We often hear the statement "rules are meant to be broken", particularly when it comes to the subject of art. I've never been a big fan of anything that comes with a set of rules but I also don't believe that "rule breaking" can, in and of itself, be the sole subject of a work of art. One of the most written about set of rules to come out of the modernist era was when the abstract painter Ad Reinhardt set down a list of what was in his view acceptable to include in a painting. You can imagine from looking at his work, which is almost minimalist, that it excluded quite a bit. When I decided about three years ago that I needed to take my work back to square one so that I could retrace my steps, and perhaps find a path that I may have rushed past in my haste to be the next Picasso, I set down a list of rules to follow in my sketch book. The list wasn't meant to be dogmatic. It's purpose was simply to prevent me from getting sidetracked in my goal to becoming a better painter. Anyway, I came across it recently when perusing through my old sketches, so here it is,
                      Rules of Painting
1. No storytelling, implied or actual.
2.No overt symbols.
3.No concept other than the depiction of value, edge and color.
4. No homages to past masters.
5. No surrealism.
6.No painting from photographs.
7.If more than one figure is used in a painting there should be no interaction between them other than what's needed to arrange a good composition.
8. No anthropomorphism.
9.No Impressionism.
10. No outlines other than those that exist in nature.
      Looking at this list, I'm amazed to find that three years later, without consciuosly intending to do so, I've managed to stay pretty true to these rules. They also sum up pretty well, the kind of art that I find most inspiring and the kind of art that leaves me cold. Too much of the art being made today could easily pass for illustration. In fact many of the more succesful painters got there start as illustrators. That's understandable. If you were an art student with an interest in traditional art, the illustration department was the only place to get that kind of training. Still, I feel that much of the realist painting that's being done today has an apologetic air about it. " Forgive me for being a Realist, I can't make it stop, I'll be sure to throw in a concept or two, if that'll make you happy".Many of these painters, I'm sure, would make the argument, that a lot of great old master paintings feature illustrations of biblical, mythological and moralizing scenes. True enough. But we are no longer living in those days. This is a vastly different world from the one that Rembrandt or Rubens existed in. Most images have a shelf life of about five seconds before a button is pushed or a mouse is clicked. It is the Realist painter who can  force the viewer to slow down the act of seeing and truly appreciate nature and appreciate the artists ability to transpose nature into their own vision. When an image comes with a tag line or a story or a novel idea, it forces the viewer away from the finer things that might be contemplated in a painting; the artists use of color and light, the rendering of form, composition etc;. Just because the story or concept is one that the artist made up him or herself does not mean that it's not an illustration. What's so bad about illustration. Nothing. I love illustrations and I love many of the artworks produced during the golden age of American illustration.But illustrations are not sublime. They are not Vermeer, they are not Chardin. Illustrations are all icing and no cake.
     There are artists that I like who's work could be called conceptual or illustrative such as Desiderio, Bartlett and Nerdrum. But I like their work in spite of the story line. Not because of it. I'd much rather that their work had no story line at all. Or concept for that matter. It's kind of like listening to music where I'm really digging the beat but the lyrics are killing me. It's just unnecessary distraction as far as I'm concerned.Would these artists have the fame and notoriety that they have today without their "conceptualizing".? Probably not. That's just the state of the crappy art world that we're dealing with these days. But they would still be great painters, because they are. Many of the writers and current post- modernist philosophers lament the fact that artists today don't make paintings with strong mythologically based signifiers, or that when they do, their images tend to fall flat, like old soda. They believe that a return to classical study will enable a generation of artists to find a thread that's been lost; subject matter painting with real vision and feeling behind it.It hasn't happened yet and it's doubtful that it will ever happen. As Thomas Wolfe said "you can't go home again." In today's world we tend to question everything with a somewhat skeptical eye. I don't necessarily consider that a bad thing. It does make it hard to create paintings meant to evoke pain or tragedy when you don't believe in the symbols that you're using and they become merely compositional devices and somewhat corny in the process. I say leave those subjects for the illustrators who work for Time or Newsweek, we Realists have bigger fish to fry.Empathy. Wonder. Humility. Grace.