Being a mentor is an ambiguous following to say the least. My mentors were people who took an interest in a snotty nose, arrogant kid and saw something worthy to cultivate. I’m talking not about art in particular but life in general. You can train to be a teacher but mentoring happens. It happens unexpectedly and on a one to one basis and is ongoing for years. Mentoring can’t be taught. You are or you are not. I’ve been fortunate to have several (life) mentors”. These relationships were not sought out nor were they asked for. They happened. Now true, those that chose to be mentor to me did it deliberately while I had no idea they had made me their center of focus. At the time I didn’t see them as mentors, just nice (older) people who took an interest in what I was doing. They didn’t overtly “teach” me anything. They were there to steer me, answer my questions, cause me to question and show me alternatives. Of course, in retrospect, I now see that without their mentoring my life would be very different today in all respects. Looking back now I see the wisdom and guidance they unselfishly gave me and I’m eternally indebted to them. Some of who have passed on.
I now want to pay it forward but I’m doing it with different people and in small increments. I don’t formally teach. I’m not a teacher yet as an adult we are all teachers.
I teach by doing and trying to live my life honestly and truthfully. I deal with most everyone equally. I try at least. With painting in particular, when a young painter or an experienced painter for that matter questions my painting method, I try and explain and in the process teach without teaching.
Those who teach in a formal school setting must have it the hardest because as a teacher the “system” sets you up to be a mentor to all the students but this is a incorrect. One who is a teacher is not necessarily a mentor. The Chinese have a saying, “when the student is ready, the teacher will appear”. The student settles on the mentor, not the other way around.

Psychologist Abraham Maslow has written, "A musician must make music, an artist must paint, a poet must write--if he is to be ultimately at peace with himself. What one can be, one must be." The question for many would-be creators is simply how to get to "must."
Maslow saw human beings' needs arranged like a ladder. The most basic needs, at the bottom, were physical--air, water, food, etc. Then came safety needs--security, stability, comfort. Then psychological or social needs--belonging, love, acceptance. At the top were the self-actualizing needs--the need to fulfill oneself, to become all that one is capable of becoming. Maslow felt that unfulfilled needs lower on the ladder inhibited a person from climbing to the next step. For example, someone dying of thirst is not likely to write or paint. People who managed the higher needs are what he called self-actualizing people. These folks, he found, are able to focus on problems outside themselves, have a clear sense of what is true and what is phony, and are spontaneous, creative, and not bound too strictly by social conventions.
Rick Wrote:
Reading the comments on Maslow and his theory I noticed that most comments refer to doing as the criteria to call yourself an artist. I’d like to state that there is an opposite equally important element. That is NOT doing. This, to me is as important as DOING. I once felt as others that if I were not painting every day, I was not an artist. For many years I did this with mixed results. The results of this “doggedness” helped me create a good work ethic that is still with me today. The other result was periods of frustration and misery forcing inferior work. After many years and with gained wisdom I realized that there has to be times of rejuvenation. Times to let the mind and body relax. Times to step away from the process to regenerate the system. I used to force myself into the studio even though mentally I wasn’t ready or willing to paint. I did this for years believing the theory that “to be is to do.” I was wrong. At least for me this is. I’ve spoken about the yin and yang of life but didn’t apply this to my emotional well-being. Now I realize that there needs to be “down time” from the doing to think about what to do. Or do nothing at all. This is as valuable as doing. This is the reason I left the commercial art field. Pressure to produce at will. If I’m not working on a piece I don’t stress myself out worrying that I’m not painting today. I’ve come to realize that art cannot be forced. Instead of trying to paint, read an art book or any book unrelated to art. Go to a show or museum. Have coffee or tea with friends (artists or not). Creativity is a blessing that needs nurturing and may mean stepping away for a period to take stock. One need not strap themselves to their easels to call themselves artists. One need only to produce when the need reaches that point where you know the juices are flowing. It’s being in touch and comfortable with your self and listening and trusting your inner voices.

Last night I went to my regular Thursday night painting workshop to paint from the live model with my artist friends. When I got there late, the others set the model and had begun. I saw the model was nude and reclining. As a rule, nude or reclining is never a problem. The problem was I was not in the mind set to paint a nude or one reclining. I usually bring several sized canvas never knowing what I'll need. This night, due to rushing to get there, I brought one canvas and an inappropriate sized canvas for reclining figure. My choice was either go home or try and use my creativity and come up with a solution. My initial enthusiasm about painting had diminished by the situation I now found myself. But I was determined to not let these factors deter me from painting. All the "good" spots were filled by others except one spot way on the side. If I chose this angle I would be faced with a strong forshortening problem to figure out. Also the light was coming from the same direction with limited shadows on the form. I happen to like to paint with strong light and dark areas. Faced with no other options, I placed myself there and started to think of how I could make the best of a bad situation (in my mind at least). The interesting thing that took place was I had to start to think about what to do and how to create something interesting. If I had arrived there early and had the right canvas size, I would have placed myself in front and ended possibly with a mediocre painting. As a result of having to leave my "comfort zone" I created what turned out to be a very interesting painting. One good enough to exhibit. Since all these factors forced me into an unfamiliar place, I also had nothing to lose. I chose to play with color. I didn't settle on normal flesh tones that might have developed had I had a better placement. I keyed all my colors away from reds and went into more greens and yellows for flesh tones. The results were better than I could have hoped. I forgot one important aspect of painting.Routine. I had fallen into a routine and my work was showing lackluster results. I had fallen into a rut of doing the same thing again and again. The lesson for me is don't always take the same road. If it feels good, maybe you should make it a little uncomfortable, be a little off balance. I had a wonderful painting teacher who once told me if you're feeling dull and stuck in your painting, get into a deliberate mess and try and work yourself out of it. Use the wrong color, put too much paint down too soon, change brush size, change mediums. The mind is forced to rethink everything usually done and the creative process, along with your training, will pull you through as it did for me last night at my regular painting session with my friends.

Robert Genn writes: (sic)
"After stumbling around in this inbox for half a day, I realize
there are two main kinds of artists, those who think it's all
about technique, methodology and process, and those who think
all you have to do is "wing it." The latter, sort of like
skydivers without benefit of parachutes, are all over the place
these days. Attitudes of "anything goes," "anybody can do it,"
and "I can do what I want as long as it has 'heart'" prevail.
While I'm a first-line advocate for intuition, just to make
things difficult I have to tell you there's something else we
need to think about. It's called "Creative Intelligence."
Rick Rotante Wrote:
I don't usually reply so frequently, but you have hit upon a pet peeve of mine. This "two main kinds of artists" is right on the money. Though I'm not sure I would lump the "by the seat of your pants" kind of approach as.....being an artist.
I believe due to the deterioration of knowledge of art and art history in general we have only ourselves to blame for the latter approach. If Art in this country took a front seat as say computers or sports do, then I think many would-be "I can do that" kind of persons would have less impact. I constantly go to shows and art fairs and see exhibitors who obviously have just bought a paint kit, painted one or two painting in their entire life and are exhibiting alone with seasoned artists. This is due largely in part too the publics inability to recognize art when they see it. It's become a free-for-all out there.
Technique, methodology and process are what one needs to get to be a solid painter. But when all is said and done these are the tools one relies on when on gets into a situation from which one has difficulty getting out.
Without these principles, the I-can-do-that people can't work their way out and end up with mediocre to bad results and abandon the work having learned nothing.
When an artist hits an artistic wall, so to speak, they have these principles to help get them out of difficulty. Not only that they have what I call "overdrive". Overdrive is what artists have from doing a thing repeatedly for years. They know what works and how to correct what doesn't. Skill is absent from most work I see today.
CI may not be God-given, but one can create decent work with technique, method and process. Not all art is inspired even by true artists.
Peer approval is one of those tools artists acquire that keep them on their artistic toes. It's a yardstick by which we can measure our progress and advances and our misses.
How we learn and what we learn is individual. How we use it is where CI comes in for me. We are not born with intelligence, we acquire it. We create good work by diligence, repetition, knowledge and production. Art is a process not a technique or a method. Without these as Ingmar so aptly put it..." first I throw a spear into the darkness...." you need CI to send in the troops to find it.

I read many artists’ blog entries that suggest ways an artist can get ahead and be recognized by trying to break away from the pack. Be different. Be daring. Stand out from the crowd. I find that these statements might just be at the root of the trouble with art in general today. We artists hope that what we currently paint IS daring and different. After all we don’t see OUR work in the work of others. Or do we? It takes years of painting and living to find a your true voice. And some never find it no matter what they do.
I don’t believe there is a genre that has not been painted almost to death. Landscapes for instance. If you take the time and make the effort and separate your ego from the process, you’d find nothing new or different is being painted in landscapes today. I know that if anyone reads this they will certainly disagree. I also know this sounds negative and not supportive of landscape painters, but think about it, every one is trying to paint what sells and in so doing is virtually painting the same scenes. Some use the traditional approach, some tonalism, some impressionism or whatever. But if you were to set these paintings next to one another, my guess is you wouldn’t see much difference. Sure they would show some individuality of some sort, color differences, angle or point of view, composition. Some will be quite good. But overall, it would be a sea of empty landscapes of redundant scenes of trees, rivers, lakes and mountains at various times of the day. Now this isn’t to say the one cannot paint a startling landscape. I’m sure it can be done because it has been done in the past. The problem for me is that everyone painting landscapes today is painting the same landscape in my opinion. The painter travels to some remote spot or vista and records what he or she sees, some with more or less skill than the other. What is the purpose? If shear beauty is the motive, we’ve seen it already and probably better. In some cases we’ve probably traveled to some of these spots ourselves and have seen it first hand. And we can’t forget photography. So why paint another landscape if not to render something about it or interpret it through our individual ability and say something different. What that something is, is very individual and not as easy as it may first seem.
The other genre is still life. I know flowers and teapots and grapes and bowls lend themselves to still life, but can anyone be creative enough to use something other than these sophomoric, banal items? Everything laying before us in life is a potential still life. Can’t we take a risk and paint these things without regard to the perceived beauty inherent in the object?
The other genre is portrait painting. I haven’t seen a great portrait painting except for John Singer Sargent, William Merritt Chase. Portraits seem stiff, unnatural. The sitter out of place, uneasy. Generally in a costume they pulled out for the painter to paint but would hardly ever wear on the street. What I like to see is personality not just a pretty image. There are some artists doing some fine portraits today, but overall the same portrait is being painted again and again. This subject may be harder to find nuance. Personality is a very elusive thing to paint and difficult to elicit from a sitter much less capture on canvas. Add to the mix the artist has to please the sitter, we can’t always paint what we see or think. Can’t we re-think the whole genre. Find a new way to say an old thing. Isn’t this our true goal as artists? Artists need to stand up and not paint the same ole’ same ole’ paintings. We need to stop copying what works and push the envelope. Our purpose is to create art first and sell second. And if we were to create something wonderful it would move beyond the same old artwork being produced again and again. Artists are pigeonholed by the “market” and as such produce mediocre work that only rises to that market level. It doesn’t move art up out and over the top to new heights. Every work we create- or should I say show, should be better than the last. In content. When an artist finds his/her niche, that artist is as good as done. The work will be the same over and over. The curse to any artist is success. Success is a dead knell to a true artist. If anyone reads this and wants to debate it so be it. We are awash in mediocrity and we all need to raise the bar and the customers will follow us as opposed to us pandering to a market. This market is starved for something new and different and better than what we offer. We have to challenge ourselves and raise the level of the market. After all the market is taking what we give it. If we give it better innovative art it will demand better innovative art. Think about it the next time you start to paint. Think about your work making a statement. Be profound. Be daring. Stand out in this way.

I may be behind the curve but today I saw a video on the Internet of Joshua Bell playing violin in a subway entrance while passersby ignored him not recognizing the virtuosity of the player. The underlying idea of the video was that art taken out of context is not always recognized as art. This may be true. There seems to be a lack of respect when one views art being performed out of context as in this case on the subway. I often feel the same when I’m painting in public. When I demonstrate out of doors while participating in an art event I get people who stand behind me and watch. A few ask questions while most are content to just watch. Children on the other hand have an endless supply of questions, which I relish. I can in those few moments try and spark their interest and hopefully they will be encouraged to try painting on their own in the future. Generally the viewers don’t get a sense that art is being created. Now I’m not saying I’m Rembrandt but they don’t recognize the ability it takes to do this. They just see someone painting on the street.
In defense of the horde that ignored Mr. Bell, when people are focused on their daily life and are in the process to going to or from their work, they tend to be myopic and focused on only what it is their doing at that moment. Also since I’ve lived in NYC, I’ve learned many people will not stop and linger – A: on the subway or B: to a person who is probably playing only to illicit money from anyone willing to stop and listen. I know we should all stop and smell the roses once in awhile and maybe those who might have stopped may have had a better day after listening, but the fact remains as the video shows, no one stopped to listen. On one recognized any art in it.
What I find interesting is though Mr. Bell gets $1000 per minute (per the accompanying article) people can’t recognize great “work” because most are not exposed to art in their lives. When we go to a museum or a concert, we’ve essentially taken choice out of the equation. We let others make the choice. In fact we let others tell us what art is or isn’t.
We don’t have enough experience or knowledge to make these choices. The museum director or gallery owner must know more than we. After all it’s their business. Sadly, today we’ve given up making choices to others. We’re told what to eat, when, what movies are “great”, what to wear, what music is in, what to think. Most of us don’t even see the choice is no longer ours. Advertisers are leading us by the nose. So don’t be too hard on all those who rebuked Mr. Bell. I believe that even those passing heard Mr. Bell as those who stood behind me watched. While most may have not seen, they absorbed and may in the future hear similar music or see a work of art and they will remember it and maybe they will stop then and listen and see and make their own choices. Good work, I still believe, will be heard and seen.

People buy art for many reasons not all based on the love of art itself. I've read people buy art for a myiad of reasons. To feel good, to invest, to seem important, interesting, in the know. Some buy art to have a "piece" of the artist. Some may buy art to match their furniture, or to please their spouse Bottom line is there are as many reasons for buying art as there are buyers. Artists should not paint and create art for any of the these reasons. It's been noted by galleries, friends of mine and even my own family that this is what I should consider when I paint. Fair point. After all these are the people who buy my work. But where is the artist in all this. Are we puppets on strings? Have we spend countless hours learning our craft, hundreds of dollars on paint, canvas, lessons, brushes, easals just to paint what every one else wants us to paint? And the carrott at the end is - money. We all need that, don't we? It's been said that for these reasons it's “THE ONLY WAY YOU’LL EVER SELL YOUR ART” This is an interesting observation. I can’t see any reason to argue this point. They seem very plausible. But this train of thought tends to indicate that we artists should then stop painting from our hearts and start to produce art to only please the public. Or, at the very least, we should paint toward pleasing these feelings in people in the hope of selling our art. Forget about the artists’ feelings of inspiration or painting your muse, paint only for those who wish to impress, invest, feel the need for power or their need to “find you” or support you. Paint only the things everyone selling regularly paints and this will almost guarantee you too will sell. One thing I’ve learned is that an artist cannot paint to please anyone but himself. Sure an artist can paint only to satisfy the market, many have, but then are we talking about artists or manufacturers of artwork.
Great painters throughout history had to paint what their benefactors desired in order to sustain themselves. But in so doing they found a way to infuse their work with greatness and be inventive and in many cases argued and fought for as much independence as they could get without losing their support. They surely painted to please the populace or their benefactor, but they also painted their visions. And not all was accepted until much later.
I see artists as visionaries. People who make the rest of the world see things that are possible. See beauty where others don’t. Show us the possibilities of a better world. Elevate our hearts and minds. Art is not calculus, not science, not mathematic. Art is an ethereal thing produced from a vision, an instinct a love to express our world in new and different ways. We look into ourselves and search out feelings others would not dare.
The truth is all people DO buy for the reasons stated earlier, but that doesn’t mean we should paint toward those ends. True artists can’t be bound by commerce alone. We need to take it into account but not be controlled by it. If anyone wants to become an artist for the money, they are in for a rude awakening. Paint you truest and best, people will find their own reasons to buy it.

I had a crazy thought today. I was watching late night television last night and a commercial came on which they do with increasing frequency of late. I’m not sure what they were selling. I usually channel hop when the commercials come on. Thank you whomever invented the “remote” control.
Anyway, there is this little boy placing small photo cards of baseball players and pictures of stadium seats and such around his room I suppose to keep fresh in his mind his sports idols.
I on the other hand had this idea that it would be wonderful if the same scenario were to happen but instead of baseball idols the boy was setting in place pictures of artists and artwork. Why don’t we see art materials in homes on television? Easels, drawing pads and pencils. Do any sitcom people paint or draw. Since I don’t watch I can’t answer but I can be sure there is void there. I did watch CHEERS and ALL IN THE FAMILY and never once did I see anyone draw or paint. Why is that do you think? Are we so devoid of any artistic interest in this country that we can’t see it on television? In daytime soap opera’s, are there any characters who paint or draw? I’m sure they can work it in somewhere in a plotline. It doesn’t have to be out front or mainstream. That would be asking too much. But can we please see someone painting or drawing or taking art classes? What about a character who is a life model? I’m sure they can get hours of laughs from a character that posed nude for artists. A male figure model would have tons of laughes I'm sure.
Media can change our thinking when it comes to gender bending, gay and straight shows, shows of women with careers and women as CEO’s and possibly women as Presidents, why can’t we show people who paint for a career? Or paint or draw just for fun?
Call me crazy. I know in my heart this will never happen. But wouldn’t it have been nice.
I don’t watch much television mainly because I find little to watch that interests me. When I do watch I’m constantly on the lookout for programs on art or artists. I don’t have to tell anyone who reads this that it’s a wasteland in that category also. Even KCET, which shows such programming, show less than I would like. I have to resort to video tapes of artists and art history.

I appreciate that FINE ART STUDIO ONLINE wants its patrons to keep our subscriptions and by wanting this they offer incentives for lack of a better word. This last attempt at informing and involving us (Leonardo) lets me begin to see that blogs in general and much of the e-mails flooding cyber-space is just so much static. Noise. Blank content to try and engage us. More like a continuation to numb and subvert us from whatever our real course might be. (I'm sure the government is behind this too.)
Today we are bombarded with unnecessary information - all in an attempt to keep our interest in a product that someone is selling. Dare I say this, but art and artists, myself included are part and parcel of this insidious plan. The internet in all its wonderfulness is becoming, or has already succeeded in becoming a blithe on humanity in my view. 
Everyday I turn on my computer and I will have received overnight 15 or 20 emails I hadn't requested, all trying to get me reply. Some may be good while others may be bad with drastic consequences to my computer and me. The world is filled with misfits who would like nothing better than insert a "monkey wrench" in to the works so to speak and sit back and watch us flounder and stumble trying to recover lost data and such. 
Generally, I like the internet, though if it were to disappear tomorrow I would not lament more than a minute or two it's passing. In reality I know the internet is here to stay come what may.    But back to Leonardo... FASO has seen the error of that ploy, but I can't help but put my two cents in. Originally when I saw that post, I resisted any response, feeling that any response would be inane to say the least. I mean, come on, ask Leonardo???  So the above will be all I will add without being guilty of adding to the mire that is blogging and e-mails and superfluous information.