Learning to exhibit

Some artists work in secret, satisfied only to push themselves in their search for clarity or enjoyment of the process.  I find I am a bit of an exhibitionist, loving the burst of laughter at a wry comment on something I am striving for.  Laughter is best, which is an odd statement, as I usually work on things where there is little reason to expect anyone to find things funny.

I have been making myself learn about exhibiting.  I have been helping the curator at Hardwick to exhibit on the wall of the cafe and the Crush Hall Cabinets on FCH campus.  This required putting out an open call for exhibitors, (I used Curatorspace, they had a free trial for one use), selection and hanging of the works.  I received so few submissions -it seems students are busy with other things, so everyone who submitted participated in the exhibition, though not all pieces were hung.  It was interesting working with Sarah Bowden, the Curator, as we looked at the pictures and the tall blank wall, two technicians ready on a scissor lift,  and decided where to put each piece.

I have never been through the process of balancing images like this before, even though I have exhibited and hung friends and family shows.  One piece (a newspaper collage of Castro by Angie Hunt) was positioned first in the centre, and then the rest added carefully around it.  Three small black and white detail images were not hung in a row, as might be expected, but were separated to add punctuation between images which needed a breathing space between them.  We stood together doing the 'up a cm, left five' bit for a while, and I was relieved that generally my instincts matched Sarah's.  When most of the pieces were up she left us to hang the rest.  One piece proved complex to hang, a cascade of electrical ties that were intended to be strung on a structural beam across the window.  It made the point that anything unusual needs a proper installation diagram supplied ahead of time.  Even the little monochrome images proved a little difficult as we didn't know which way up they should be hung (close-ups of leaves) as there was no indication on the pieces themselves.  A 'this way up' or arrow on the back of pictures is a useful thing- we found the artist and hung them correctly, but another thing to specify in advance in this type of process.  Perhaps a disclaimer in the call out would be sufficient - if you don't mark the canvas or provide full installation details, we will 'hang as we see fit'.

Only one person submitted a 3d piece for the cabinets- a small piece of cast concrete. With a little coaxing Fi Hill, a second year BA student, filled both cabinets with an exuberant display of her experimental cast concrete, plaster and textile pieces.

I also submitted a piece for the Wilson Gallery's new phone box display in the middle of Cheltenham.
I found out about the opportunity a few days before deadline- to make disposable pieces the correct size to fit in the window panes of these old red phone boxes - either one, eight or sixteen images.  The sizes meant that my first idea, to print onto acetate, wouldn't work, as I would have needed A3 acetates, so I printed on paper.  I awkwardly photographed my face and hands through coloured glass, using my phone, and these were then increased in size to meet the specification.  My acceptance letter  included the sentence "The panel met today, and they were very impressed with the intriguing nature of your work and how it relates to the phone box environment. The panel were also impressed with your accurate response to the formatting brief."  This seemed a little surprising until I went to see the display to discover that very few people had works that accurately fitted the phone box dimensions.

The big challenge of the month was to submit to the British Glass Bienniale.  Submissions needed to be media quality, and glass is a tricky thing to photograph well.  I hired a third year student to photograph my three pieces.  This was a very interesting process, as she wasn't photographing with the camera tethered to a computer.  I had expected an interactive process but was unable to see the work she did until it was complete.  The work was very precisely photographed but looked rather forensic- and I wanted drama.  As she was completing her dissertation with the same deadline as the submission I attempted to photograph the pieces myself, and submitted a mixture of her photographs and mine to the Biennale.  I submitted not because I expect to get in - this show has world class glass, but because the process of submitting needs to be learnt like any other.  How to chose work, how to photograph work, how to meet project briefs etc.  One of the difficulties in working with glass is that other people go 'oh wow!' even when the actual technical quality is poor.

Scanning the University opportunities notification I spotted internships at an exhibition of outdoor sculpture near Cirencester.  I can't manage that kind of work and am already participating in the Open Studios in Cheltenham, but I followed the link to the artists call for the show.  Submission was nearly over but they were still looking for some glass, so I hurriedly photographed and measured two pieces (the large red gecko and the Antarctic Porthole) and submitted.  I'll make sure I visit this year, and hopefully when it runs again, in two years time, I will have some excellent works on suitable stands/supports and properly photographed.

The Corinium Museum in Cirencester held an exhibition of art inspired by the Cotwolds. I submitted a glass panel of Bluebell Woods, and was selected.  At the private view I felt a bit sheepish (sorry) that I had taken such a restricted view of the what the selectors were looking for.  There were lots of pictures of curly headed sheep and charming scenery, but there were also so edgier pieces of ceramic, tweed and paint.  
   
I also attended a Masterclass on Hospitality as part of John Walker's The Zany Capsid exhibition at the Hardwick Gallery- where we made costumes and practiced the notion that as bar staff/jesters we could take any query or comment and use it to make the gallery attender feel comfortable - this was recorded, and the video includes my take on the process, based on a five year old I once interviewed about some art at their school. 

So, a busy period.  I am hoping that some reflection on these various processes will allow me to take a more planful and measured approach to exhibition.  I did launch myself at the process in an attempt to make myself aware of the issues, and thought it best to consider and record them before I forgot.











 

Artists talking - about their work and the business of being an artist

This week the lecture was by Simon Ryder, discussing collaborative practice.  Simon described the complex and changing process he has taken to be able to do the types of works he envisions.  The key messages from this talk were that it takes persistence, flexibility of approach and the willingness to shift the key strategies used as the financial and cultural climate changes.

He showed examples of his work, some of which incorporated sound as a key feature.  One of these was working with transcriptions of the sound made by the Aurora Australis, the light swirls caused by electrons and the solar win around the south pole. I was startled to realise that I had never given a single thought to the fact that the south pole would have its own light show.  I was caught out on a trip to Australia, trying to navigate by the sun, and it wasn't until we went around in a full circle and passed the same person pushing a pram that I realised I was so completely and unthinkingly a northern hemisphere person and had forgotten that the sun would be northerly at midday.  I have lived on three continents, but always north of the Equator.

Simon regards the audience as integral to the planning of his works.  The production of any guide to the work is carefully thought out to be a meaningful part of the experience.  This is a useful point to remember with the work I am doing, as I have the audience clearly in mind but hadn't thought of the accompanying handouts as an essential component that should be given as much thought as the works themselves.

Managing expectations during a collaborative process can be difficult.  Artists have their own strong drives, public bodies have their own expectations and these can change at very short notice.  Simon agreed to a prison residency, and the prison closed a week after he started.  It was to be turned into an immigration detention centre, but was empty for a long time.  The work produced here became an exploration of the history and space of the empty building.

There is uncertainty of process.  There can be anxieties that there will be something that will fill the expectant space.  Have to keep opportunities open, and manage the uncertainty that comes with it being hard to predict the pathways and process.


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Library books- the university has helpfully changed the renewal system so that books are renewed automatically unless requested by someone else.  It takes all the pressure off reading them.  Not a good idea.

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Chapel Arts Cheltenham

A beautiful new art gallery opened last week in Cheltenham - Chapel Arts.  The building used to be a Baptist Chapel, then the Mormon's took it over, the the Christadelphians ( I hear the cries of 'splitter' in my head from the Python's 'Life of Brian').  The clear open space has a gallery with movable walls, a lift, wide glass balustraded stairs, an excellent little cafe, and a determined, inventive and witty owner.  The first show is Contemporary Royal Academicians, and includes prints of many types and some small sculptures.  An artist talk by Emma Stibbon and Anne Desmet produced an interesting insight into the impact of both Rome scholarships and being elected to the Royal Academy.

I used to be a member of the Royal Academy- an annual fee allowed entrance to all their shows and, even more important, to the Members Room.  Not only was this a good place to stop for a rest on a busy day in London, but one was almost guaranteed an excellent and amusing insight into the life of some of London's eccentrics.  The little cafe with its sofa is already producing some of the same delight- yesterday I met a woman who got an entire first class honours degree from the Open University using Tesco Vouchers.  I have a Certificate in Science from the OU gained the same way (done for amusement), but I've never met anyone before who even realised that the OU used to be a partner with Tesco and the vouchers could be used for four times their face value for courses. As an outcome of that conversation I am now going to be helping her find a home for a large slide archive.

The artists who spoke were Emma Stibbon and Anne Desmet.  The both spoke about their processes and motivation.

The election to the Royal Academy was a very significant moment for both of them.  Anne talked about submitting year after year to the Royal Academy Summer Show, with some success.  Her work was rejected one year and she was wondering whether to continue but submitted two small prints, having one chosen.  The next year she was elected- which brings with it the right to hang six images without any selection process, and that shift being enough to mean she could give up an editorial job which had been essential for her financial stability (she hastened to say she had enjoyed the job, but had done it for a long time).

Anne said she wanted another 200 years to be able to work thorough the ideas she wanted to explore.  When she talked in detail about the works hanging in the show she explained some of the processes she used to modify prints to get different images from the same block.  One useful tip for collaging was to use Pritt Stick ( a child-friendly glue) rather than 'archival' glue. The Prit holds well, is a pH of 9 so won't damage the paper, and allows immediate work without buckling the paper.  If she used archival glue then each time a piece was added to an image she would have to put it in a press for a week to keep it flat, and would forget what she was trying to achieve between stages.

At university people have talked about 'materiality', and I have been struggling to understand what they mean and why they think it is important.  I hadn't really got past 'it's the stuffness of stuff', which is fun to say but doesn't really advance my understanding.  Listening to these two artists talking I begin to glimpse a different form of relationship with their materials - Anne talked about the " deliciousness of ink".   Her favourite drawing tool is an old Bodyshop bottle filled with diluted Quink ink- it fades rapidly, but allows her to sketch strong light/darks in a scene.  She explained how  woodcarving was a process of carving with light - each stroke of the carving tool takes away from the black of the image, rather than starting with the white page and adding black.  She wants her (usually) small images to pull people into a miniature world.

Emma uses polymer resist plates as her primary medium.  She has produced works which refer to her time in the Antarctic and Arctic, and large prints of icy flat vistas are included in this show.  She aims for a theatrical sense of immersion.  One of the challenges of working in these places is not only that she gets cold when outside but that ink freezes - adding salt or gin were suggested as effective solutions.  She also incorporates found materials, so, for example, images of volcanic eruptions may include ash in the final print.  Emma described the process of working with photographs, photocopying to get grainy images, collaging, painting, mono prints, manipulating in various ways- creating a fiction that has the essential qualities of the place she is documenting.  She also said it is possible to spend three weeks on a work and then decide it is not working and needs to be abandoned- leave the studio and shut the door.

Both artists use photographs, but agreed that drawing in situ imprints the scene in a way a camera doesn't do.  When looking at a drawing can remember what they were thinking at the time, how the breeze felt like, how the air smelt.  Photographs are useful data but the attention given during a sketch produces a very different relationship with the scene.

Why do an MA in Fine Art?

I'm currently doing a part time Masters degree in Fine Art at the University of Gloucestershire.  Those of you who know me know that I always like learning new things- whether it is welding or meteorology or how to mange a kite buggy.

Those of you who know me will also know that I rarely leave the house these days for more than a couple of hours because I have health problems.  I keep myself interested with working/playing in my studio.  However, gaining some input from other people about art and ideas is wonderful, and my local university has a part time art option which commits me to only a half day a week at seminars, and the campus is only a couple of miles from the house so I can get home quickly if I need to.

I think I might have an 'O'level in art from when I was sixteen, but that was so long ago and the classes were so marginal to the goal of the school that I am not even sure about that. It might seem strange to jump to the higher degree level, especially when the local college a two minute walk from my house has just started doing a Foundation Art course.  However, that course is full time, and not only full time but surrounded by bouncy teenagers I suspect.  The undergraduate degree is three years full time.  So, having no idea what 'Art' really is when it comes to discussing it with academics, I enrolled on this postgraduate course.

I should have written about term one, but it was full of chaos, with multiple staffing issues and no clarity of expectation.  I enjoyed the company of my fellow students, and made use of the opportunities to get the technicians to help me with some casting, wrote my essay and submitted my portfolio, but didn't feel much closer to getting to grips with this weird thing of professional 'art-speak'.

This term we are working on a module called 'professional development' and it requires a collaborative project.  I've been working on animations, both stop-motion and 2d computer animation, and have started work with a second year animation student, Keira Marshall, who fortunately has agreed to do her required 'work- experience' with me to try to get an animation of bone modelling made this semester.

First character studies of the 'Equipoise' character, who controls the flow of work /calcium in the bones.  These will be draw in in the computer to allow the beginning of the storytelling.  I've been learning how to use TV Paint Animation software, but unfortunately using the drawing tablet tears my shoulder rotator cuff in the same way using a paint brush at an easel does.

I am also going to write a case study of an artist, exploring the issues in achieving success in this profession.  I have chosen Colin Reid, whose work I admire, is renowned, is local, and with whom I did a glass casting class a couple of decades ago. I still have the strange test pieces I did on that course, though I didn't carry on and do glass casting as controlling a pottery kiln to fire glass was complex and difficult in those pre-computer controlled kiln days.

Blogging about the processes required for these two pieces of work will help me explore the issues around this kind of work.  When I was trying to decide whether to apply for this course I looked for information and opinion on what it was like to do an MA Fine Art but found very little.  It is just possible that this blog will be useful for others trying to decide whether an MA would suit them.