Viviano

I have been targeted by a gang of art thieves from Venusuela. They tried to take a painting from my exhibition in Candeles Plaza, Queretaro, Mexico. The security watched one of the gang take down the paintings, put it in bin liners and leave it there. Another picked it up and moved it and also left it. This was repeated many times. Finally the mother picked it up and put it into the boot of a waiting car and left it there. The security guards let down a tyre. The gang were being watched and realized it as they moved separately around the plaza whilst keeping in touch with each other via cell phones. When they all returned to the car the security guards offered to help them fix the tyre but they claimed to have no equipment to change the tyre and then that they had no spare tyre. They then tried to catch a bus to escape and get two youths to pick up the car. The police hauled them off the bus and demanded to see in the boot and the painting was revealed. We had to go to declare and prove I was the painter and the painting was mine. Luckily we had registered it in Mexico City. It took until 3 am in the morning to make our declarations. Now I see why many people don't like to get involved in such incidents. Whilst waiting a woman friend of the gang claimed that her friend acknowledged that she had made a mistake and asked if she could buy the painting before we made our declarations. We said we would only sell after making our declarations. The next morning the police rang at 2.30 am and asked us to pick up the painting immediately. They had an art expert value it at 7000 peso or 250 pound intrinsic value and 10000 pesos or 500 pounds commercial value. The valuations of the painting are relevent to the settting of the bail bond. The VW Bora they had was also stolen so their bail bond is set very high, The gang/family could not pay it and were led away in handcuffs to await trial. Their six year old daughter and a disabled male teenager are being looked after by friends. Since then I have had to take down all my paintings down from exhibition in the plaza for fear of reprisals by friends of the gang. This would not be the usual sticking on of chewing gum in strategic places that the Mexicans love to do. They are so creative! Also I can no longer teach caricaturing there in the Plaza. I am told it would be too dangerous. On the good side - Since then my work has been given a lot of airtime on TV and I am described as a well renouned international artist. It is the best publicity I could ask for. The TV networks are boosting my reputation in order to add relevance and significance to their reporting. We all win except the gang. I feel sorry for the two youths as they were not part of the robbery.

There are some big misconceptions about art and selling art. What is on the price tag will always be a fantasy until someone actually pays that written price. A painting is only worth what people will pay for it.
There is intrinsic value and commercial value. The intrinsic value is related to how good it is or how well it is painted. The commercial value is what it might sell for in the current market. Van Gogh's work was at the time of painting considered worthless on all counts. Now it is considered intrinsically priceless and commercially worth millions of dollars and still rising.
At the moment there are 44314 artists on Artmajeur who submit on average 12.5 paintings each. 7.9 per cent of the works have sold. This means that 92 per cent of the works have have not sold. So if we put up 100 paintings on site we could expect to sell eight of them. But these are only statistics. We are not selling standard mass produced articles. We are selling art that may be good or bad but every one is unique. A musician gives a unique performance but he can sell it a million times over. We can produce a work of genius but we can only sell the original once. What I suspect is that some popular artists sell very well and the rest of us rarely sell a single work. The question is which works sell and which don't.
Another pertinent question is are we painting to sell or indulge our personal whims and fancies?
If we look at the print market, this will give us a very direct guide to the current taste in art. Currently abstracts have taken over the bulk of the market with photography becoming an ever bigger player with giclee prints. Fantasy is a close second. Reality has dropped well behind as photography improves and becomes ever more amazing. People are still liking hyper reality if the subject is obviously historical and so can't be photographed. I remember seeing an exhibition of paintings of dinosaurs. I was standing behind a group of women one of whom said, 'Why didn't they just take photographs of them instead of trying to paint them?' I waited for one of her companions to explain that the dinosaurs had to die out so that humans could evolve and invent the camera. She was just off by a few million years. Strangely no one told her. Were her female companions being merely polite or brain-dead?
There is still the niche markets of puppies and kittens, young children with a tear in their eye, also yachts and tasteful nude women. By tasteful I mean ones that show the breasts and not the pubic hair. When I was a child of the fifties the rule was nudity was art and showing stocking tops was pornographic. Things have changed and underwear is in your face from every shop window. As for the internet, pornography, is now driving force behind the internet, just as it was for Polaroid Swinger market and VCR cameras. Suddenly the public could shoot their own home pornographic videos and photos in the hope of creating a nice little earner. Hell! as a child I even discovered photos of my mother which my father had taken. He was always coming up with a new scheme to make our fortunes. Needless to say he created beautiful model boats and aeroplanes that I loved to play with. Years later I learned that he had given them all away to God knows who?
Now the latest problem for companies is their highest paid executives may be spending all day texting and downloading pornography on company computers in company time.
It almost makes me turn Muslim. We have the world of Islam blaming women for all the current earthquakes. The women of USA have responded with the internet . They are showing their cleavages on camera and checking the statistics for correlations with earthquake activity.
I wonder why artmajeur hasn't also created a category of erotic paintings. There are plenty of erotic images on the site, but there is no current route or classification to find them or even avoid them. They appear indiscriminately and without the family discretionary rating applied. Artmajeur please note and please could you do something about it? I don't want it banned, but neither do I want it popping in my face.
What I suspect is that most of what we artists submit to artmajeur will never be sold. What is sold most probably follows the old guidelines of the right subject and high quality at the right price.
I have tried to talk to galllery owners about this, but have yet to find one with the candour, courage and knowledge to engage in meaningful and honest dialogue. So I can honestly say I have yet to learn anything from gallery owners with the one exception of Henry Vermillion of Azimal Gallery in San Miguel. If any of my fellow artists have any strong opinions and experiences on this subject I would love to hear from you.

HOW TO GET GOOD ADVICE
For an artist this is not easy. I have always wanted advice on many aspects of my work and rarely if ever received any.
HOW SHOULD I DEVELOP AS AN ARTIST?
This is a question that can pop up at any time in our lives. My friend in India has painted all his life but is now hit with a double whammie. The current economic crisis has destroyed the market. That hasn't stopped the newspapers hyping rumours of big sales of very expensive works. Consequently his world is flooded with amateurs hoping to sell their rubbish paintings for less than the price of the materials. It merely confirms the commonly held public view that all the art in galleries is rubbish. I have often asked gallery owners about my work. They look at my work like they are God looking down from on high and ponder deeply. Eventually they ask me what I think and then change the subject. Now it is my turn to judge them. They tend to be business men or women with a yearning to reach some higher realm of respect. In short they can't paint, but they would like to get closer to it and be a part of it. People who can't make a living by painting tend to teach painting. Those who can't teach painting tend to become art critics. And the saddest wannabes of all become gallery directors. The other side of their business is the economics. A gallery is one of the few businesses where you can set up with minimal costs because you don't have to pay for the stock. The painters give their work on loan because they are so desperate to sell. As artists we are effectively the galleries creditors. Ask the director how long he has been in business. It is rather like the restaurant business where they open and close like barnacles following the tides.
Now for the good news. I have found a gallery in San Miguel Allende that is full of US-ex-pats. Gallery Azimal is run by Henry Vermillion and his wife as a co-operative. He looked at my work and said it was highly competant, but my heart seemed to be in the paintings of the Tarot that contained lots of surprizes and unexpected elements. I explained this was because the source of inspiration was my studying and understanding of the principles of the ancient Tarot and the Quabalah. And he was right, I had put my heart and soul into them and felt much pleasure in doing them. I hadn't been able to find a way to publish them, because I am a nobody, so I shelved them. Now I am hoping to exhibit in his gallery in June, that is if I am accepted by all the artists in the co-operative. I will focus on the Tarot. So why is he the only gallery director to have ever given me good advice? The answer is that he is a gallery director but he is also an art teacher and a brilliant portrait painter of the old school.
HOW SHOULD I PRESENT MY WORKS TO THE PUBLIC?
Again I have turned to gallery owners who have suggested the biggest and gold or alluminium frame. These are of course the most expensive. If you have fifty or so paintings this means a huge investment with no guarantee of covering your costs let alone making a profit. Perhaps the worst part is the clients who say they like the painting, but the frame is awful. I now work to just three sizes so that I can interchange paintings and frames. I tell the customer that I can take the frame off and sell it to them without the frame, to save them having to get rid of it. They quickly add that I can leave it on to protect it for transporting. I insist that as part of the service I will remove it and proceed to do so. They then say they will think about it and return, but never do. So what was all the nonsence about? Firstly I could tell when they were lying, because their lips were moving. Secondly they knew nothing about art, but wanted to pretend that they did. Thirdly they knew the frame was expensive and didn't want to pay for it but to still have it. They were just trying to find some wiggle room to lower the price.
I once had a painting accepted by the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition in London, but it was not hung. Truth is they accept far more than they hang. However I went to the exhibition and was amazed by the quality and vision of the works. Also I noted that the frames were perfect. In most cases the artist had spent as much time on the frame as the painting itself. In many cases they had taken a very substancial frame, stripped off all the fancy finish in a caustic bath. They had drilled it, hacked pieces out of it and distressed it with all manner of tools in order to make it look as old as possible. They had then painted it in similar style to the painting itself.
Many artists simply put strips of wood around the painting. It's quick, cheap and effective.
I have now solved the problem of framing. I paint the edges as a continuation of the painting. It can go on the wall with or without a frame. I think it is important to see the painting exactly as the painter painted it. Personally I like a boxed frame so that you can still see the painted edges. I suspect that many paintings have been reframed every time their investment value has risen dramatically.
HOW DO I ATTRACT THE PUBLIC TO BUY MY WORKS?
We artists need to ask ourselves some hard questions as to why we are painting. Are we doing it for a love of painting, or are we trying to seek attention? Alternatively are we trying to express some deep feelings of hurts and injustice? If that is the case perhaps we need to go to a therapist, drama group or even a charismatic church. The real answer is to look at what sells. The worst thing to do is look at the prices. This is because the price is irrelevant if it never sells. Secondly the painter may value the painting so highly that he is insuring that it is so overpriced that it will never sell. I beleive that the real answer is that it is horses for courses. You don't put a childrens pony into the Grand National and you don't put a thoroughbred into the local hunt.
The fact is that cat lovers buy paintings of cats and kittens.
Boys like racing cars.
Women like flowers and romance.
Men like images of fighting, freedom and escapism. That is why they love yachts that are racing over the waves.
WHAT SUBJECTS AND STYLES SHOULD I CONCENTRATE ON TO BECOME FAMOUS?
This follows on from the last question. I think you have to follow your own strengths. What is it you enjoy doing most? That is where you energy flows best, so that is where you will do your best work.
WHERE SHOULD I EXHIBIT TO GET MY WORK KNOWN?What you have to remember is that you have to find your own voice in art. You have to find your own niche so that you are speaking with your own voice and not just copying everyone else. Remember that you are constantly improving, but you may not be ready for a big exhibition even if you could get the best venue in town. We all have to grow slowly. So we have to try and get whatever we can. That means public libraries, the local school or just on the park railings. You may not sell, but it makes you look at your own work and see it in a new light both metaphorically and literally. Seeing your work in a new surroundings makes you step back and see it afresh. You can then reassess it and realize what has been wrong with it all along. Lastly it is good to copy others to see how they did it, how they think and what problems they faced along the way. Back to the question of how to get your work known. What I think we should be focusing upon, is how to develop our works. That is the key question. Recognition and appreciation will come when we deserve it. In the mean time keep painting. At the same time we do need suport and encouragement on the way. I know this because I remember my own mother never rated my paintings and would never allow me to hang them in the house anywhere. It was only when I was an adult, a house-owner and a husband that I had walls on which to display my works. It was only just before my father died at 84 years that he at last said how he appreciated my paintings of falcons and preferred them to watching TV. My advice to would be painters is don't hang on to your works too much, but let them go as presents or in raffles for good causes. This gets you known, costs you nothing, but the materials and time and earns you good will and a good name in the community. At the beginning this is worth more than you will ever know. I exhibited in my local shopping plaza. It had many empty shops so they wanted something, in fact anything to make it look used and occupied. Later a Venuzuelan gang of art thieves tried to steal a painting. Being Mexico the director feared I might be targeted by them and their families in a revenge attack, so I had to finish exhibiting and teaching there, but this was not before a photographer gave me his card and asked me to ring him. It turned out he was the photographer for a big calender company. Later he arranged for me to meet his boss and owner of the company. 90% of calender work is with photography which are now amazing images, but they do a few that use artists. He had an amazing artist who did Aztec kings and their women in gold and feather costumes in a romantic style. The artist had died so there was a need for a replacement. He looked at my work and showed me the exhibition of all their old calenders. I had been warned not to criticise them at all. However I noticed that the older painters were not so skilled and consistent as the modern painters. If their faces were good the landscape in the background or the fruit in foreground was inferior or vice-versa. So I mentioned that they were obviously time-challenged and weren't always consistent. He agreed and pointed out many more weaknesses. My conclusion was that he wasn't just a business man, but also had a good artistic eye for quality. He asked me if I could do Western Rodeo pictures. He opened the internet and showed me photos and then asked me if I would do two pictures any size but to 4 to 5 proportions. I agreed naturally. There was no talk of money and some artists would not touch it, but I see this as a wonderful opportunity to reach a huge audience that may make my reputation. I just have to do my very best. So above all my advice to anyone is do not become too precious that you refuse or overlook opportunities that come your way.
ONE LAST TIP - If you like someone's work, tell them because we all need some encouragement. If they see you as a fan and a supporter, they will be more willing to encourage you in return and support you with advice.

EXHIBITIONS IN MEXICO. - AN ARTIST’S TALE – Problems of selling paintings in Mexico.
Most of us at some time try to use galleries, but sad to say I have had many rejections. I suspect most artists will commiserate with me on this issue.
I became a solely professional painter in 2009.
GALERIA MOODS - I contacted a gallery on the day before it opened. We showed the owner some of my works that were in the boot of the car and laid them out in her car park. She invited us to the opening and an appointment with her the following Monday. The opening was very lavish and enjoyable with lazers, chocolate coated strawberries etc. Eagerly on Monday I arrived for my appointment. After an awkward five minutes she said she was interested only in abstracts. If that was the case, I wondered why she had arranged to see me knowing full well that I had shown her was portraits, animals and raptors, everything except abstracts.
GALERIA, THE ARCHES, The Mission Queretaro in JURIQUILLA - The first gallery I did use was in a fancy hotel 5 killometres outside of Queretaro. I was promised an exhibition and assumed it would be in the main gallery itself. It turned out to be in the lobby and separate from the gallery. I had to put the paintings way above head height to avoid them being stolen. We organized live music, wine and cakes for the opening. A lot of my friends turned up, but none from the gallery’s client list turned up. I still don’t know why that was. I used a gallery because I assumed it was professional and had a good client list. Sales - none. The gallery has since closed and become a flower shop.
COLEGIO MAPECO, URUAPAN - The next exhibition was in a lovely old art school in Uruapan. I had very good responses from the students. They said it was good to see paintings of Mexican life through the eyes of an Englishman. Unfortunately the students and teachers charged no more than a 1000 peso for any of their works. My prices were far above that. Sales – none and I had one painting stolen.
I found a gallery Juriquilla with a very friendly manager, Manuel. He confidently assured me that no painting ever stayed with him longer than 3 months. After six months – no sales and no explanation. Manuel was still smiling, but I wasn’t. It closed within the half year.
GALERIA TAURENO - I persuaded a restauranter to take down his bullfighting paraphenalia and let me exhibit my paintings in his restaurant and also to work there on Friday nights, drawing portraits of the customers. We raffled three painting and sold two. The owner said he would like 20 paintings of bullfights in the style of Picasso’s. We agreed a price of 1,500 each. I did the first for that price but then explained that I had underpriced it and must re-negociate the price for the others. He then said he hadn’t actually ordered 20 paintings, but only said he would like 20 paintings. I reminded him that we had agreed a price so I assumed that he had been serious. Unfortunately Espanol though a beautiful lyrical and poetic language, is not as precise as English. The words in Espanol can mean any number of things. For business it is neither as practical or precise as English. He finally bought the first one and insisted we supply a digital photo of it and email it to him. We did this, but had to reduce the mega pixels for it to be acceptable for e-mailing. He was being cute by not telling us what he wanted it for. He used it for a new sign and had it blown up to 12 feet high. The image looked most strange, just a series of squares of color because of its low resolution and extreme enlargement. it was difficult to see what it was meant to be. He blamed us and said he had done a better image with his own camera. We reminded him that he hadn´t sent it over the internet so he was comparing a 10 megapixal photo with a 3 megapixal picture. He insisted that we should have asked him what he wanted it for and specified the quality necessary. I reminded him that he had commissioned a painting for a very low price. He hadn't commissioned a 12 foot high poster design. He hadn’t paid for the digital photo. We had supplied it to him, as he asked, over the internet, within 24 hours and as a favor to him. It was the job of the printer to specify all the parameters and he hadn't. Either way we could not be held responsible for the lack of information, poor briefing and the incompetence of the designer/printer. As for trying to draw his clients, it left me with an utter loathing for drunken women who enjoyed making it as difficult as they can for the artist to draw them and then saying they didn’t like it. I finally gave it up as a bad venue. It closed 3 months later.
GALERIA, THE WINERY LOS ARCOS - A friend recommended a wine bar with lots of wealthy customers. I saw it in daylight and had my misgivings, but my friend assured me that the customers were very wealthy. Under night conditions my worst fears were realised. The lighting was such that we could hardly see the paintings. The owner had said his data-base held 2,500 clients and the exhibition would be in 7 days time, but his computer had crashed and he was unable to contact any of the 2,500 customers. I only found this out much later. Only a few of my friends turned up. I felt an utter fool trying to give an opening speech to three people. From this experience I learnt that everything has to be planned to the last detail and with adequate time and never take what Mexicans say on face value. I just assumed the owner had done it before and was experienced. I urged him to change the lighting and make it a really beautiful gallery as well as a winery but he is slow to change. He arranged for us to paint eight barrels which he would auction or donate them to us. They didn't sell. The fact is that it is a wine bar not a gallery and his customers are not into art.
STUDIO GALERIA, MILLENO 3 - I opened a studio in a very high class neighborhood and offered classes. The problem is that the people had money but seemed to have so many holidays they never turned up for their classes. An ex gallery manager whom I had dealt with before opened a gallery below me. I tried to pick his brain to find out what would sell. He said go bigger and do abstracts. I went bigger and did abstracts. He kept telling me they were sold and he had buyers in Mexico city but no money materialised. He actually wanted me to do copies of existing paintings. As he was starting up we loaned him easels. He had no electrics so I let him wire up to my junction box with the agreement that he would pay the bill. It is quite illegal, but a very common practice in Mexico. He didn’t pay the bill. We kept reminding him and he kept saying he had paid it but the company double checked and proved to us that he hadn't. He maintained that he had but never had the receipt at hand to prove it. I never understand why men here in Mexico tell such blatant lies that are bound to be exposed as lies. It seems lies and honesty have different meanings here. Luckily we had one of his frames that was worth as much as the bill, so we kept it and didn't lose out. He commissioned me, to do two portraits. He paid for the first one and then insisted on paying less than promised but gave no reason why. Result - one sale only. I thought that with his business knowledge and my artistic skill we could build a real business and client base. We left and he closed shortly after.
- I found a beautifully designed and user friendly website that took only 7% commission. It started off with high aspirations of becoming the top art-site worldwide for art lovers. The owner objected to my putting on it my cartoon work. He felt cartoons cheapened the site. This seemed most strange because the site gradually attracted more earings and hand knitted leg warmers etc and less paintings. I did sell one painting, but it was to someone on the opposite side of the planet and the postage took most of my profit. It has now expanded and is a very successful craft site for art lovers. I still feel this is a contradiction of terminology. Art is art and craft is craft. Both are equally valid but they are not the same.
PLAZA CANDELES - Finally I exhibited in a local shopping plaza. This gave me lots of contacts, commissions for pencil portraits, and an opportunity to teach caricaturing to children. I enjoyed it immensely. I received one commission of 7,000 pesos for a tiger. Shortly after this I was targeted by a gang of art thieves from Venezuela. The director felt that it was no longer safe for me to be there. Such is the climate of fear in Mexico. For my own safety and with much sadness I had to leave.
CHUZ Cafe Candeles. I pursuaded my friend Omar to let me exhibit in his cafe. I did eight paintings of Acapulco, Paris, London and Venice. There have been no sales but there are no costs and the coffee and cakes are the best in Queretaro. Unfortunately Candeles Plaza is still has only 35 of its 150 locals occupied. The owners live in Mexico and don't seem to understand the laws of economics. The rents are too high especially now the plaza is only 23% occupied.
In June 2010 I will be the guest exhibitor in Azimal Gallery in San Miguel.
CONCLUSIONS AND LESSONS LEARNT - We artists tend to be desperate to find exhibition space. When we do, we have to consider the cost of doing sufficient paintings, framing, invitations, food, wine, music and guest list with no guarantee of selling anything. The critical factors are producing paintings that people would like to have on their walls and creating a list of such people. This is why we turn to galleries for help. We assume they have the experience, expertise and a nice big list of real, potential and wealthy buyers. We need to realize that Art galleries are one of the few businesses that do not invest money in stock. We supply it to them on a sale or return basis. So we are in effect acting like a bank and giving them unsecured credit. We have invested time, money and love in our paintings. They have invested nothing except their overheads. We assume they know how to make it work, what will sell and advise us accordingly. Unfortunately we have no guarantee of this and no way of knowing how good they are. I am still looking for a gallery owner who knows his business and is willing to share his knowledge with me so that we can have a mutually profitable co-operation.
As artists our first problem is learning our craft. The second is learning what to paint. The third is learning how to market ourselves. The fourth is making contact with the right people. The fifth is finding enough of them to make an exhibition worthwhile. Personally I believe exhibitions are not worth all the effort or profitable in Mexico. There is no easy way or magic formulae and the gallery owners are not much wiser than we are. It seems that they have little idea or knowledge of what will sell and merely take what is offered and see if it will sell. They say very little because they don't want to reveal their ignorance.
WHAT TO PAINT? - So, what have I learnt from all this? Answer - I have still a great deal yet to learn about the art market. I still believe that art is like no other business. Whilst the world is massproducing and reducing unit costs, we artists are trying to produce paintings that communicate to the souls of our patrons. Every thing we do is unique. The customer can cherry pick the best and we are left with the dross. It is driven by subject. If people like dogs they are not going to buy cats. The trick is to find our market and do the best we can.
VIVIANO - It is possible that our best option as artists is to dispense with galleries all together. I think the world is changing and we artists must change with it. We must find a successful and internet site that has a good proven record, it has already attracted a lot of high quality artists with over one and half million artworks and it must have sold a good number of those paintings. Then we just have to paint a given subject well and trust that it will be seen by a real art lover who is willing to pay a fair price for. I believe and trust that I have found just such a site in Artmajeur.

How are we to differentiate between a copy, fakes and forgeries?
The problem is becoming more difficult to solve with the proliferation of Chinese copies. I contacted one site that was exhibiting old masters on and asked who the artist was. I recognised the paintings as famous old masters that if genuine were worth millions. The person I wrote to had an English name, but was obviously Chinese, so it was either a false name or a pseudonym. She gave me lots of information but never answered any of my questions. From the information she gave me, it was obvious that it was a Chinese site of a factory that was churning out copies of old masters and European artists. I never found out whose signatures if any were on the paintings. I suspect that it was a production line of artists each specialising in painting skies, landscapes, flower, animals and people etc.
Here in Queretaro there is a huge warehouse full of paintings and artifacts. They are at ridiculously low prices. Selling cheap is not a crime of course. However the paintings are huge 300 by 400 cms and are selling for less than the price of the basic materials. I would describe them as inferior fakes and unfinished rubbish, but the Mexcians buy them simply because they are so cheap and most have no idea of what they are getting or not getting.
I complained to Zibbet on the grounds that these paintings were copies fakes or forgeries. They were not painted by a single artist and the company was not being honest about who had painted them and it was that they were selling. I knew they were copies and fakes, but I fear that the Mexican public and the public world wide didn't realise it. They were being fooled. The site was taken off Zibbet immediately.
I visited Momartre behind the Sacre Cur in Paris and loved the paintings of Paris in the rain. I began talking to the artists who all seemed to be so brilliant, skilled and fast. They complained how they simply could not make a living as artists because they could not compete with the shops around that were selling similar works but for ridiculously low prices. They were inferior works but the tourists could not tell the difference between good quality French work and inferior Chinese work. The artists attracted the tourists to Momartre. The tourists then went into the shops and bought paintings of Paris in the rain that were a third of the price of local artists. They were of course imported from China. The shops pleaded fair trade whilst the artists condemned it as unfair trade. I spoke to the shopkeepers about it and they said they all had to make a living and no one forced anyone to buy. It was the buyer's/tourist's right to choose and buy whatever they wanted. The shopkeepers also admitted to buying paintings of Paris in the rain from China and then adding some touches and strokes of paint themselves. They were buying cheap and selling cheap. The fact that local artists could not compete with Chinese prices was not the shopkeeper's problem.
So who is right legally ethically and morally? I believe the buyers have a right to know where the product was produced and who painted it. It is a very special relationship between buyer and artist that must be respected and held as sacred. The whole basis of that relationship is honesty and openness. The shopkeepers, importers and the Chinese factories in my experience and opinion are cheating the public. They are lying by ommission. They are avoiding saying what should be said. Unfortunately legally they are not bound to speak out openly. Morally they are nothing but dishonest, cheating charlatans but they are not breaking any laws.
Until the laws are tightened up the French and foreign artists who attract all the tourists to Momartre will continue to suffer poverty. They are source of the French artistic culture that attracts the tourists to Montmartre. They will continue to suffer poverty due to the dishonest competition from China. It is unfortunate that the Chinese do not seem to respect intellectual property rights.
I can only hope that the Chinese economy will soon rise to the point that the Chinese artists will demand better wages and the right to paint in their own styles. As such they will become part of the legitimate art scene and get the respect and appreciation that they deserve. It will become a more level playing field in which skill and genius will be valued and appreciated world wide.
Lastly my fear is that they may have already infiltrated Artmajeur although they have in my opinion no right to be here. I believe that it is a site only for genuine artists who are what they appear to be.
If anyone has any other points of view that are relevant to this issue, I would like to hear them. I believe that this situation cannot be allowed to continue, but I cannot see any way of influencing or rectifying the situation.

I apologise for these questions if they appear too radical and innappropriate to be included in the next revised version of artmajeur.
1. Can we get a higher profile for our writings´and articles?
2. Can we be recognized for trying to help our clients, patrons and art lovers understand our works with the descriptions of our paintings and articles.
3. Can we have the number of hits and the quality ratings for our writings just as in the case of our paintings?
4. Can we also have gold, silver and bronze ratings as writers of interesting articles?
I believe we need to acknowledge art, painting and writing as all part of the same mental process.
Viviano

High or low art and which is which and which is best?
To really understand this we must consider the wider context of human nature. The natural trend of society is to become ever more sophisticated and highly secularized. Conversely when it comes to holiday time, many of us delight in going to more primitive societies for our holidays and this is not only because our dollar doubles in value. A sophisticated society tends to be more organized. We all like a well ordered, civilized and sophisticated society to live in. It satisfies our need for the stability necessary for our psyche and to feel that we are in control of our lives. But apart from this we also need to satisfy our need for excitement. We sit in our safe armchairs in our safe houses in our safe society where police corruption is below 10% and we watch the news of the border towns where police corruption is 50% at best. The gang-killings, drug-wars and beheadings are the normal order of the day.
So what has this to do with art? It is the context of the world in which we painters reflect, comment and illustrate. It is no accident that San Miguel Allende in Queretaro in Mexico is full of American and English painters. We come for the light but also for the sense of freedom. This is created by the lack of order and discipline. We glory in the sense of freedom and reflect it in our paintings.
Another factor is that French Impressionist art came from the lowest classes. The artists were penniless. They were the beggars of society and from my own experience, I feel we still are amongst the beggars of society. We are the richest in society in terms of intellect and our visions of beauty, but it doesn’t alter the fact that many of us cannot pay our rent.
Art has always been about confronting and breaking through the boundaries set by society and creating a new sense of reality. That is why art has shocked and offended so often. It has been considered worthless and now fetches Millions of dollars and funny money in the best auction houses.
Much of what is now considered high art with a great message, was once considered to be the lowest form of art, worthless and with nothing to say.
Sad to say humorous cartoons have suffered even worse. On other sites I have been accused of lowering the standards by introducing my humorous cartoons alongside my paintings.
I note that Hogarth is now considered a great painter and cartoonist. He created great paintings/cartoons in his Rake’s Progress. It is a very moral tale of how the Rake destroyed himself with his progressive debauchery.
I would like to remind you of just 3 great men who have used cartoons, humour, stories and allegory to get across their ideas and changed the world.
Shakespeare is now recognized as one of the greatest play-writers of all time. In every one of his plays, there is a scene that appeals to the lowest intellect and mentality. People often deride the Music-Hall of the past as pandering to the lower classes, but it was the entertainment of choice for both rich and poor. Shakespeare is seen as the highest form of playwriting for the theatre now, but it was the music hall of his time.
Picasso’s greatest work, Guernica was created as a result of the Nazis bombing the small Spanish town of Guernica as trial to test the principles of the Blitzkrieg. Such is the power of this work, that when a peace conference was held in the same room where the work was held and exhibited, it was covered in drapes.
Christ was not a visual artist, but he created visions in the minds of his listeners. Much of what is recorded concerns his discourses and teachings to the common people. To get his ideas across he used stories, fables allegory. We no longer know and understand the context of these stories and yet they still communicate across two thousand years.
It seems that now artists are very wary of making simple statements that can be readily understood by everyone. They seem almost afraid to tell a story with pictures. It seems that they would rather use single words that prove somewhat enigmatic. I wish that my fellow artists would have the courage to state their beliefs in a more straight forward way. They seem to forget that the truth does not need to be shouted. If it is real truth it can be whispered and still have a profound effect. It is as if they want to seem to be more wise and knowledgable. They want to astound us all with their cleverness like children who are trying to prove they are not children. Unfortunately the art market seems to collude in this. Many a gallery owner will pander to and flatter a rich client by complimenting them on their having seen the deeper significance of a painting. The fact is that we are all come into this world as naked beggars trying to survive and prosper, and largely ignore the deeper significance of life and living.
So why is art that is enigmatic and obscure seen as a higher form of art? Perhaps it is because art that communicates too directly is seen as merely a communication. We appreciate so much more our knowledge that is hard won. The Bible is the classic case of this. The translations are so convoluted from the original, that I believe it is an utter waste of time to try and understand them. I believe we would do better to put our trust in our honesty and common sense. We all know what is right morally and ethically. It is to seek the greater good of all rather than our selfish interests. The question is do we have the courage to uphold the deeper truths?
But back to art, I believe the enigmatic qualities are applauded as being all part of the snob-factor. The wealthy who can afford the highest prices want to believe that somehow they have a more profound insight into greatest art. This is in contradiction to the more profound truth that the only reality and inconvertible truth is the current asking price of the work on offer. Even this only becomes a relevant truth when money is exchanged and the painting is paid for. For many this is the only proof of a paintings worth that many so-called art lovers really understand.
In defending my cartoons as art I would like to say that too much of the art we see today is self-indulgent and inward looking. It is only of interest to someone who is suffering the same identical neurosis as the artist who painted it. For this reason I personally wish they would give it a title that gives more explanation of the neurosis that created it.
Cartoons are essentially outward looking. They depend upon careful and insightful observation. They have captions that complete the cartoon by satisfying the viewers intellect.
I believe good art communicates, pleases and satisfies. Bad art does not.
Equally a good cartoon communicates instantly. It gets across the idea completely and instantly and is therefore seen as a good cartoon. It can also make us laugh. A bad cartoon does not.
I do not want to put the clock back to a time when art was not secularized so much. I don’t think I need to because it is the one area that defies secularization. I say this because with modern reproduction techniques a great image can be reproduced in every possible medium and situation within days. This is thanks to the forgers, fakers, pornographers, plagiarists, dis-respecters of intellectual property-rights and the internet. What I would like is for artists to be more respected and valued for their intrinsic as well as commercial value. I would also like to see cartoonists equally valued and respected.
So, high or low art, which is best? I think this is rather like asking which is best, chalk or cheese? It all depends upon you, your needs and personal taste. The statement, ‘beauty is in the eye of the beholder’ is as true now as when it was first spoken.
I note that the art experts generally sidestep the question of high or low art, when asked to give a valuation. They give a commercial value and also an intrinsic value. They then may also qualify it with, ‘it all very much depends on the fashion of the moment’. This makes me question and wonder how much they really know.

This is a question we need to ask ourselves if we are to find the secret of selling our works and making a living. Just look at all the paintings on the web. Would you buy any of them, in which case which are they and why? What stimulates your desire? What drives you to desire and possibly consider buying a particular painting?
Is it subject driven?
Is it fantasy or super reality?
Is it the quality of the paint and brush strokes?
Is it the reputation of the artist?
Is it the present value and the possible investment value in the future?
Is it intrinsic value or commercial value?
Is it a delicate water colour, a mere sketch, a funny cartoon or a heavy acrylic/oil?
I believe the answer is simpler than it seems and is to be found in the world of pop-culture and pop-music. Imagine if you could get into your teenage daughter’s mind. Let us make it easier still. Imagine what is in your 5 year old daughter’s mind. She is most probably into Barbie dolls and Ken. Her devotion to Barbie is all about desiring an image of perfection and ridiculous beauty that will attract loving. Any woman with Barbie’s proportions would look utterly freaky. Even the catwalk fashion models are looking ever more like skeletons and stick figures. Your six year old is projecting herself into her future life and the adult world as she sees it. Her fantasies are all a projection of her desires and aspirations. It is no accident that the teen-magazines focus on the stars and all their favourite things. They are the dream leaders for our children. Equally it is no accident that they now have to be singers dancers and fashion models all rolled into one. Consequently they have the hearts and minds of all the young people. These high flyers seem to have all the answers, until they crash to the ground through over indulgence that is. Alongside their success and money they have infinite choice. They can have the best of everything. Usually they binge on drugs, sex and rock ‘n’ roll or rather instant gratification, but that is just the extreme. Your daughter will be much more sensible than any over-indulged have-it-all pop idol. She wants to be able to choose a good life and to fulfill herself as a woman. She wants love, security a home, to be surrounded by all that she loves and those who love her. That is why she looks to these apparent leaders of success. As she grows up she may learn to hide her aspirations. It may not even be deliberate or conscious. She wants a man and when she feels safe in her choice of that man, she will want a baby. Until then she focuses on the man in the hope that he will grow and also want a baby. Society is changing in that women are becoming more independent and realizing that men are fallible and will most probably fail them. The advent of easy divorce destroyed marriage. The current economic crisis is destroying relationships even more quickly. The truth is a man is no longer a man in a wife’s wyes, when he has no job and income. Women are becoming more realistic and realizing that they can now do it solo and on their own, just as well as with a man.
Our constant aim is to surround ourselves with our comfort blanket and pleasure zones. For women it is romance and fur us men it is porn, Internet-on-line games and sexual fantasy. For the wealthy it is to have a famous and expensice original painting. It is what all their friends want. They know this because it was so very expensive. If we can’t have the real thing, at least we can have a symbol of it or a copy of an image of it, ie a painting or a print.
Whether it is a print or the real thing, the question is what is it portraying or representing? It is no secret that women love images of love and romance in pictures, books and films. We men on the other hand want images of the beautiful women whom we would like to possess. The mainstream pictures and sculptures have always focused on the Alpha male and female. It is epitomized in the Gods and Goddesses. Those gods have now become the pop idols, whilst the goddesses have become the divas.
Now we come to a divergence of culture. It is like the Etruscan culture which focused on sculptures of the fantasy of perfection, whilst the Romans focused on reality, beauty and the effects of the ravages of time. Today the advertisers use this dynamic and call it identification. They advertise using perfect models whom we would like to identify with or one’s that look far more ordinary whom we can identify with. So there are effectively 2 markets, people who are seeking an alternative fantasy world and those who are trying to realize and appreciate what they already have.
At a deeper level I believe we are all seeking a guru who will show us the way to happiness. The problem with gurus is they don't say much. We look for people who are saying what we want to hear. Some of us turn to the superficial and moronic sound bites of Sarah Palin. Others turn to the more sublime, poetry and art. Even pop music can have some profound thoughts. I believe that the public seek in paintings, the visions and symbolism that will enlighten them. I believe that when our public like our paintings it is because they see a deeper truth. From there they want more of us. They want to see our total view of life. This why I think we need to give titles to our paintings plus explanations and be more open generally about the failures and successes in our lives. They want see what we really care about.
To see what anyone cares about you just need to go into someone's home. My own is quite instructive. My wife has a wall of family portraits and wants paintings only of her grand children. I have none. I am a divorcee and have lost touch with my children long ago. My countless photos of my children are all locked away unseen. I have to remind myself that they are adults and may never have any use for me again. Instead I console myself to enjoy my second wife’s grandchildren and my ex-students. They are all the greatest joy to me. My favourite paintings are of animals and birds within their habitats. They are a celebration of the real world and also my fantasy world. Here in Mexico people choose abstracts as if they want to get away from the horrors of reality, of kidnapping threats, gang fights and drug wars. They choose not to focus on the beauty all around them. The most common images are of Christ, Madonna, Guadalupe and the saints. They hang them on their car mirrors and on the dashboards of the auto buses.
Now let us look at the internet. Together with offset-litho-printing it has changed the social scene completely. Gone are the great patrons of the arts. The Churches are full of cheap artifacts and are no longer commissioning great works of art. Perhaps we just have too many churches. In England they are decommissioning churches that no longer have congregations. Meanwhile the vicars that remain, have to spread themselves in an ever increasingly larger diocese. Every Sunday they have to rush from church to church to give the services. It seems that we artists can no longer be of service to the church.
The internet has made it easier to exhibit our works world-wide. I believe that the result is an Internet of on-line-galleries that are full of increasingly self-indulgent art. ‘I am just doing my own thing’, has become our mantra.
I wish to end on a personal note. My wife is a devout Christian with an absolute certainty. For me the jury is still out. I don’t know enough as my wife does, what and who God is. My mind is too small to encompass what I would like to believe. It all goes back to what my sperm and egg experienced, felt and believed even before my conception. My wife sings God’s praises. I don’t have a good singing voice and I don’t trust what I cannot see. I wonder how they can hear God’s voice in such a cacophony. Instead I paint the beauty that is all around me, that humankind is destroying so quickly and wantonly.
These are just some indicators of why some people buy art. What really matters and is of real significance is, what do you like? And how much are you willing to pay for it.

SPOTTING FORGERIES
Anecdotal – A friend showed me a painting and casually asked me what I thought of it. I said that if it was genuine he had a very valuable old master in his hands. He asked me how he could be sure what it was. I took the lens out of my camera and examined the painting minutely. Eventually I found a tiny area of coloured dots. This was all that remained visible of the original litho print. An artist had painted over it with oil colour. I rubbed it hard and the paint moved slightly. The surface paint was dry but underneath it was still soft.
On another occasion a friend showed me a very fine painting of horses. The detailing was magnificent but almost too good to be true. The only possible explanation is that it has been photographed and reduced in size. Also the surface was just too smooth. I ran my finger tips over the surface and could discern no texture except the canvas itself. This was not possible. I then found a small section which did have texture. This was most puzzling. I turned it over and the back revealed its history. The canvas had been pierced and the surface repainted. That part of the painting was genuine as a repair but the rest was false. I examined the surface with a magnifying glass and found the telltale dots of a litho print. I took it out of the frame and found the painting ended in a perfect straight edge. This is not possible unless the canvas is cut in such a manner that it cuts off the edge of the painting that the artist painted. Modern printing is so clever now that they can print on canvas. The proof is the perfect straight edge within the square of canvas. No painter can paint that neatly and why would he bother to anyway?
Indications of a fake-
Litho dots.
Surface is too smooth.
The detail is just too good to be hand painted.
It is too cheap indicating it is fake or stolen.
The back is too clean to be old.
The paint is too soft to be old.
The authentification documents have been falsified.
Impossible to spot fakes – This is the case when a really good painter paints in the style of a master and forges the signature. One painter had a huge Chateau. In it he had a separate room for different painters. All had the references and the materials for that artist. He also had a friend who was curator/director for a famous gallery. This friend supplied the false authentification and arranged the selling of the painting. He still paints but now signs them with his own name. They did not prosecute him because if they had it would have destroyed the art market. He intimated that his paintings were in all the major art galleries around the world. He has never identified which they are. His defense was that the so called experts are the real frauds. Meanwhile he can travel and see his paintings in all the leading galleries and museums.
Van Megran was a very famous Dutch painter who specialized in painting Vermeers before World War 2. He would never have been discovered if it were not for the fact that he sold some to the Nazis. After the war he was accused of betrayal by selling to the Nazis. In order to defend himself he said they were fakes. He then had to spend many months in jail where he produced another Vermeer painting. He got of the charge of colluding with the Nazis but was then charged with forgery.
An art lover’s complaint. I once met a man who asked me to look at all his paintings and appraise them. I had to tell him they were virtually all fakes or just bad paintings by very inferior artists. It seems that he had believed what the gallery owners had told him. He said how my words had destroyed his love of art. I maintained that I had only done what he asked of me. He then cursed the forgers who had spoilt the collecting bug for him.
An artists defense. I have to make a living. I can do a painting. If I put my name on it I will never sell it. If I put a famous name on it I will sell it. I even put Picasso on some paintings. They ask me if it is genuine. I say I don’t know if it is the Picasso or just another Picasso. They buy it in the hope that it is a genuine and hitherto unknown Picasso. If they knew their stuff they would know it cannot possibly be one of HIS works. They are buying not because they love it but because it may be worth a lot of money. They effectively are suckering themselves.
Source of the problem is that the art market is so corrupt anyway. Most people buy a painting because it is famous and not for its intrinsic value. Many paintings are so expensive that they cannot be put on display.
Solutions. I believe the only solution is on a personal level. I suggest that anyone who wishes to enjoy buying paintings seeks out unknown painters and buy the paintings only if they personally enjoy looking at them. That way they can have the pleasure without the expense of complicated security systems.

I have painted drawn and cartooned all my life. I have given up on painting many times, but I have always returned to it when my other endevours have failed. I have also suffered depression most of my life and been bored silly by the well regulated English culture. It is only since living in Mexico in the burning sun that I realised I have been suffering for most of my life from SAD, Sun Attention Deficit syndrome which is a lack of sunshine and vitamin D. Here in Mexico I have found the stimulation of an amazing culture and the freedom to paint, breaking free from all the constraints of the English culture. The result is that I have amazed myself with my output and quality of paintings.
I now realise that I paint to Natural Law or God's Laws. I am not a religious because it has always seemed so hypocritical, illogical, fanciful and plain silly. You cannot make a deal with the wind and the sea, nor with something you cannot see. I look at the natural world and am in awe of it. I have a respect for diversity of species, weather systems and the balance of forces and natural laws of the world. I don't know who or what created it. I don't have a mind big enough or powerful enough to envisage the act of creation. I see what is around me and am in a constant state of curiosity and awe and gratitude.
I personally think that the religious fanatics and God Squad have got lost in the cosmetics of worship. Worshipping, going to church and believing in the Bible as a literal truth and fact is the ra, ra and halleluyas are only a fraction of what the true spirit of worship is all about. They have lost the plot as they always have done, as is revealed repeatedly in the Bible. Whilst the people are in the churches worshipping the almighty, we are all destroying the balance, diversity and magnificence of this world faster than any generation before us. We are effectively excreting into our own food bowl. The real work of worshipping, respecting and taking care of this world requires real action to protect what we have been given so that we may leave it as well-tended as we found it. This is the true spiritual act of worship, whilst the church attendance is more social engineering. We have been put in charge of this beautiful and wonderful planet and we have a duty to be good stewards of it. So whilst the fanatics sing to the glory of God, I paint to the glory of life and the laws of God.
Everything in a painting has to be congruent, logical and consistent within its construct and concept, just like the rest of nature. If I add a new element it may alter everthing which must be adjusted accordingly to make sense. When I do this well the painting works. When it doesn't, it is because I have not understood the laws sufficiently.
I am very grateful to culture of Mexico. I live with my Mexican wife and my dog. I feel revitalised here to the point that I have no wish to return. I look forward to painting here until I drop.

Now we are selling our paintings on line, it is just another opportunity for the scammers. I got a rather convoluted story from an African merchant seaman with very bad English who wanted to buy one of my paintings. He called himself Jonnie Cool which raised my doubts straight away. He told me how he wanted me to send the painting to his son, because whilst he was at sea he had no permanent address. He asked me if I would accept a bank accredited cheque. In old banking terms this would be as reliable as gold, but modern banking it seems isn't what it was. I normally only accept money through the site using Paypal. I thought he was trying to get around the website’s rules and trying to avoid the commission costs so I wrote to the website. They explained that they were aware of him and he was trying the same scam on many artists. His modus operandi would probably be to send me a cheque as promised, but for double the asking price and then ask me to refund him the difference. It sounded crazy until you realize that the cheque will always bounce anyway, so the amount sent, double or quadruple the price of the painting is irrelevant. He can send a cheque for any amount and it is still worthless. The cheque would have bounced and I would have lost the amount I returned to the scammer, the painting and the cost of postage. Unfortunately e-mails are so cheap and convenient that, win or lose, the scammer loses nothing, but his time. I am old school. I thought banks only gave the money after they had received the money. It now seems they 'CLEAR' the cheque and give us the cash, but that doesn't mean they have received the cash. They may clear a cheque, but that doesn't mean they have the money. A cheques having been cleared by the bank has taken on a new meaning. It seems they have now given up this tried and tested procedure of holding the cheque until the money has been delivered to them. They ahve become very unbusiness like or in simpler terms plain stupid. The scammer was taken off the site immediately and blocked, but of course he re-registered as a new customer under a different name. By then every artist had been e-mailed with a warning to expect him.
POINTS TO LOOK OUT FOR:-
Badly written English indicates a potential scammer.
A convoluted story - every scam needs a good story to play on our sympathy.
Don't trust a 'customer' or bank to be sensible and ethically and morally honest.
Don't send any money to anyone until you are sure the bank and yourself have received payment in full.
Be ever vigilant and trust no one.
Follow the rules of the website and don’t try to be clever.
For details of more scams check on the internet and particularly Wickipedia.

I have been targeted by a gang of art thieves from Venezuela. They tried to take a painting from my exhibition in Candiles Plaza. They were first spotted by a security guard who happened to be a young woman who had only just been appointed to the job. She watched one of the gang take down the painting, put it in bin liners and leave it on a bench. She informed her colleagues and waited. Another gang member picked it up and moved it to another bench and also left it. This was repeated many times. Finally the mother picked it up and put it into the boot of a VW Bora parked in a parking space reserved for disabled drivers, and left ostensibly to continue shopping. The gang may have realized that they had been spotted, because they continued to shop separately and kept in touch by cell phone. Meanwhile the guards were watching and reporting their every movement to the head office by phone. After some time the gang all met up back at the car. A security guard pointed out that they had a flat tyre and offered to help change the wheel. They declined the offer and claimed they had no equipment to change the tyre. The guard offered to get them the jack and spanners necesary, but they then said they had no spare tyre. The guard queried this as the car was both new and expensive. They then tried to catch a bus and arranged for two Mexican youths to pick up the car. The police hauled them off the bus and demanded to see inside the boot and the painting was revealed. They arrested the two Mexican youths as they came to collect the car. The Plaza Diriector phoned me and we went immediately. We had to follow the police at high speed with sirens wailing and lights blinking through the city at rush hour. After a while it was impossible to keep up with the police because the taxis kept jumping in between us. Few people have respect for the police here as so many are corrupt. The president himself said the police force was only 50% reliable. Fortunately we knew where they were going so it didn't matter. We had to make our declarations, but I also had to prove I was the painter and the stolen painting was still legally mine. I showed them the preparatory sketches and three other paintings in the same series. The problem was that it was three paintings in one frame. Each one was of a the same chichimeca Danzante but painted in different styles, naturalisitic, French Pointilist and German Fauvist. They doubted that the paintings were all painted by me as they were in such different styles. Luckily we had registered the painting in Mexico City and managed to find the certificates etc. It took until from 6 in the evening to 3 am in the morning to make our declarations. I now see why many people are so reluctant to get involved in such incidents. The gang consisted of a fat middle aged mother who seemed to be gazing up to Heaven and asking God how she got into this mess. Meanwhile her wife's brother stared straight ahead as if it was just a normal day's business. One of her sons was enormous and dressed in beach shorts, t-shirt and trainers. Two Mexican youths stared about themselves wide eyed and agitated, obviously wondering what they had got themselves into. The final member was not handcuffed because he was obviously severely disabled. I don't think they even bothered to charge him. Whilst waiting a woman dressed in a shapeless and lumpy purple leotard approached us. She explained that she was a friend of the mother in the gang, that her friend acknowledged that she had made a mistake and asked how much the painting was and if she could buy it before we made our declarations. We said we would make our declarations. She insisted we sell before making our declarations. We just laughed and said, ''No way'' The next morning the police rang at 2.30 am and asked us to pick up the painting immediately. They had an art expert value it at 7,000 pesos or 250 pounds stirling intrinsic value and 10,000 pesos or 500 pounds stirling commercial value. The valuations of the painting were pertinent to the settting of the bail bond. The VW Bora was also stolen, so their bail bond is set very high. The car was used in the theft of the painting so it cannot be treated as a separate crime. They have to be included in the same crime. Consequently the bail was 80,000 pesos each, which is almost the price of a small Mexican house. The two youths were bailed at 15,000 each. They have effectively put their heads in a noose of their own making. The gang/family could not pay the bail so they were led away in handcuffs to await trial. Everyone is warning me that I must be extra careful of revenge reprisals by friends of the gang. Since then I have had to take down all my paintings from exhibition for fear of reprisals. This would not be the usual sticking on of chewing gum in strategic places that the Mexicans love to do. They are so creative with chewing gum and grafitti. What I regret is that I must keep a low profile and can no longer teach caricaturing to the children there in the Plaza. I really loved those evenings teaching. I am told it would be too dangerous. On the good side - Since then my paintings have been given a lot of airtime on TV and I am described as a well known international artist. It is the best publicity I could ask for. The TV networks are boosting my reputation in order to add relevance and significance to their own reporting and the security guards will all get a bonus, so we all win someting, except the gang of course. I feel sorry for the two Mexican youths as they were not really part of the heist.
UPDATE 1 - We now realize that the little girl kept waving to my wife because she is one of my wife's former pupils for music. We knew she was having trouble with and keeping away from her husband. Now it seems that his brother got her into this mess by persuading her to participate in the heist.
UPDATE 2. - I am told that I will be approached by someone, maybe their lawyer and asked if I will accept their apology and forgive them. If I do, they will be allowed out on bail. This is Mexican law. My answer will be that it is not my place to forgive others. I can only forgive myself. Likewise it is for them to come to terms with themselves and is nothing to do with me. They will only be doing this to try and get themselves off the hook. Well, they put themselves on the hook with their freely made choices. If it is true that they all have criminal records, then they didn't learn from the last time and it is not my place to deprive them of another chance to learn that life lesson.

I am an English paintier living in Mexico. At times it can seem to be a very crazy culture, but this makes it particularly exhilarating for me. Whilst in England everything happens behind closed doors, here it is much more on the street. It is a living culture with street parades, festivals, religious pilgrimages and street theatre. Queretaro is particularly rich in theatres and party places for children. Mexico is a melting pot of peoples including Spanish, Indigenous Indian Toltec and European/Americans (USA). We are at the meeting point of all the Americas. Drugs going north, guns coming south, illegal imigrants going north and United States industry moving south. Corruption, kidnapping, extortion and narco-gang-wars are rife. The costumes are colourful, the women are very womanly and sexy and the people fun-loving. There is much poverty, especially in the indiginous Indians who form the majority of the street sellers. Despite the corrupt laws, police and Caltholic church, the people can always smile with broad smiles and laugh at advercity. Every birthday is taken as an excuse for a party/fiesta. For me it is a painter's paradise. I am just surprized that it is relatively undiscovered and not more of a tourist attraction to Europeans.
HISTORY
born D,Day 1944 in Rugby England
Artist designer Pergamon Press
Cartoonist, designer and advertising copywriter - Oxford Mail, Times and Star.
Cartoonist Oxford Journal
Retail copywriter and dezigner - Impact advertising UK
Harwood Advertising Johannesburg. South Africa
Cartoonist Johannesburg Star South Africa
Designer, Money Magic Johannesburg South Africa
Cartoonist MediaWatch, FirstDown American football magazine. UK
McCann Erickson Australia.
Cartoonist MediaWatch Oxford UK
YWCA, Body Positive, Care work, Sainsburys, Stage Coach, bus driver.
psychic, psychic artist, RDA Promotions, Psychic Circle, Mary Rose Psychic line.
Married Maria de Leon in Virginia USA
Art teacher, Titita Queretaro. Mexico
The Studio Gallery in Millenio. Queretaro Mexico.

Here in Mexico oils are very expensive because they are loaded with import duty. Mexico has millions of small family businesses that stay under the radar and don’t pay any taxes. Consequently the government has to go for easy targets and tall poppies to get their tax revenues. Mexicans seem to accept that corruption is inevitable and widespread throughout the justice system. I am told that the customs officials are like the London dockers were before the advent of container transport. They treat the imports as their own personal Christmas presents. To combat the pilfering of imports many businessses employ people to oversee the arrival of their goods and escort them through customs, but they are another expense. Either way the customer pays a heavy price for any importation and especially imported oil colours.
Because of the costs of oils I decided to change to local acrylics. Mexican acrylics have a strange quality. As soon as they are contaminated with the local tap water they smell awful. I am told it is because of the quality of tap water which is not potable, but this has not affected my Windsor and Newton acrylics that are up to a decade old. The biggest problem with Acrylics is that they don’t have the shine of oils until they are varnished and also they dry too fast. I struggled with this until I tried using my wife’s atomizing water spray that she used for her plants. By adjusting the distance I achieved a fine mist that just dampened the surface. With the brush in my right hand and the atomizer in my left I am able to keep the paint just damp enough to work it almost like oil colour. The dampness makes the acrylic paint take to the canvas as easily as oil. It is a bit like working with egg tempora. With continual strokes as in painting fur, the surface builds up and becomes gradually more moist like oil colour. When painting the individual hairs of an animal’s fur, the trick is to use a slim brush with long bristles and have it wet enough to get the paint to flow well in fine long strokes. Having overcome these difficulties, I find that acrylics have one incredible advantage. Precisely because they dry so fast I can paint very fast with them.
I once read that an art forger used acrylics for the under-painting and just added some touches with oil colour. One of the best ways to discern a forgery is to ask one’s self is the paint dry. If it isn’t and it is supposed to be fifty years old, then it is a fake. He also maintained that it was not about quality but production.
In a way he was right. In order to develop as a painter, one needs to paint a lot and go through many styles and phases in order to find one’s niche in the art world. Eventually one has to go bigger in size, in which case the cost of frames canvas, paint and frames rises dramatically. I have resorted to making my own. I get the wood yard to cut the strips/lengths of fibre board and assemble. This reduces the costs by 70%.
Above all one has to remember that the art market is a luxury market. In times of recession, luxuries are the first things people cut back on. With the latest recession the corporate market has also collapsed. The banks are no longer trying to outspend each other with telephone numbers to buy the hugest and most impressive monsters for their board rooms. In fact many such monsters are being resold in order to recover the lost assets of banks that have crashed.
Lastly we artists have to remember that the art market is the pinnacle of elitism. Just as in the film world, the big names reap 99% of the ‘dosh’ and the rest of us are effectively out of work and business. We have to do it for love and the best advice may be, you cannot live on bread alone, but don’t give up your day job.