November 2011 2000 words
My overall personal practice plan over the next few years is mainly attitudinal. It is about a philosophy and strategy of continuing to seek out and build up qualifications and experience, and allowing my artistic ambition to propel my confidence towards making a body of work, a reputation and a living.
Like most artists, I multi task. I have various career strands which for me add up to my practice. Not all activities are equal at all times, and achieving equilibrium is fleeting. However, progressing in different areas is the moving goal, and some objective measurable goals can exist as well as more abstract and subjective aims. I aim to continue in several parallel occupations, and have divided my practice into different areas, all of which I am active in, or plan to increase or establish activity. All of these require continual development, and crucially, all of them for me are essential and interlinked, and here in no particular order:
Reviewing/Assessing
Fiction Writing
Gallery Projects
Teaching
Moving Image/Artwork
Selling Work
Reviewing/Assessing
My current role with the Arts Council as Artistic Assessor in Visual Arts is finite, and last year the publication for which I review books nearly collapsed. These circumstances remind me of the precariousness of such employment, and the need to secure more appointments. This is partly a question of confidence, or making multiple submissions and approaches to magazines and newspapers, and not ceasing until I have found sustainable reviewing opportunities. I have put off proactivity in this area recently, but will pursue this throughout the New Year. I realise that I have built up considerable experience and credibility in this area over the years, having reviewed hundreds of books in cultural areas, from art to music and photography, and more recently poetry.
There are many publications which review books and exhibitions, and I have listed and identified the appropriate contacts – a list which needs continual updating. I do not wish to make use of the multitude of unpaid blogging and social media reviewing, although I may reconsider putting some on selected sites – perhaps Reviews Unedited on the Artists Newsletter site:
or the members reviews on the Art Review site:
I think there is a danger of spreading one’s words thin, and devaluing them by giving them away. If I can convince myself of the value of reviewing on such sites, and how I could use that to develop further paid reviewing, then I may proceed. Otherwise, it seems a little backwards for me, when I should be thinking more ambitiously and professionally.
Sometimes I doubt my ability for quick recall and access to facts in reviewing – specific names of other artists, dates and movements to refer to, but the reviewing I have done specialises in referring to itself – in analysing the actual exhibition or book rather than what else it may reference. I personally also find the other type of review – the academic and knowledgeable, often off-putting and too expert. Perhaps this is a positive – my Unique Selling Point as a reviewer, that it is experiential and considered, but not written exclusively for experts.
Visiting and assessing exhibitions for the Arts Council has been a highlight of this year for me, giving me diverse experiences and perspectives on the gallery experience. Perhaps I see now that my next task is to define my role as reviewer, to summarise that, so that I can easily communicate what viewpoint I bring to reviewing work.
In a few years time, my plan is that I will have built up and established more reviewing roles, writing about books, exhibitions and other cultural events.
Writing fiction, and especially now novels, is integral to exploring and expressing my ideas. It takes a good year of commitment to write a novel, and more to edit and process it. It has been unfeasible to write one while starting the MA and other commitments, but things change, and I may prioritise writing at some point over the next couple of years.
As to getting published, I have many finished and nearly finished projects, some of which I have previously submitted to agents and publishers. I have gained some idea of how the world of publishing works, and in some ways, am still waiting for my lucky break. I have gained some useful feedback and developing relationships, and at least know how to submit work properly. I occasionally attend events for aspiring novelists, and also writers’ talks. When it comes to it, there is no substitute in this area for getting on with it, applying rigorous self editing, and consistent proactivity.
I have a friend who has a long established book group of nearly 25 years, and who has offered to read with her group my most recent novel of 2010, Einstein Symphony No 1. That is arranged for the New Year, and is a great opportunity to gain considered critique.
It’s important for me to write, and develop my ideas which link with my art practice – notions of time as it is experienced, the legacy of having lived, ideas about music and movies. I have plans swirling around for my next novel which concerns the reality of fictional characters. Although I may plan over the next few years to write another novel, and to get one published and distributed, what is really within my power to enact is the will power to write, to get involved and commit to the thinking process and what it takes to list and send out. That at least I will do.
Gallery Projects
I have given myself recently a platform for development, spurred on by the MA, in the Breaking Boundaries task. Through theViewergallery, I plan to create many different projects. I feel it gives me license to set up, to experiment, to sell, to approach. I can link to other organisations and events, involve other artists, and create all sorts of contexts around my own work.
I am thinking through projects I’d like to do with theViewergallery – as well as similar and repeating events like those initiated at the launch, it is an ideal imaginary space to try out more conceptual ideas, to make use of free space, office space, any resources that may be had. It is not my intention to overload myself with commitments and debt, since even negotiated space requires some financing, but I feel somehow liberated to set up and try out art and exhibitions I would like to see happen. In time I would like theViewergallery to have a more concrete basis, to pay for itself and to have a studio/premises/storage space, but this is not its current priority.
Teaching
One of my main reasons for studying for an MA was to make myself more qualified to teach, in a very qualified and shrinking market. I have proactively gained various experience and qualifications in teaching in recent years, and still add to that and continually apply for the kind of jobs I would like. My CV has become more specific and credible, and so I hope it is only a matter of time before I gain the right job. Whenever I see vacancies for Associate Lecturers in Fine Art somewhere in England that I could travel to and from within a working day, I apply.
I have had plans to devise and organise classes, which I occasionally revise and add to. Throughout next year, if I do not gain appropriate employment, I will volunteer for more relevant experience, and work on setting up my own classes.
There are two places who have indicated they might ask me to do an artist talk next year – Newcastle University and Oxford Brookes University. I may be able to combine these with some tutorials for students, which again adds up to credible experience.
Moving Image and Artwork
I am surprised at how I have moved away slightly from making work this year, but it feels like a natural pause and preparation for much more work. Preparation for an exhibition in the New Year has dominated – Vessels, with a delayed deadline it spread out for longer, but I feel, benefited from even more consideration and deciding of details.
I have not felt a great deal of artistic satisfaction in the visual work I produced for the MA, but feel it has been really valuable, and added to my stable of ideas to develop, especially the use of layers of empty frames. There is much to explore there in projected and subtle images and Moving Image.
It has been an artistically active year, but over the next few years I hope to be more productive in Moving Image terms, to make work for its own sake, and to continue to develop my own style and ideas in Moving Image. I have an aim in my life and my practice to create a body of work which manifests my vision and ideas. This whole idea propels me and connects all my activities and aspirations together.
Approaching galleries, working with curators and organizations, submitting proposals and gaining funding all still seem to be rather more a question of luck than decision, but are things I continually try to learn about and participate in. More reliable is what I actually make sure to do myself.
Selling Work
I have not concentrated on this aspect for some time. I have produced work which has, if not been unsellable, has at least been unsellable by me, despite aspirations otherwise. Plans and ideas are one thing – actually producing works and multiples to sell, and creating the arena and market for them is what I am now ready for.
I have previously made and sold arty and creative items, and heartily wanted to avoid some of the pitfalls of that – selling sale or return, having leftover stock, not really knowing how to price and basically not really being equal in business. Now, courses and experiences later, I am ready to relaunch selling products. Thank goodness for the internet and the practice I have had selling excess review books and items for my son on eBay and Amazon. I used to feel that everything must be anticipated and thoroughly thought through, and while it is efficient to prepare for eventualities, and to start off well, it can be immobilizing to activity and experimentation.
I have always enjoyed making things. Often my artwork becomes contraptions, or objects, or art inventions. I delight in coming up with practical solutions which also convey my ideas, and I have had rewarding experiences in showing these publically. Through theViewergallery, I will present and sell a range of my handmade art products. I have already made a start in this area in my handmade corporate items – theViewergallery badges, magnets, stones, cards, etc. I have some ideas and prototypes and models which I have devised. I don’t know what I have been waiting for – things to come together perhaps, but I have found a way to start now, without having everything already paved towards the V&A shop or other ultimate goals.
Again, I find the persona afforded me through theViewergallery somehow liberating in acting as an agency to sell, rather than dealing with any dilemmas about selling through my own name, giving me a workable solution.
Where I am in the Context of Contemporary Art
I am in a position of potential. I have experience and a body of work which now means that although I must maintain my proactivity to ensure progress towards a sustaining practice, I no longer have to pounce on everything that moves, and follow through every slight opportunity. I can create a context around what I would like to happen, whether or not the world of contemporary art fits itself around me. I like being involved in current practice, and plan to continue exhibiting and reviewing, and would also like to get more involved in cross media Fine Art teaching.
18th February 2012
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