Core Gallery is most definitely go!
A surge of momentum from everyone is giddying and delightful!
I have been sending out little jobs for people – to research and sort and they are busily finding the answers. The obstacles that seemed to loom before are melting away.
Cor Blimey Arts are now on the must see spots on Deptford Art map and we shall have Core Gallery on there as well as soon as
http://www.deptfordartmap.co.uk/
I shall be posting my blog about Core Gallery once we are more finalised onto there as well as going to a meeting with Deptford Art Map and Bearspace to meet and talk to other gallerists and studio spaces. Very exciting!
In addition I have had some good meetings with Curators and artists; Nick Kaplony, an artist and advisor from Artquest is going to collaboratively curate something. Our very own A-N editor Andrew Bryant is also on board to curate a show! Both of which sound very interesting. Hopefully Zoe Whitley from the V&A may get involved along the way as well. Chantelle Purcell is going to be liasing with students at Central St Martins and University of Kent, Arnold Borgoreth, a lecturer on the “Image & Communication” MA degree at is also going to see if he can get some more people involved there-perhaps a photography exhibition…. Already an interesting programme is unfolding…..
More plans unfold by the moment!
Core Gallery is go!
Hooray!
The trustees are letting us go ahead with the idea. Bless them!
Hooray again!
I have a new phone that is terribly unreliable which doesn’t help a gal with sleeping problems. Today the alarm did not go off at all and some part of my slumbering self must have realised it was getting lighter in my room. I shot out of bed at 8am ( should have been 7am ) and left the house in 6 minutes flat!
I am at my admin job today- where I am a drone for the day ( financial security is a must for me to be able to paint so this is a necessary evil ) I have not painted for about 2 weeks since I dropped off my last piece to Long and Ryle for the London Art Fair. It feels strange.
I don’t know what’s happened with the time- except I have finally done my tax return and sorted out lots of admin. Plus read the December and January Saturday Guardian Newspapers – hurrah!
I have not been sure what I was going to paint next and I was thinking I was going to have some time to really research my next research trips around and outside London but I am about to send all my work out to 3 different places. I will have no works left for anything if I need it…..so I need to crack on! One idea however has been brewing subtly in the background and it began to form over the weekend. The addictive elixir of paint is drawing me back……..
The other good thing is more teaching is coming my way. I am doing mixed media courses for adults at West Dean College and Brighton Phoenix http://www.phoenixbrighton.org/courses.html and am back at The Stephen Lawrence Centre and Bedford over the coming months. Hopefully one day, not too far away, I may be able to exist on this and painting alone…..
Core Gallery
We had a second and fuller meeting about developing our studios into more of a gallery space/artists initiative…..as one of the newly set up Gallery Committee members there are lots of logistics and politics to get through.
Our first main issue is the name. Cor Blimey Arts Studios is the current name for our space. We cant change it completely as we have charitable status, plus we have a board of trustees some of whom live in Somerset, half are up for it, the others it is unknown.…….the studios and their artists have moved on in their output. there is a desire for those of us in the studios to be taken somewhat seriously now . We pay rent so surely we should have some say so?
Hence kick-starting this gallery idea…..
We have to work within some kind of parameters of that name in terms of branding and also to try and persuade our trustees to allow us to do this, so the suggestion was Core Gallery. Connected but different…..
If we cant change the name of the gallery space we shall have to do something else, somewhere else……possibly we could have a splinter group of artists, collective, utilising empty spaces to put on exhibitions….be part of something….
Other news is that London Art Fair with Long and Ryle Gallery was a success and they have some of my works hanging in their gallery in Pimlico until mid feb which is great. Then 2 more solo shows pending in feb-literally opening on the same day I think. One in Regents Place, London with Trudie Stephenson and an exhibition with Bedford College where I lecture occasionally…..the new year didn’t take long to have many scheduling clashes! It is all invigorating though!
Crikey ! Very crikey!
One of the A-N’s 2009 blog of the year!!!!! To say I am really rather surprised and humbled is an understatement. I thought it was just me and the dog that read it and the dog is not even real….more a vegetarian taxidermy! Thank you A-n!
I am celebrating right now with a glass of merlot and complimentary cashews!
The first Core Gallery meeting occurred in the last few days too which was super interesting. Many ideas cooked up by 3 of the 8 or so gallery committee as they shall be known….however even getting 8 people together is nigh on impossible so I am having several meetings as some sort of liasing gal…. There is another thing that has popped up that has been playing on my mind- we are likely to have to move studios…..ours is going to be smashed up for new development housing…what the hell are we going to do is the first thing?
As one artist put it, we take the legacy of this gallery idea with us but still, very difficult….the hub of Deptford artists workshops is going to change rather dramatically as everyone now sees an opportunity to make money on this overseen space. Darn…….let me know if you know anywhere we can move to- a collective- at least 10 artists, somewhere…….
