Friday, February 16, 2018

Is Blogging Dead?

I'm sure my adoring public is waiting with bated breath concerning my thoughts on the importance and relevance of blogs.
Honestly I'm just asking. So my question was more an act of baited breath.
When I started my blog it was a great way to work out my ideas and strong opinions on art. It is a lot of work- somehow I still manage to have typos and misspellings. Basically I have enjoyed my time as a blogger but as you can see, over the years the number of posts has been drastically falling. I recently added an event on my phone to remind me to post every Thursday, which I have mostly been ignoring since I set it up first of the year.
Social media has changed things since I began this blog. Ive noticed that it has been come as satisfying for me to work on a 140 character tweet (yes I know Twitter is now 208 characters- I will never accept that change). Posting an image a day with a short description on Instagram is very doable with not much work.

We are constantly tempted by click bait, enjoy sound bites, funny quips and memes. Do people have the attention to muddle through a long blog post?
I may try to ramp this up again as a more regular effort, but with an effort to try to keep the posts shorter and to the point.
Keep in mind I am also playing with the idea of  a video blog of some sort on my YouTube channel, which may in time replace the efforts I put in to an old fashioned "wordy, have to read it" style thing like this.
Please, let me know what you think.

Friday, February 9, 2018

Painting Vacationing In Florida

Working Lunch, 18X24, oil on Linen, © 2018 Richard J. Luschek II

My painting 'Working Lunch' was one of the 142 entries  juror Steven J. Levin chose out of the 574 submissions received. So, while I'm stuck here in a gray Cincinnati day with ice melting out of the trees my painting is living it up hanging around in the 11th Biennial National Art Exhibition hosted by the Visual Arts Center in Punta Gorda.  

The exhibit runs through March 20. Throughout the show, visitors will be invited to cast their vote for the People’s Choice Award at $1 per vote. The award money will be split between the winning artist and the Visual Arts Center. Ballot box stuffing is welcome! So, if you need a reason to go to Florida, I'd say this is as good an excuse as any. Of course you also have to vote for the obvious choice. In case you're not sure- mine. You should vote for mine.