“I’m really tired right now kid.”
I have been showing my work around like crazy. To anyone I meet who I have the opportunity to share 10 minutes with. People having a drink in bars, people on transport, girls I meet at museums, people in bookstores and sometimes I’m the one who is approached, like in Berlin.
These aren’t uncomfortable or awkward encounters. No really, they aren’t for either party. It happens very naturally with just one initial hurdle where they fear that they will have to respond to really bad art with the artist right in front of them. Scary. But having done it enough times now, I’m pretty natural about presenting them the opportunity to see some photos “which are really good, I promise you’ll like them” and they have very little time to really say no before I’m already into my “I just spent 3 months in Bangladesh shooting close up …” and looking straight into their eyes.
Usually the conversation runs on and on. It’s always at least half an hour of them looking at the photos and commenting. I have a spiel that I do now for the photos and an order that I show the photos in. Talking to people like this has been great in first, clarifying my own ideas about my work, but more pleasurably, getting original reactions to the work form others that I wouldn’t have thought of. I thought that this whole audience participation thing was a myth but it is decidedly not. It has made me hungry to get my work out and in front of other eyes and minds so that I can have more conversations about how great I am, my art is, and my ideas are.
However, there are some problems in paradise. One, there is little point I think in showing the photos if I don’t have the time to show significant numbers of them. Otherwise the overall story that I’m trying to tell does not come across and I start rambling incoherently and quickly. This is especially bad in France where they pretend not to understand English.
Another is handling any negative comments. And really from about 10 people I’ve shown it to I’ve received one negative feedback. Even that was couched in how good the work was technically and that I had a very good ‘eye.’ But a French art bookshop seller (who also makes collage artists (yeah I know)) said that my work had already been done. When I researched the references that he gave me to backup his statement I could not find any similarities. Also, he believed the way the art was made, or it’s context of creation was not important. Once the work was done, it was done. Of course I do not agree with this. It is very important to my work that it is real and hard. That the people in the photos haven’t consented to the photos and often do not know that the photo has been taken. This gives the work authenticity that is lamely lacking in the art school theatre that passes for photographic art. I had the time and I should have showed him all the photos.
Another problem which surfaced in Berlin was that often the director of the gallery is not the one who is in the gallery at the time of the visit and the assistants are very reluctant to look at the work, and they aren’t of huge use anyway. I need to start printing work and learning to use the mail system (or dropping them off) to be able to reach the directors and not fall into the email rat race which I refuse to participate in.
Hopefully I will be doing a lot of this stuff when I’m in Australia.
Posted 2 years ago
