Banned!

When did you last say fuck? I said it loudly yesterday; read on you’ll appreciate the irony. A few posts back, I said that I was controversial - well now I’ve actually been banned. At first it seemed sad, then I thought it was funny. After a while though, I became angry. I’ve been censored.

An open call for submissions went out, asking artists to depict their home town. I found some graffiti on a Glasgow wall (see above) and defied anyone to say it wasn’t the very epitome of Glasgow cheek, bolshy confrontationalism  and also - humour. Yes, it certainly contains liberal use of the word fuck, but so does daily life in Glasgow. The graffiti has been visible in public for at least two years.

I submitted the carefully sewn mini-sampler to the competition (there’s a £500 prize/commission.) I was thanked via twitter so things were looking good. A few weeks later, I was interviewed for the accompanying book and website, and my profile featuring the piece was put up online. The exhibition opened, but I couldn’t attend.

Good job really. I contacted the organisers (all artists themselves by the way) and asked for a picture of my work in the show. They emailed back a few days later, and said that – mindful of their audience – they couldn’t include my work in the exhibition, despite having said there were no restrictions. I think they were feeling doubly awkward as (only when the programme was announced) did I reveal that this was going to feature in an article I was writing, and would have been the happy ending to the quest I mentioned here for getting my work shown. Oops.

There were many ways around this for the organisers. First of all, make sure that any limits on what is permissible is shown clearly, as well as flagging upfront in the terms and conditions. Or they could stage the exhibition with the words: ‘Adult Content’ (we’ve all seen that). The show is being held in a town hall where the word fuck has been heard regularly, possibly for centuries.

I honestly thought that battle had been fought an won. I rue the day that people began to swear all the time simply because those carefully valued transgressive words lose their power if overused and now we need new ones, as fuck seems tame. But saying fuck out loud is one of life’s greatest joys, and most of us do it.

This blog is about my being an innocent artist, and I innocently thought that  art involved freedom of expression. But artists censoring, or allowing others to censor their fellow artists for something so trivial – is so wrong, misguided and reactionary as to be surreal. Those silly people took the gloss of what could have been some excellent news.

Having said that, trying to be positive, I have been banned from a gallery and have now arrived. I learned to describe myself as an artist. Perhaps now I have earned the desirable soubriquet ‘controversial’ whenever (if ever) my work and name is mentioned. Fuck yeah!

Pushy

Artists are as shy as woodland creatures. They hide, and only emerge at twilight when tempted by a trail of warm white wine in paper cups. After establishing trust by telling them you love their work they might even drink out of your hand.

I am not like that. I don’t believe there is some kind of fairy art-mother who will correct my use of colour, improve my brush strokes, and announce: “You shall be selected for the next Saatchi New Sensations show!” before my slot on The Culture Show (but then I screw up by leaving after midnight and all my work turns into Vettriano looky-likeys, and I am forced to paint a portrait of the queen, or am I alone in waking up screaming after that particular nightmare?)

But I don’t have an agent, a gallery, or any representation at all. My exhibitions so far were down to my own efforts, or a gallerist coincidentally stumbling upon my work online.

And so I am being pushy.

I want a show and to sell some work, but I have no idea how to go about this. So I updated my artist CV, polished the bollocks-speak in my artist statement, and emailed galleries, asking simply if they have space or time to show my work. Aw bless my naïve little soul.

And of course, I’m still waiting. Even the gallery that asked to show my work was incommunicado, and was amazed when I tracked her down via the clever people at BT and was crafty enough to phone. She seemed confused, but I twisted her arm, and she has agreed to show work...eventually. (I know: a gallery owner being flaky and disorganised. Astonishing.)

And there are so many galleries in every city. There are public galleries, boutique private galleries which choose work on the whim of the owner, strange galleries where they sell only chocolate-box landscapes and cat portraits. I am grateful that this campaign is possible using email, as postage would bankrupt me. I am also certain that those emails are instantly deleted.

Perhaps I should use the old-fashioned postal system, and send carefully printed examples of work, my cleverly designed business card enlcosed, but there is something contrived about that.

When an emerging artist is adopted by a name gallery, you wonder how this came to be. Perhaps it’s word of mouth, or who they know, or maybe those artists are pushier than I am. Possibly, there’s a knack, a trick to sending emails or invites. Is it the timing, or the title. Is it down to the image and personality of the artist: must they be authentically wizened and crazy, child-like, amazed and trendy, or stoically professional and business-like?

I know I am unlikely to be selected for a retrospective at The Tate, but a well-chosen piece exhibited in a regional gallery: is that too much to ask?

I need advice. Seriously – is anyone out there? How do I this, because being innocent isn’t going to help with this part of my project.

Sculpture

I was really looking forward to the sculpture experiment part of this innocent artistry mission, partly because I think sculptors are mad. I used to go to the club-night in an art school years ago and the following day, the dance-floor was usually littered with blood and body parts: for some reason all those rugged sculpture boys (and they were boys) were the meatheads of the place, and wouldn’t stop fighting. Maybe all that carrying and carving lumps of wood and rock had knocked the sense out of them.

I can’t see myself using marble (oh come on – how the hell…?) Nor can I picture myself standing enraptured in front of a rock waiting for its spirit guide to communicate, or for the shape to emerge. Predictably, when male artists ask the stone what it wants to be, the answer is often a naked lady.

Also, I loathe most of those awful mannered marble efforts, like Cannova’s creations, finding them prissy. As for classical Greek sculpture, I want to replenish their original gaudy colours, because they are too pure and soulless without it.

I will not be forcing massive ingots of metal through a grinder, or nailing forests together. I must accept the limitations I am working with. I can’t see why sculptures must be massive, or even made of stone (despite that making the majority of purchases for the those fantastic new outdoor sculpture parks) so I decided to make some micro-sculptures.

As for materials, well I am still travelling, and will always remember the joy of luscious Mediterranean fruit, sometimes standing over the sink as the delicious juice ran down my wrist. I wanted to use, and channel this image, while evoking the legend of Persephone and the pomegranate pips. I began by saving and scrubbing all my fruit stones, and consulted my talented friend Sybren Renema  who had the following advice:

(1) The back is just as important as the front

(2) The sculpture tells you when it is finished

Wise, useful and inspiring words.

I’ve bought some metallic ink along. While researching icons, I was reminded that we now associate precious metal, especially gold, with being tacky, and with bling, and with nouveau riche notions of value. It’s easy to forget that gold is appreciated not just because of its price, but because it is beautiful. It glints in the sun.

I assembled some stones, and encased them in metallic thread. It was the most intricate to achieve, and took the most forward planning. You can see the result above.

When every task is over, I must decide what to do with anything I produced. I can’t possibly carry all of my creations, but I’m pleased with this piece, and I might try sculpture again. I think the setting contributed to the work, and having seen it glistening in the sun on crystal sands, the ocean sparkling in the background, I can’t imagine that it would look effective on rainy concrete. I might keep it, just to make sure.