No More Secondhand Art: Awakening the Artist Within

This is one of the most inspiring books you can read if you are an art student or just interested in art. Peter London tells the artists to go out and find themselves, make their own art, an experiment with encounter. Encounters are excises that are designed to help you know yourself and find out maybe unknown things about you. Since, he is an art therapist, the exercises are very creative and geared to giving you incite into how you can go out and create your own art based on what you have learned from encountrs with self. This may be a very unique approach to art-making but it's a journey through your own soul and I believe you need to make that journey to make your artwokd say what you want it to say. London's title is roughtly based on a book by Buckmaster Fuller, who wrote "No More Second-Hand God". Fuller states that if you want to know God, go out and find him for yourself. Don't just except whar yu've been told. That is someone else's experience. Peter London also suggest that other aqartist's work is about them, not about you. Go out and find yourself , then you will be able to communicate visually your unique fellings and deepest thought. Presuasive and inspiring,would recommend you pick it up today.

Having studied with Peter London over the past ten years I can assure readers that as a teacher he lives what he writes. He embodies what every teacher should bring to students: careful listening, respectful attention, thoughtful questioning. His writings have won the deserved respect of his educator and artist colleagues nationwide. Treat yourself to a fine book.

I've read this book three times from cover to cover in the past ten years; every now and again for just certain sections. I wish every teacher taught with the respect and care that comes through in the words of this book; won't you try? It is an invaluable resource for the teacher; covering subjects such as setting up classroom environments, critiques, media, and even giving art experience ideas. If you listen carefully to his words you will be given precious pieces of knowledge for your classroom and your studio, from someone who undoubtedly practices and believes in what he knows to be good. It's that real; and that important.

I teach art to adults and when I saw this book in the stacks the title intrigued me immediately. It is easy to teach technique, but it is really difficult to help students find what they want to say with their art. Why should we all strive to make art that looks like Picasso, O'Keefe or Degas? Instead we must learn to trust and value what we each have to say as artists, thus "No More Secondhand Art". The twelve exercises described in the book are geared to helping students generate imagery that is uniquely personal and immediate. These "Creative Encounters" are best done in a group setting. I have watched numerous students who have participated in these exercises break forth into new territory and finally find a freedom of expression that had eluded them. This book was a revelation to me when I first discovered it, and it transformed my teaching.

I don't know Peter London, but I would like to. He has the rare touch of originality that awakens the soul. His book's subject is painting, but he actually focuses on self-discovery. If you want to see your old world with new eyes, if you love originality, buy and read this book! Some authors write for fame, some for money; Peter London writes to reveal the deeps in humanity, and possesses an extraordinary prose style of surpassing beauty. Give your soul and spirit a treat, and read him