Well, the exhibition is up and I think it went ok…. I am in the obligatory black hole at the moment, feeling a bit dazed and empty and also like I’ll never have any ideas ever again. That’s not strictly true as I have already found myself reaching for a notebook whilst trying to get to sleep.
But generally I am pleased, especially with the catalogue. The book was part of the exhibition budget as it cost far too much to print for YSP to actually make any money from selling it. This is something that forms a vital part of career development: providing me with a document that can be used as a legacy of the exhibition and to support future applications.I think it costs around £3,500 to print the edition and personally I would rather have this spent on a book than wages, especially when I consider how much work and expertise went into laying it out etc. It sells for £5.
Thanks to Rachel Howfield for coming along to the opening, brilliant to meet someone in the flesh that I feel like I know fairly well just through Artist’s Talking.
(How embarrassing – just interrupted by water-meter man. His look of horror at the piles of boxes and cardboard in the front room did make me blush a little).
I also just wanted to add this link, a piece by Alistair Gentry on the excess of artists. This has come up before, especially in Hans Abbing’s ‘Why Artist’s are Poor’. It’s funny. I especially like suggestion #7:
Eliminate every situation in which an artist is expected to be an underpaid teacher, social worker, daycare nanny or some combination of the aforementioned. Eliminate the very idea that artists are meant to fulfil these roles.
http://www.marketproject.org.uk/too-many-artists-s…
In the section titled ‘First against the wall when the revolution comes’ various groups are mentioned, including artists:
[4] Artists. The ones who stab other artists in the back, the ones who work for nothing instead of demanding proper pay, the ones who care about nothing and nobody but themselves. Compliant artists who never complain no matter how badly they’re treated, because they’re scared of blotting their copy book. The liars and plagiarists.
I concur.
