This is Shakespeare’s Polonius, in Hamlet, of course, advising his son about to leave home. Get the good stuff if you can afford it. I wish I had. Some time ago I encountered the kind of deal you think you can’t refuse, on artist’s paint brushes. Now I get round to using them I find that they are a complete waste of space. In fact, I wouldn’t even give some of them to kids, as they would be sufficiently frustrating to put them off art for ever. I would have been far better off buying fewer brushes, but ensuring that they were of a good quality.
I think that the same rule probably applied to the floor sander we borrowed in order to resurface the floor of the Unit 9 gallery, at the South Square Centre. It packed up half way through the job today, and now we have to hire one tomorrow to finish the task. On reflection, it really was not up to such a demanding project.
I guess that in this, as in so many things in life, you get what you pay for.
You can tell that I’m not in a good mood today. My own painting is imposing its own stresses, emotional as well as technical, and the combination of the Palestinian situation and the wall-to-wall treatment in the media of the First World War is taking its toll on my state of mind.
Your post has lietfd the level of debate