I really must stop leaving my blog until the last thing in the evening; it has moved progressively down the list after all the other evening chores until I am always totally knackered when I reach this stage.. Last night went really well; my previous show openings (of my work) have been pretty underwhelming so this was most definately a step forward. Last year saw my first 'official' solo gallery show, but as fate would have it, the location was Weston-super-Mare and so I had no friends or contacts to call on except my brother, who gamely made the trip from Bristol to be my moral support for the night. And I needed it; not the most busy room and of course everyone including the gallery owner a stranger to me. 'Experience', I told myself that night sitting outside a pink tent in a campsite in Sand Bay...'What doesn't kill you..'A year and some on, the experience was greatly enlivened by actually knowing the main participants of the show and being able to call on the support of a few key friends to chivvy me along; luckily we had an amazingly good turnout despite the snow starting to come down (very beautiful) and the multiple attractions of Edinburgh in November calling for support.
My thoughts after the event centred on the issue of self perception; how hard it is to see your own work with any degree of objectivity. I love the description of Teresa in the Unbearable Lightness of Being; she is forever staring at herself in the mirror hoping to glimpse her soul peeking out of the humble, flawed body she finds herself in; I have always related to that in person and with my art.
So the interest in many ways of standing in a room full of people viewing your work is earwigging on the comments, listening to what the viewers see and trying to see it through their eyes. I was interested at the Edinburgh Art Fair when a gallery owner referred to a painter I really like as 'someone you love or hate'; it had me baffled for an instant as it had never crossed my mind that someone would dislike it, let alone hate it... I should know well enough that we all have different opinions; I remember a colleague throwing away a lovely (free with the newspaper) print of Picasso's drawing of Francoise Gilot with the words 'Infantile Shite'. I rescued it sneakily later and it is framed in my house.
So, polarisation of opinion... I have to realise that some people (many!) may dislike my work or find it 'scary' (a quote). There seems to be something about figurative and portrait pieces that can provoke this; not wanting to have the image 'looking down from the wall'. I love having little people on my walls, but I guess that is why I am drawn to paint that way.
A comment I liked on this point last night was one lady had a friend who 'Loved Frida Kahlo, but wouldn't have one on the wall'...
On a positive note, many people came up to say how much they liked my work, and one in particular made my day by congratulating me on my 'lovely hands and feet'. (I'm assuming she meant in my paintings.) Put it this way; I remember a time not so far in the distant past when I expended a lot of energy repainting and repainting hands and feet; then over-painting them. Much has been learnt since then, and much still in process... but that is what I love about the whole thing. It is very, very much a journey for me; a narrative learning experience. I can't see a point when I will ever succomb to the need to be so commercial that I am producing work 'for sale'; this probably means I am destined to be skint for the foreseeable future, but I just have to keep moving and finding things out.
That was the other comment I liked, or that made me think; I was described as 'brave'. If brave is metaphorically laying yourself bare on a gallery wall and asking people to come and have a look, then yes, I am brave. But it has taken me an awfully long time to get brave:)
Have to say that last night, I enjoyed it.
No comments:
Post a Comment