It was the AIR Open Dialogue event last night at Castlefield Gallery. Very nice to finally meet Susan Jones after much emailing, and also great to discuss the very basics of practice with loads of new faces.
I thought about blogging last night when I got in, but partly I was tired and I also wanted to digest it a bit. The things that stayed with me are unexpected. I found myself sharing things that I hadn't expected to, some parts of my life/work that I probably have never vocalised before. One of these was finishing off my spiel by saying that I wanted to get my head down and work, and that I wanted rid of the organising. This was backed up at dinner afterwards when Susan was talking about the fact that people seem to have forgotten that good work and careers take time. There is an expectation of talent and genius to negate the need for long hard graft, whereas musicians and others (quoted, I believe from the article below or similar) need about 10,000 hours practice on average to become a professional.
http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/books/article4969415.ece
I know that I have my first ever solo show, infact two of them, coming up in 2010, and obviously I want them to be great. This means starting now, no more agreeing to shows and flinging out the work. I want and need something different for my work to see a change and development. 10,000 hours is after all, well over a year, and that's without sleeping or doing anything else. Perhaps five years of full time work represents that statistic a little more meaningfully.
Giving some feedback about this blog to Andrew Bryant this morning also made me consider what a fantastic tool it has been in sharpening everything. Being determined to practice what I preach, I have suddenly become much better at valuing my work and time more highly, saying no and generally looking after my long-term self a bit more. In turn, I hope this is also looking after the industry by not getting involved in projects that rely on artists working for free or without in-kind support/trade. I hope I can keep it up…
I also realised I am still fairly terrible at negotiating and that must be the next area for improvement, especially when YSP starts….
