Artist as unpaid carer

A Journey Exhibition is due to finish on 23rd September.

My fingernails are sore from being bitten from weeks of worry and sleepless nights wondering if Portrait Of Ian Duncan Smith With Bandaged Nose has been sold, and no notification to suggest it has yet.

I have submitted him for Nottingham Castle Open – I figured that if he hasn’t sold, if he is accepted for that, there’s the chance of winning some prize money, and to be viewed by a wider audience.

IF he’s accepted. In my opinion, the context is perfect for a roguish politician, in connection to the Robin Hood legend, but I wait and see.

If not, he will be collected from City Arts and I will try to sell him to clear my overdraft.

Other attempts to clear my overdraft are not working.

Citizen’s Advice, who used to be very helpful, have become less so. According to someone I know, their funding has been cut. Surprise, surprise.

The only advice they could offer was to try Turn 2 Us, and when I found a grant that I thought might help, was told they won’t clear debts. If I hadn’t paid the rent and gotten into rent arrears, they would, but I’m weird, I like keeping a roof over my head (and that of my disabled son).

I have shared info for the current exhibition with DPAC, who have been very active protesting the rights of disabled people, to coincide with the Paralympics. They have a related exhibition, and were very interested.

I’ve spent the last week in a state of inability to work. Then the Referendum, which has taken over everyone’s world, came to its head, and as I passed the old abandoned mental asylum yesterday, going online is like looking in through its windows to see some scenario from One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest being enacted on reality.

Every now and then, I’ve been online on twitter doing small bits of self promotion for my work and the exhibition.

Because my twitter account is linked to my Facebook account, these tweets filter through to there.

Where “friends” and “family” then erroneously respond to posts that aren’t meant for them, and in negative ways.

One of them was along the lines of “I don’t like the idea of an Ian Duncan Smith sculpture, but I prefer your Simulacrum” – obviously someone that has read a tweet, hasn’t paid attention to the actual work when I’ve shared links to my website or the City Arts website, and hasn’t been to see it to know that it’s a painting, not a sculpture!

I don’t mind if people don’t like the work, but social media is for us to share work to a wide variety of people, some of whom may like it and buy it!

I’m not interested in unpaid Brian Sewell posting necessarily critical comments out of context.

So I posted an off-the-cuff status basically telling them that if they don’t want to buy my work, or support me or my practice, they are free to ignore my posts or unfriend me.

Instead, I’ve been told by an aunt that she never intends to buy my work and that “I’ll never have any friends with that attitude” – well, that attitude has protected me against abuse for many years, thank you, and I had to unfortunately unfriend one of the two people that had taken the time and trouble to tell me how, when he was unhappy with his job, he got another job doing something else.

We artists encounter this all the time, but here, he has failed to understand that I already do 3 unpaid jobs, so I don’t have time for another, and I also wasted an hour applying for a job working in mental health support for young adults, which was rejected. So I’d like to think I could maybe give up my degree and maybe go and be a qualified mental health nurse, perhaps, but that would require undertaking medical training etc.

Amidst family divisions, a general sense of impending doom, fears for my future as an artist, and as a carer, for my kids’ future, I received a message from another artist about a possible project in the pipeline, which I would be interested in if funding is successful.

And I’m also now qualified in Emergency First Aid at work, which is a useful skill to add to my bow, but if you choke on a nut, you’re still probably dead, as I found that part difficult on tall people!

I feel that others are articulating the feelings following the referendum better than I can, as I watch in disbelief as once again democracy fails to account for just under half the population, all of Scotland, where I want to move to now, and we are left with a disconcerting mix of having been told we were crying wolf when there was a huge werewolf eating the megaphone.

Portrait Of Ian Duncan Smith With Bandaged Nose was taken to City Arts in Nottingham and successfully delivered yesterday lunchtime.

I’ve updated my blog with links to other exhibitions I caught whilst in Nottingham, including the epic Simon Starling works at Nottingham Contemporary and Backlit gallery, along with highlights from John Newling’s latest work, and Artist As Mother As Artist.

I’ve updated my website here.

Yesterday, I was busy preparing Portrait Of Ian Duncan Smith With Bandaged Nose to take to Nottingham for the exhibition, and I was invited to volunteer for this event – in a workhouse.

I obviously declined, as it directly violates Article 27 of the Human Rights Act, and obviously, I have no intention of voluntarily going to a workhouse.

Then I got quite angry about it. I reported it to Facebook (not that I think that’ll do any good) and recommended that no one else volunteers for it, in fact, I’d suggest going to protest about it on the day!!

I thought about doing that myself, but that would mean buying train tickets and making some kind of placard, all of which would take time and money that I wouldn’t be paid for.

I hope anyone that might be in Ripon on the day (or can afford to go) has the opportunity to protest outside against the fact that a single parent artist was asked to effectively enslave herself for another artists’ work – work that is funded by the Arts Council.

The private view for the A Journey exhibition, which will feature Portrait Of Ian Duncan Smith With Bandaged Nose, will be at the Institute of Mental Health on Monday 23rd May. More info to follow.