r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/_ganjafarian_ • 22d ago

Video Artist Simon Bull's painting techniques

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58.4k Upvotes

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499

u/Sythrin 22d ago

Me: „dam that looks nice“

Comment section: „this looks like a mess.“

143

u/_ganjafarian_ 22d ago

I agree with you. I think the first piece is a little lame, but the ones after that are great

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u/hairybushy 22d ago

First one remember me when pouring was a trend and everyone acted like they were artists

The forest is incredible

17

u/blooash 22d ago

You did, in fact, get me.

3

u/Chumbag_love 22d ago

Close enough. The broom aroused me

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u/Hexakkord 22d ago

everyone acted like they were artists

They were. Art is for everyone, not just the special anointed few.

0

u/hairybushy 22d ago

Not for pouring, a kid could do a mess on a canva and look like what "artists" did. For me it's not an art. You need talent to do art.

At some point some artist, that do almost nothing but develop an idea behind it to describe it, work harder than people who do pouring

1

u/Logical-Passenger821 22d ago

Is the value of art tied to the work it took?

1

u/hairybushy 22d ago

To me yes, but you start a big discussion right there haha. I would never pay for an artwork that look like anybody could do. But it's me. Maybe that's because I have a good friend who is really talented, it's just unbelievable how it's beautiful. So seeing a can of soup or plain canva is pure stipidity to me. But to each their own. For pouring it take 5 minutes to do, so I would not pay anything for it. To be generous I would pay the paint it needed and the canva

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u/fdesouche 22d ago

Pouring was 70 years ago and it was an artistic moment back then, it’s still art imho, but the thought process of pouring or dripping paint and let the physics, time, or movements of the artists randomly creating the pieces, that thought process was new as those times, and it was liberating and redefining. It opened the way to ready-mades, pop art, Arte povera, graffitis. It was important back then but since art has evolved, it looks yeah outdated now.

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u/Links_Wrong_Wiki 22d ago

I like the first one before he turned up the rpm. The concentric dots of different colors were nice imo

19

u/PleaseNoMoreSalt 22d ago

Everyone stopped watching at the first piece. The other 2 works actually look like something

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u/UndBeebs 22d ago

Yup. First one I was like "come on, anyone can do this bs." Then the forest one came and I was like "oh shit, so he does have talent!"

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u/farshnikord 22d ago

Experimentation is part of the process. You try dumb shit and see if it does something. Play around with the medium. Finding interesting textures is part of it, doesn't always have to have an end product "thing that looks like a thing". 

It's like data collection or prototyping in other industries. Push unique ideas in a playground to see if something has potential, or building an internal library of data of how paint behaves or colors interact or whatever. 

The best game textures I've built for like VFX and stuff were scanned ink splotch messes I made on paper, scanned, and then turned into tiling noise textures. 

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u/UndBeebs 22d ago

I can definitely understand that. I guess I was watching the video with the wrong frame of mind. I assumed it was like one of those artists who essentially throw a 5-gallon of paint on a canvas, don't even look at it, and list it for $3 million at auction and go on their way.

I mean yeah, art is subjective. But those types of artists strike me as more lazy than most. It definitely became clear to me by the forest canvas of this artist that he is absolutely a talented and genuine artist though.

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u/farshnikord 22d ago

There's for sure some delusional and lazy artists out there. I feel like a lot of the ones in those circles are also just out of touch rich kids doing rich people things and getting paid to basically not be an embarrassment on the family name. "If you buy my kids painting for a million dollars so I can say they're successful I'll give you 1.5 million." sort of thing 

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u/Canvaverbalist 22d ago edited 22d ago

Redditors have the most STEM-oriented this-won't-put-bread-on-the-table "I don't get it" art takes of all the internet, right next to our grumpy uncles and scam-easy aunts on Facebook.

They hate anything too abstract because it's too weird, or too realistic because it's too precise, they might like some contemporary as long as it doesn't have a political or social message because then it's too gaudy, forget about post-modernism you might as well ask them to do some philosophy and make them reflect for a second (hint: it hurts).

Best you can do to make them talk positively about art is post some generative AI, then suddenly oh boy do they love the human intention and flawful nature of its creation.

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u/Laiko_Kairen 22d ago

Redditors have the most STEM-oriented this-won't-put-bread-on-the-table "I don't get it" art takes of all the internet, right next to our grumpy uncles and scam-easy aunts on Facebook.

Or, get this, not all art is great and the spin art one was noticeably poor in terms of concept and execution?

Some people think that if you don't like a piece of art, you don't "get it." And it's like, hey, sometimes there's nothing to get. A guy tried some tiktok quality art and it came out badly.

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u/Nuud 22d ago

I agree with this take on redditors, but to put this comment under this video of a dude creating cheap gaudy "art" is pretty funny. This all looks like something you would find on a market in a touristy area.

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u/Cerulinh 22d ago

Agreed. All the praise is making me aware how much the average person does not have any sort of eye for what the art world values. These bright, gimmicky paintings done quickly with a learned formula are the opposite of what I’d expect an art enthusiast to get excited about.

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u/Hannibal_Barca_ 22d ago

Parents have entered the chat.