Is there an artist (person who paints/draws/etc.) whose work you absolutely adore? What about an artist's whose work makes you want to vomit?
I worship the work of Edmund Blair Leighton (especially his paintings with castles, princesses, etc.... "Meeting on the Turret Stair"!!!). And I can't help but admire anything da Vinci, the man was a genius. I never understood Picasso, Pollock, or nearly anything "abstract", for that matter.
You?

I love Patrick Nagel, courtesy of my husband's appreciation for his work. Part of that is because Nagel was influenced by Japanese artwork and Art Deco, both styles I favor. I also appreciate what Nagel contributed to graphic art during the decades I grew up. Heck, you still can't pass by a hair and nail salon without seeing an image inspired by Nagel's work.

On the other hand, Thomas Kinkade makes me quite literally sick to my stomach. His work is the romance novel of the art world.

Part of the reason I like Picasso is that I never really made much attempt to "understand" him. I don't view art from the perspective of what I think the artist was trying to convey because I consider art a personal experience, and the only truely important thing is how it makes ME feel. I find many works by Picasso to be visually pleasing, and that is all that really matters to me.

What makes the art world in general go round? Diversity. And in turn, diversity allows artists [both fine and commercial ones, like me] to make a living doing what they love best, which is no small deal. Even though I have been a writer, musician and grade A junk collector for years, my first love is still painting.

I used to be really hard on people who enjoyed having the "kincaid look" in their home. Heaven knows how many drawings / paintings I have executed for folks who needed my work to match the color scheme in their living room!

As I get older, I realize that everyone has a right to enjoy what they love, just for the sake of the pleasure which comes from it. Art is a spiritual endeavor, meant to either excite, heal or soothe the viewer. True, the commercial stuff we crank out is not personally what I've got in my house. I tend to like the 'ash can' school of the 1890's. The impressionists who were able to convey how a scenic woodland made you feel rather than provide you with an exact duplication. Van Gogh, Monet, Renoir, Alice Kellogg Tyler, and all their friends from that time period. I love John Singer Sargent for his beautiful, luminous society portraits [and his private work, which not many were interested in]

Nobody except my friends are interested in my private work, which is definitely an accquired taste! But I 've sold tons of the 'correct subject matter' around the world. Who would have thought those dratted bears and flop earred bunny rabbits of the mid 1990's would provide such a nice income? In Japan and Canada they loved my work and we couldn't keep up the supply. I drew bunny rabbit greeting cards night and day for two years. Eeewwh.

I used to have a tee shirt printed with the legend 'REAL ART AIN"T GONNA MATCH YOUR SOFA,LADY.' But with age, comes understanding. If people like all those phony English cottages and too good to be true babbling brooks...well, okay. Who am I to argue? Along with my Led Zepplin and Flogging Molly cd's, I also have some Carpenters hidden away, too. Too late for me to be anything but one of the commoners!

I did Irish and European Art History for the Leaving Certificate (state examination), I never really liked art before I took up the subject a few years ago when I was at school (it was either that or biology)but I liked it in the end. I liked Michelangelo, Da Vinci, botticelli and caravaggio. I liked monet and rembrandth's paintings as well, I didn't study rembrandth though. I wouldn't say I'm mad into art but I like it. I like one or two Irish Artists also, I can picture the painting but can't remember the artist's name at this moment

kt, I've got to agree with you.
Art can be part of the whole gamut of human needs and emotions, all the way from "It provides a profound spiritual experience" to "I like the way it looks over my sofa".
I have a large glass jar thingy in the corner of my living room. It has a way of gathering the light from the room, and 'doing something' to the air in that corner. In that sense, it is a created object, that enhances the experience of the room, and so I call it art. (maybe a collaboration between the person who made it, and me, who saw the possiblities).
We have an oil painting of a scene in the woods, that personally I think is quite dreadful (muddy colours, and some very odd proportions on some of the trees) but to my husband, it gives a sense of peace and serenity, and he looks at it often. So, I guess it's art.
We have a poster of part of a Van Gogh painting on the wall, we have pencil sketches of our children done by my sister, we have a couple of Inuit soapstone carvings. I like them all, for different reasons.
All this as a way of saying - I tried to make a list of favorites, and couldn't. I really like almost all art, in one way or another.

There are so many great artists from so many eras that it's literally overwhelming to choose but a handful of favorites. Additionally, artists often go through many styles or phases in their careers. Picasso had his Blue period, his Rose Period, Cubism splash, and Neo Classical fling, among half a dozen more. Some of these leave me cold, others I've "fallen deeply in like with".
Zelda mentioned the under-rated Pre-Raphaelite, Edmund B Leighton, a master of light. I never knew he did a version of Meeting on the Turret Stairs. I saw the famous one in by FW Burton in the National Gallery, Dublin. Knowing the legend that it depicts only adds to its charm.
Here's my short list of some personal favorites: George de la Tour (his versions of "The Fortune Teller" and "The Repentant Magdalene" top the great Caravaggio versions of the same subjects IMHO)
Vermeer ('nuff said)
Bellotto (what early city-scapes)
Gustave Caillebotte (come back and paint more than that glorious handful!!)
Winslow Homer & Thomas Eakins (representing 19th C USA with the gusto it deserved)
The British social commentators from Hogarth to Fildes
The overlooked 19th C Russian masters Levitan,Aivazovsky and Repin
All the great Impressionists
The cynical (but TALENTED) self-promoter$..Whistler..Picasso...Dali
The incomparable TURNER..VAN GOGH (I've lost all readers and space by now..lol)
Hates?? Only the "emperor' clothes" of the modern art ideolgoues of today who lionize a painting that goes 30 years hanging in a museum before being discovered to be....upside down!! (apologies to the better abstract and surrealists)