by Chandra Clewley

 

 

The premier episode of Work Of Art: The Next Great Artist begins with 14 artists competing not only to show America and some terrific art judges their work but also for a show at The Brooklyn Museum of Art and $100,000! We start in New York City, meeting some of the artists, including Abdi who is from Pennsylvania, Nao who mostly does performance art, Ryan who sleeps till noon, paints til the wee hours of the morning and is mostly broke, Jaclyn, a pretty girl who most people don’t think would meet the criteria for an artist, the quirky Minnesotan Miles with OCD, Amanda who comes from an architectural background, Nicole who already doesn’t like Nao, Erik who has a knack for dark portraiture, Judith, the elder spunky gal, who knows Trong as a curator and who she feels is well known. There is also Peregrine, Jaime Lynn, John, and Mark the photographer. All of the artists are meeting each other and looking over their self portraits when host China Chow and Simon de Pury walk in to the room and gather everyone up. Simon de Pury has been in the art world since he was a teen; he spent 16 years at Sotheby’s before starting his own company. He is there to mentor the artists as well as judge. 

 

For their first challenge, the artists will create a portrait of one of their fellow artists including their inner essence.  They only have a few hours that night and then the next day to finish their piece before they have an art showing the next night.

 

They then go check out their work space which is completely chock full of the most amazing art supplies.  They get a half an hour to get acquainted with their subject. Judith and Jaclyn are partnered up and Judith shares that she always uses the word “pussy” in her art work. For Jaclyn, she thinks of “proud pussy”. Jaclyn finds it mildly offensive. Trong and John are teamed up, and Mark hopes that he can portray him well. Peregrine and Nicole are paired together and Peregrine wants to paint Nicole nude. Jaime Lynn and Amanda are talking about Jaime Lynn’s jewelry.

 

 Nao and Miles are paired together and Miles is running around pulling out power tools and doing his own thing. Erik and Mark are together and Erik feels out of his league, he has been in the art world for 6 hours at that point. During the prep time, Sarah Jessica Parker comes in to give an inspirational speech to the artists. Abdi and Ryan are paired and Abdi thinks he is a bit ironic. Miles makes himself a fort for his art, and Nao is going to make a map of him being all over the studio. Judith thinks both Erik and Jaime Lynn’s are amateurish. 

 

Erik finishes early, and Simon is worried about Nao and Amanda’s work.  Simon also announces that whoever wins the challenge will win immunity on the next challenge. The artists go to their new home at the William Beaver House which is so much nicer than the cars that half of the artists seem to be living in at the moment. The next morning, the artists have 3 hours until their deadline and are brainstorming. Judith and Amanda are talking and Judith thinks that what Amanda is saying is much more interesting than her semi-boring piece. When time is up, everyone is nervous for the judging.

 

We meet the judging panel in addition to Simon and China: Jerry Saltz, senior art critic for New York Magazine and Pulitzer winner; Jeanne Greenberg Rohatyn who is an art advisor and gallerist, and Bill Powers, co-owner of a gallery and editor of a magazine. After seeing the art, the judges call in Abdi, Erik, Amanda, Mark, Miles, and Nao. These are the strongest and weakest artists and the judges want to find out more about their pieces. Miles piece is strong, as is Mark’s and Abdi’s. Nao is very defensive about her artwork to the judges in the presentation of Miles movement and says that their experience with art is not her responsibility. Erik gets a lot of criticism but has never been critiqued before so it is hard for him to take it.  Amanda’s piece is too quiet still for the judges. 

 

The winner of the first competition is Miles, who truly captured the essence of Nao.  The judges say to Erik that there is no excuse for a bad painting, Amanda’s piece didn’t communicate anything about the subject and there was too much process and not enough portrait in Nao’s.  Of the bottom three, the one to be eliminated is Amanda the architect. 

 

Catch an all new episode of Work Of Art at its regular time, 10/9 c Wednesday’s on Bravo

 

(Image courtesy of Bravo)

 

Follow Chandra at http://twitter.com/ChandraClewley

 

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