people in paint

I have been painting away the last couple of days, doing a piece for my grandad, a portrait of him with his best friend - our dog, maggie. At the moment this piece is simply paint on paper, which is usually what I use in draft stage, so if he is happy with is it should make its way onto canvas now. I wanted to demonstrate the importance of line my composition process; especially with portraits, my main aim always is too try and capture the essence of the person through shape, which forces me to break down the image and make visually the association between a person's appearance and a person's personality, combining the two things that make them recognisable. I then try and continue this process in colour; colours are usually a continuation of this exploration rather than an actual portrayal of enviroment.

Doing this made me think about artistic process in general, and the way young artist explore their individual development. I have been watching : 'Goldsmiths: But is it Art?' on the BBC (it is still on i player) and it made me revisit the issues I have with going to art college. What do other people think? What does art college teach you, is it a pre requisit to launching yourself as a young artist? What does it proove - if it is about exploring artistic process, meeting people and getting you work out there, being inspired and learning from other artists and working collaberatively, I feel like I am embarking on this already and know other artists who are not at college who are doing the same. To be honest, a lot of the work displayed by young artists on the programme I found hard to understand; art for arts sake seemed to be the message, art without a purpose other than itself, and despite this a direct quote from one of the tutors was that modern art must have a clear motivation, it must be an 'act of communication'. The act of communication in my work is literally communicating who the person is, from them to paper to canvas to the viewer, a process of communication. This line of communication - presenting an interpretation of what things are to show a perspective that that the veiwer can connect with and interpreate themselves - is what informs most of what I do, and asks the question - 'How do we recognise objects/envrioments/ideas/sensory experiences/each other? How do we interprate them? How does our imagination inform this interpretation? How far can our imagination warp these things so we can still recognise them as well as others?' I don't know what artists think of my work but other people have always seen something in it and understand what I am doing through the images I produce; maybe other artists would see it is as too simplistic, under developed. But then should art really at a base level be for other artists, who validates work, the veiwer alone? Lots of questions.....