I've noticed that the the ones who cheat are the same ones that win these shows. There are even techniques to cheat with, have you seen all the ads for photo mechanical projectors? Take a picture, blow it up and paint over the image. Who knows the difference? I do, when I see an action painting of a horse painted above their skill level I know that person is just coping a photo. The sad thing is I know that artist will never get any better. He will always depend on his/her morgue collection.

Studying skeletons of human and animals: last night I found myself in bed pining my arm to my side to represent the shorter upper arm bone of a bird. The whale, the horse, the bird and the human all have the same bone structure. The fingers of a bird are feathers, the thumb feathers extend outside the wings flying grasp of air to test the ambiant air its flying in. You can see the elbow on a whales fin. Finger nails are the horses hoofs. You can reshape a horse head from a human head, all the parts are there.

The old school has no judgment at the top, the judges (Quote: One does not have to be an artist to have an excellent understanding of color, it's a science.) refuse to show their own paintings prior to excepting entries. The artist must submit to the higher authorities even before their work is judged. Everybody wants to be a judge, for the standing. This will not go on forever.

They refuse to believe oil painting are on the way out, that acrylics are a better paint. There can be no visual difference between the two types of work and clandestine acrylics could easily be the best work in the show. But what artist would lie just to be entered? These judges will accept oil work copied from photographs and called original. There are a lot of old school thoughts that have to be removed. The buying public can not be counted on to know what is good interpretation and what is copied, these judges can't even tell. The revolution is silent.

Personally, I wouldn't submit my work to a technically lessor artist to judge it. If you look at the "highly respected portrait painters of today" any good artist would tell you they are not very good. Paint a tree or rock takes the same abilities the portrait painter uses, and the best tree painters don't use photographs. They see it, they paint it. After you have painted enough trees or people you can make them do anything you want. The pure artist doesn't care about recognition so the revolution is silent.