ARTISTS TALKING

# 1 [18 February 2010]

We have arrived at the point to reflect, evaluate & curate!  In just over one week we put up our first exhibition.

This blog will document the curating process and exhibition outcomes.  

# 2 [19 February 2010]

The gallery space is essentially a long corridor and viewers will enter from either end giving two starting points to the exhibition.  We met yesterday and quickly looked through all the work seeking possible formats or order for the presentation.

There are themes emerging, a figurative narrative is appearing which was probably predictable we both make figurative work.

To help me think, to “play” with the images & to see where such a narrative could be taken I made a very quick ‘book’ folding & cutting an A4 sheet.  It changes the scale of the work and has become a collage of collages.

Pleased with the results I print out one or two but I am no further on with a definite plan for the presentation yet.  I need instead to start sorting out frames & mounting card.

# 3 [23 February 2010]

Art allotments started as a weekly swap of images and ideas, like packets of seeds. We posted and received A4 envelopes of collage materials made up from what came to hand, a mix. The idea was to have an artist¹s conversation through something different, accessible and spontaneous.  The focus was on doing. It has grown over a year and so now it is time to see what this looks like in an exhibition and find out what other people think. The exhibition space is a long gallery connecting two buildings with windows on one side and zigzag walls on the other. Outside is rough ground.

The thing about the art allotments and growing ideas is that it is about seeing what would come up. It has also been about working on an idea with another artist and friend. This has given two different perspectives in our choices of materials, the collages and the effect all this has on our other work. The exhibition is itself another collage to sort, place and build. There are narratives that appear accidentally, cumulatively and the ones that, for me, reappear.  What I love about collage is that its like a puzzle without a picture on the box. The activity is about space and placing things, shapes, colour, noise, creating sets, and movement.  The exhibition is a process in progress.  I can be wary of process but in this case, it¹s key.  Its great to see work recycled and returned and images have started to resurface such as  figures as part of the furniture or moving through it. The process has made new images and new work to develop and grow. I find it hard recycling some images sent to me and it is hard to rip up someone else¹s images! 

Ok now I am starting to worry as one of the other things is that the strength of this conversation is that it has persisted in the face of many other demands of everyday lives.  I am clearing the path for this week and keeping my animation (work) sessions at bay. 

Angela

# 4 [2 March 2010]

Last few days have been hectic. Publicity is now distributed, framing done … It seemed odd to be framing ideas & unfinished work including pages ripped from sketchbooks. By Saturday lunchtime the exhibition was up.  Thank you to helpers. Questions still surface. Is the work any good? Is it worth exhibiting?

I give myself the answer. It has to be yes & yes, but there remains a sense of apprehension & unease.

So we have to remind ourselves again that this is an exhibition about a process.  “Finished” work will be for a future exhibition.

Next task is to plan for the “official opening” – Next Sat. March 6^th.

# 5 [7 March 2010]

The grand opening has happened. No time to update this blog before hand as too busy making cakes & seed packets. It was great to welcome 50 or more people. We can’t be sure of the exact numbers because we had forgotten to bring a number clicker & at some point fairly early on I lost the pen & list I started & gave up.

In order to have cake everyone had to first make a collage. We handed everyone a seed packet – an envelope full of random collage scraps - for the task. We didn’t make it compulsory but even so, half way through we needed to put out more tables.  Many people made one or more collage postcards and some took extra packets home.

Gradually as the cakes disappeared, the notice board was filled with small pieces of Allotment Art.  The results ranged from exuberant to restrained, witty, abstract, figurative and even a 3D thank-you collage bouquet.

The feed back has been so positive. Everyone found the gallery despite some of the posters/directions going astray. The whole event felt relaxed and everyone said it was fun. As fun was one of the aims from the very beginning we now both feel exhilarated & inspired.   Several visitors want to join the project & so it will now move into the next phase but first we have a family workshop to run next week. ‘Art Window Boxes’.

# 6 [10 March 2010]

Art Allotments grows out of ripped up artwork .......

So begins the article appearing today on BBC radio Shropshire website.

..... Art Allotments was born out of the frustration that comes with artists block. In need of inspiration, Shropshire artists Angela Martin and Heather Prescott decided to send each other pieces of their artwork - to cut up. They added an assortment of other cuttings and materials and came up with a series of collages....

http://news.bbc.co.uk/local/shropshire/hi/people_a...

# 7 [10 March 2010]

The family workshop today was busy - very busy. For over 2 hours children came & went & sometimes came back again. They drew all over the gallery windows and the windows in both entrances to the building with chalk pens. They filled their "window boxes" with flowers, trees, the occasional tank & aeroplane and some interesting semi abstract patterns. We should have said no to writing and we would have avoided a lot of "dudes" in speech bubbles  and references to football teams. In the end we wiped away most of the writing and kept just the drawings.

The children also made a lot of small collages but not many made it onto the exhibition wall - most were taken home which is how it should be.

# 8 [11 March 2010]

When fragments come together & become inspirational, ideas grow & new work is made.  There are, however, definitely time, space and attitude weeds that get in the way and obscure the view and access to getting on with making.

Now the exhibition is up I notice maps and figures and a lightness of touch. There are themes but no big statements, a series of sight bites.

So far the exhibition is an airing of the collages over the past year presented on walls.   It is still growing after the 50 plus people made small collages out of the seed packets. Some even came later by email – from visitors who took envelopes home with them.  It has proved very popular and the good feedback continues.   Over 30 children and parents added to this yesterday.
 The plug on Radio Shropshire website and John Davall¹s programme helped – A big ‘Thank you’ to Genevieve Tudor who came to the launch & spread the word. 

It is our turn now to review our work and decide what next. The work has fed into my work. My decision so far is to concentrate on making more landscape based mixed media work.

Back to the image of growing – growing new ideas from new collage materials. We have decided we must start anew as the old stuff is pretty well composted.

Angela

# 9 [26 April 2010]

The exhibition is now down & stored for a while.

In reflecting on the work made there were themes & links which emerged. When viewed chronologically the early images were closely related to the gardening theme. We often found ourselves playing with language ... growing, weeding, nurturing and companion planting ... terminology that proved useful in helping develop the visual image. At other times shapes & colours or an odd word of text provided the starting point. Some envelopes sparked several varying approaches while others took ages for ideas to properly germinate. At times the collage images began human narratives.  Who is this figure?

# 10 [29 April 2010]

So I had to ask "Who is the figure that appeared?"

I decided fairly quickly that it was Icarus with contemporary interpretations. The possibility that people can fly like the birds to escape from difficulties has always been attractive even with the associated dangers. 

The first images began together but were separated for the exhibition. Later Icarus appeared with hands in the air. He appeared quickly as a response to Angela's cartoon drawings.

Later still he is hanging on to a ?sun ?a clock ... ? to save himself.The phrase  "Flying to close to the sun" become the title for this image & the work (the print) that I is still struggling to come into being.

I like to use myths & fairytales and Icarus could stand for both my low key anxiety & mistrust of my place in the art world and my moral & ethical concerns about the environment.

I have always held on closely to the notion that any art work I make is transient and so the practical ways we have explored in creating the collages have been liberating.

The act of cutting up old work, using material I have been given but have not chosen and then reworking and cutting up the first collages to make new collages is an exciting journey to new territory every time I begin.

It still amazes me that at some point in the process the real images to which  am connected, and which I want to develop I as an artist start to come to consciousness in this process .