#30x30DirectWatercolor 2022 : Artificial Intelligence Vs. Watercolor, The Great Debate

DAY ZERO: An Explainer about my project for 2022

#30x30DirectWatercolor is our online marathon of mutual support, in which we make one painting a day for thirty days, and then post it to our Facebook group here.

I personally am doing it a little differently this year.

I’m going to be doing a ‘daily video’. (I guess that would be a ‘vlog’ right?).

These are going to be short, and more chatty less teach-y. Also it’s not likely I’ll manage to be daily. So I’ll be doing it as often as I can manage it. Other than this, I hope to be spending as much time as possible in the FB group, talking about *YOUR* paintings, not mine :)

If anyone is doing an interesting project this year, please drop me a comment, and I’d love to have a look at what you have planned. Especially if you want to be mentioned here on this blog page. Drop me a note and I’ll keep watch on your stuff this year – and help you spread the word. I hope some people might take me up on this!

Ok, here’s my ‘explainer video’ about where I’m starting this season >>>

DAY ONE : Peak Generation, An Artist’s Response

DAY TWO : Some Success? Fourth Summit Attempt!

DAY THREE : Mystery and Imagination, the Holy Mountain

DAY FOUR : The High Plateau

DAY FIVE : A Crisis of Faith, This Mountain Does Not Exist

DAY SIX : At Low Ebb, This Island Does Not Exist

A Night off for Life Drawing

DAY 10 : Erase this Face, This Person Does Not Exist

DAY ELEVEN : Empty Shells, Nothing Behind the Eyes

DAY TWELVE : Bonus Video : This Person is a Watercolor

DAY THIRTEEN : Urban Sketching at the OSI

DAY FIFTEEN : Mid Point Crit with Uma Kelkar

DAY SEVENTEEN : Castle Thurant

Alrighty! I don’t have any deep thoughts today. Just painting something found on the web, simply for the enjoyment of seeing the pieces click together. Anything that keeps us painting, right?

DAY EIGHTEEN : Hokiin Temple

DAY NINTEEN : Umeda Shrine

DAY TWENTY : KAGOSHIMA SHRINE

DAY TWENTY FIVE

Hey. Want to hear an interview about #30×30?

Nishant Jain of The Sneaky Artist Podcast has posted an interview with me/myself/and I, in which we talk about the event #30x30DirectWatercolor. As usual inside his long format interview’s there’s a philosophy sandwich around the #30×30 stuff – so – you might enjoy a listen while you’re painting! Or doing the dishes. Gardening. Going to the gym. You know – podcast things. :)

Link is here> https://sneakyart.substack.com/p/134

And here’s a little audio teaser :)

DAY THIRTY : Back to Street Sketching!

It’s been an interesting #30×30 this year. Starting with my small study of AI intermediated artwork and all the accumulating implications.

UPDATE: Hey, so now it’s 2023 – and since the time I did this project for #30×30, AI generated art has exploded. With the advent of MidJourney and StableDiffusion, and the release of ChatGPT doing for prose that these models have done for visual art. Just this week Microsoft has begun a beta of it’s search engine BING incorporating the next next level of AI text generation, which may soon come to replace human-written blogs! I had been so busy looking at my artwork being replaced, I forgot to consider my writing might get replaces as well!

Is it the end of art as we know it?

Yes. Yes it is.

Art is not going to be ‘the way we know it’. There are huge changes coming. This stuff will revolutionize visual art. It will end some careers, while being a huge new opportunity for others.

I’m not sure I’m in the position to be a part of that revolution.

When it really comes down to it, I just want to be outside on a lovely day, making paintings with watercolor. You can’t beat that simple enjoyment. Being out in the world, looking for beauty with your own eyes. Sometimes having to make it out of whatever you happen to have around you.

So, please enjoy some simple sketching on a beautiful summer day in my city :)

Thanks everyone!