this style are Leonardo DaVinci and Claude Monet. Impasto is a favorite of impressionist painters because it works well with a less precise, more energetic painting style. Impasto gives a painting a three-dimensional look, letting the viewer really see the shape of the artist’s brush strokes.

Our artist, Carolyn DiGiovanni, uses this technique in her work. Her signature is a raised circle that you will see on all her paintings. She uses tissue paper, cheesecloth or whatever she can find mixed with a hardening agent. After the raised sections of her paintings are adhered, she tells us she “uses about a hundred layers of paint. Mostly pure pigments are used to mix the color to my liking. I use texture to begin with because it adds so much depth to the work..”

Here are a few examples of her work.

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How is The Word Medium Used in Art?

Oil paint tubes on a work surface

The art world can seem out of reach for non artists who would like to collect and display art in  their homes. At Embrace Gallery, we are making it our mission to take down the barriers and help make everyone feel welcome. We are doing that by sharing excellent art by talented regional artists online. We are always available to help you through the process of selecting art that is right for you. You can find our contact information here. Today we thought we would explain the term medium and how it is used in the art world.

Medium is the term that refers to the substance used to create a piece of art (acrylic, oil, canvas, or wood). When you look at the descriptions of the paintings in Embrace Gallery, you will see that our current artists work with either acrylic paints or oil paints. Currently our gallery contains paintings on stretched canvas or wooden boards. I believe we have one framed watercolor on watercolor paper available in our gallery. Debbie Black prefers oils, but uses watercolors when she is away from her studio because they are easy to transport and clean up. Carolyn DiGiovanni is a “mixed media” artist combining acrylic paints with materials that add texture to her pieces.

There are other types of media commonly used by artists today-pastels, textiles, watercolors, colored pencils, graphite, charcoal to name a few. Typically an artist will explore various media until they find the one that works best for them. Art of course, art is not limited to two dimensions. Examples of three dimensional artists are sculptors, potters, and ceramic artists who use their own varied types of media such as clay, marble, metals etc.. Today there are artists whose work only exists in the digital realm being displayed on monitors. I am sure you have heard of the NFTs -non-fungible tokens that have been all over the news.

Before the 1500’s tempera paint was the primary painting medium in the west until it was overtaken in popularity by oil paints. Tempera paint is a fast drying medium of pigments (colors) often mixed with egg yolks. Poster paints of today are often called tempera paints but are very different from the original.

Oil paint consists of pigments (colors) that are held together with an oil that dries when exposed to air. Originally the pigments were ground substances found in nature, but now we have the ability to create synthetic pigments. The benefits of painting with oil is the slow drying time giving the artist time to blend paints and easily create gradients of color and shading. The disadvantages can also be the slow drying time making it take longer to create a piece of work. The oils can be toxic so care must be taken with this medium. Special cleaners must be used on brushes to remove the paint.

Acrylic paint is made of pigments suspended in acrylic polymer emulsion, plasticizers, silicone oils, defamers, stabilizers or metal soaps. The benefits of acrylic paints is that they dry quickly so artists don’t have to wait as long to apply paints with hard lines. Clean up is easy with soap and water. Disadvantages are that paints dry so quickly, it can be difficult to blend and shade areas of the painting. 

Artists are always looking for ways to improve their paints. They have developed various additives they can mix with paint to slow drying time of acrylic paints or speed the drying time of oil paints giving the artists more time.

We hope you have found this information useful! If you have an art topic that you’d like to learn more about, let us know in the comments! Have a wonderful day-go out and see some art!!!

Featured Image of oil paints by Melissa Wiese

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Two Takes on Tulips

Oil painting of orange and red tulips in soil with a blue sky in the background

Our two current artists, Marsha Shelburn and Debbie Black decided to paint the same subject and see what happened. It seems that even with flowers, Debbie’s work (bottom) tends to be more freeform and flowing and Marsha’s (top), the economist has more structure. Funny how our personalities come out in everything we do. That is what makes people and art so interesting!