“The purpose of art is washing the dust of daily life off our souls.” — Pablo Picasso
In today’s society, art is what adds a bit of spark and personality to our environment. It plays an important role in our daily lives, whether you are admiring the beauty of a building or contemplating how different fonts can affect the general aesthetics of writing. Art is also what defines each age: in the Renaissance it was hip to whip out a paint brush and paint a realistic portrait on a fresh canvas, while in Ancient Egypt they were decorating the desert with pyramids. Each era has its own art… so what is ours? With newly discovered technologies, today’s artists introduce something new to the table of innovations: digital art. With digital art; painters, sketchers, inkers and all venues of artistry are united, all of them using a medium that everyone recognizes as computers, touch-screen tablets, and other devices.
These digital art applications take on any medium, whether it’s coloring, blending or sketching, technology combines these materials into one handy square icon on your touchscreen devices. With the tap of a finger, these applications help open a global community of artists all sharing the passion of creating masterpieces without paper. Such sites and apps include Deviantart, Digital Art Served, Drawcast, Big Canvas and many more. Digital artists have also brought extreme talent to the world of digital art. For example, Kyle Lambert, an artist who has created the world’s most realistic finger painting on his tablet, has become a celebrity for his skills in digital painting. (Look below for an embedded video of the process of his digital painting)
In the past, fingerpainting was a fun activity for toddlers who were incompetent for drawing realistic masterpieces, but now, digital art allows artists to take fingerpainting to a whole new level, providing zoom for artists to add small detail. It also allows artists to use traditional “pencils,” as styluses act as a substitute for traditional art materials.
Next time, when someone asks “what is our era’s art?” you can confidently say digital art. Next time, when you decide to create an art composition, I implore you to try digital art and see how new technology can help enhance your masterpieces.