🏛️ 🎉 Architecture Bonanza and other Surprises | Summary of 2022 from the producer

Fellow Apellesians: a Happy New Year to all of you!

For the Cave of Apelles, the past year has been phenomenal, so I would like to summarize the most important things:

Approximately one year ago, the Danish composer Frederik Magle appeared on our show with his father's trumpet. Magle has composed wonderful pieces such as "The Secret Garden" and it was especially interesting to hear him talk about overcoming the fear of becoming kitsch.

Early on last year, we also released a new tier here on Patreon where we offer one-on-one feedback from Jan-Ove and Sebastian. I think many have received important and necessary criticism from our skilled instructors in the year that went by.

Some of you might have missed that we released the TCA Booklist in January 2022, featuring a range of books on topics such as Kitsch, Art, Storytelling and History. A handy tool-set for any painter!

🏛️ Architecture bonanza

Carl Korsnes has become more involved as the guest host of the Cave of Apelles and in 2022 he notably conducted interviews with two representatives from the Architecture Uprising movement in Sweden: Michael Diamant and Eric Norin. Both are brilliant minds and among the most articulate people I have met.
The short video clips we released from their conversations was a hit on TikTok and in November we reached over a million views with not just one, but two video clips on the social media site.
One video clip was also re-posted on Imgur by someone else and received a million views there as well!

I have personally believed for many years that everything rests on architecture for a real Renaissance revival to happen big scale, and this is why we will continue to focus heavily on classical architecture on our channels in the time to come!

🎨 Instructive videos for painters

Throughout the past year, Jan-Ove Tuv released his Teiresias-series where he paints a self-portrait in twelve sessions and he also published a useful article on how he saved a hopeless self-portrait.

We also learned some bushcraft from the wild Scot Alastair Blain who taught us how to make painting brushes, and a previous student of Odd Nerdrum called David Molesky came on two separate occasions to show us how to properly varnish a painting and which oil mediums to use, among other things!

🌟 Talented painters and a special surprise

In 2022, we got to better know promising talents such as Melisa Calabria, Shaun Roberts and Hjalmar Hagelstam, whom we all covered on the Cave and the School channel.
We also did a few videos on landscape painting with Per Lundgren and Boris Koller.

And something I think many were happy to see: a special interview with Odd Nerdrum and a thorough analysis of his retrospective exhibition in Oslo, which was Nerdrum's first solo-exhibition in Norway in more than twenty years and by far the largest exposition of his work that has ever been on display!

🧠 Philosophy at the core

If there is one thing Odd Nerdrum has emphasized, it is the importance of philosophy. Every day, he gathers with his students in the studio to dissect a philosophical issue. 

He is convinced that it is the mind people and painters that needs training, more so than their hands.

We are devoted to spreading this message and therefore I would like to highlight the most interesting conversations on philosophical topics we had in the past year on Cave of Apelles:

• Aristotle's Ethics for Painters with Einar D. Bøhn
  Jung’s Collective Unconscious with Öde Nerdrum and Sebastial Salvo
• The Romantic Manifesto by Ayn Rand with Nic Thurman and Bork Nerdrum
• Kitsch or Art as a Name for Classical Culture with Martin Romberg
• How the Kitsch Questionnaire Clarifies Your Values with Nic Thurman

With that being said, I hope we will continue to grow in 2023 and yet again, on behalf of the team, I wish you all a happy new year!

Best wishes from the producer,
Bork Nerdrum