Randomize

A few things bug me about modern art. The biggest thing is that so many artists, rather than actually having something important to say or something beautiful to express, cheat to create something impressive, but in the end, hollow.

1. Make it big. Really big. If you can’t produce something interesting, magnify the scale until it confuses the viewer into thinking there’s something really important about your piece that they are missing.
2. Take a long time. Rather than doing something that requires skill or has some important meaning or strong aesthetic, an “artist” will simply do something that makes it painfully clear that they spent a really long time constructing the piece. Installation art like is the worst offender. Making a ¹⁄₅-scale copy of the White House in Legos is impressive, but it says nothing about you as an artist or than you have too much time on your hands.
3. Make it complicated. Hide the lack of a strong concept in layers upon layers of random junk, hoping the end result looks like there’s more than there actually is.
4. Be trendy. Photographers are the worst about this. Rather than actually taking an interesting photograph, they rely on the crutch of faded and cross-processed color actions, Dragan filters, old film looks, and the Flickr-flavor-of-the-month.
5. Be offensive. True, offense is a sin of the viewer as much as the artist, but some “artists” are little more than visual shock jocks.

So, instead, I recommend the opposite:

1. Scale each piece for optimum viewing, not just to make an impression.
2. Challenge your technical skills with each piece.
3. Edit. Find the point where further complexity and layering no longer speaks to your concept, and stop.
4. Create the next trend.
5. If your art is not merely aesthetic, seek to educate and illuminate, rather than simply to offend. Understand your audience and bring them with you.