Do you have art in your home?

[ringoffiire]

I'm wondering how many people have art in their home and is it something you care about?

If you do like art on your walls, do you care whether it's an original (i.e. an actual oil painting) or a print/ reproduction of the sort you can get from Dunelm etc?

If you don't like art on your walls, what do you instead? (If anything?)

There's an annual exhibition at the Southbank of art by prisoners, including some in maximum security and sex offender prisons. Some of the work is extraordinarily good, and for sale. It's all anonymous though so you wouldn't know if RH had submitted any prison art department paintings.
The idea is much more about creating hope through expression and creativity, bringing the arts inside prisons. I'm not sure anyone is thinking about the criminal history of the artists.

Yes on every wall. All done by me. Family portraits at different stages of their life. Flowers, holiday scenes etc etc.

I've got some originals (my DDs MIL is an artist), some limited edition prints, lots of photographs and a few more generic pictures too. I like what I like and love being surrounded by it.

We have a mix of originals from relatively well known local artists plus some prints and gouache, framed landscape photos that I’ve taken, a really cheap oil painting the DH picked up in Ukraine that needs reframing. The two that give me most joy are an entire wall of reportage style family photos in the kitchen, and a set of framed Ikea art postcards of psychedelic ducks in the bathroom.

I mean anything thats made is 'art' really but if we are talking like expensive oil painting of sun sets, large gallery style abstract canvas prints or concrete 'centerpiece' statement sculptures etc... the stuff people think of when thinking 'art', no.

I never saw the point of random pictures or sculptures with no real meaning to my life.

Things in my house are things with meaning to me like photos of my kids, vintage items linked to our passions/hobbies (more antiques than 'art'), keepsakes/knickknacks from moments of our lives (who doesn't love a trashy fridge magnet from a day out on a family holiday etc...), the odd item the kids have made and a few practical items like mirrors. If the kids want a minecraft or something poster in their bedroom they can but I doubt thats classing as art either lol.

Even my own 'art' (I was a professional photographer for years) apart from ones of the kids I don't even put the photos up on the wall because One) most are of clients, models or animals and while nice shots the 'subjects' aren't personal to me. Two) I have thousands and thousands of then and Three) there is no reason too in this digital age I have them all at my fingertips right now (well the good edited ones) if I want to see them.

Yes, I have some things I like looking at (not paintings, ceramics).

Unfortunately the good ones can be a bit pricey.

But I don't really see it as a waste of money, because I could always sell them on for more than I paid for them - probably better to have something I can enjoy looking at every day rather than an extra few numbers on the bank balance making a pittance in interest.

If you can make your art an investment then you get something beautiful to look at every day that costs you nothing if you buy at the right price.

We knew some people like that @Echobelly. They were multi millionaires (he had worked his way up from nothing, so I admire them for that), who in their mid/late sixties sold their large 1990s detached house, that was all faux pillars and ugly gates with his initials intertwined.

They bought a truly beautiful ten bedroom, early Victorian house (sadly not listed) set in 50+ acres. They proceeded to knock most of the house down (retaining the facade, throwing anything of salvageable value on the bonfire!) and built a larger version of the house they'd sold, creating a pastiche of the original historic building.

They then filled it with flatpack furniture from Amazon and those hideous - but not cheap - pictures of animals in the wild with embellished jewels/glitter. Anything anything old/antique or of historical interest was binned, because (they told us) they thought only poor people had 'second hand stuff'! There's no accounting for taste as my grandma used to say!

The house went on to feature in a 'Homes of the Year' type programme - although didn't win, thankfully!

Put a frame around it!

Who benefits financially from the sales?
Prison service, prisoners or the Southbank ?
or does it all go to Charity

Good question! I've just asked AI, which states the proceeds of prisoner art sales at the Koestler Exhibition are split three ways, to the artist, the Koestler Trust and victim charities.

Thanks that’s interesting
As most goes to the prisoners directly or by way of the Koestler Arts I’ll steer clear
Although I’m a bit torn about the arts trust for prisoners I will admit as I do like the sound of the work they do.

So. I read a bit further as this caught my imagination too. The Koestler organisation reports quite significant impacts on prisoners doing arts programmes- lower self harm, increased engagement with education, better behaviour in prison, improved relationships with staff and families etc. I think it's about finding something they are good at that doesn't harm other people and encouraging them to focus on the positive. And having some payment for their work can build a nestegg for when they are released, which seems like a good thing.

Quite a lot of the art I've exhibited there expresses pain or sadness though so not necessarily something I'd want up in my home.

Apologies @ringoffiire for derailing your thread, will sign off now from prisoner art - it was the Rolf Harris question that caught me!

I've seen exhibited, not that I've exhibited!

I've bought things from Fine Cell Work in the past, the quality is fantastic and their ethos is fab. Obviously, there's no way of knowing what crimes the makers were imprisoned for, but I do think buying anonymous work resulting from a rehabilitation program is a very different concept to buying the named work of an established artist, celebrity and known sex offender.

what a fab idea. Thanks for posting.
Owning a piece of craftwork that was made by an anonymous person is on a different level to owning an artwork to an unnamed artist.
Obviously a part of the value of artwork (I mean pictures) is who they are by, but the soft furnishings made through Fine Cell Work is a great idea as the "value" is not so influenced by the worker's name (unless it is a really great name).

It was a stupid comment from you on a thread about art.

Their work is often exquisite- I've seen it at the FCW shop on Pimlico Rd. I guess having something intricate to produce that requires total concentration is rather therapeutic, given the violence and overcrowding we hear about in prisons. Like an exercise in mindfulness. It's too time-consuming to be viable for most people. But I guess being in prison is the very definition of 'time- rich'.

And I agree the anonymity makes it more palatable than if linked to notoriety.

Re the anonymity vs notoriety point. For some it does. There are plenty of people who collect the work of notorious prisoners because of their infamy (Charles Bronson is the one that comes to mind first). A bit like people who collect Nazi memorabilia, they seem to get a thrill out of being adjacent to the madness.

really and your reaction to it shows you are unable to deal with things in a sensible manner
go and pick on some else

I have original paintings and some limited prints