At the risk of sending everyone to sleep with the details of the project I thought I would just add – aren't artists busy these days? I like the project about CN4M cos its trying to allow artists time and space to think and experiment, and yet its set in arena(CN4M) that is all about dull but neccassary meetings and unwieldy structures.
But aren't artists busy? Time flies by and we are all juggling projects, budgets and making work – then promoting it, writing blogs, evaluating, teaching, feeding back……and then there's a living to earn..
The first meeting was good. All but one artist could make it. Everyone outlined their initial ideas, their interaction so far with CN4M and how ideas were developing. The artists ranged in their approach from the very precise to the relatively loose. Almost everyone was tentative at the time of the meeting, but it felt like a healthy place to be in the process. With no cast iron deadlines, there is time for ideas to gestate and for experiment and play to take place. Focusing and then re-focusing. Apart from anything else its been a time of testing some of the initial proposals – and rethinking in some cases.
By the end of the meeting, the feedback was very positive. Hearing each other had been inspirational, supportive and re-motivated everyone.
For the benefit of the reader, here I re-cap on CN4M, and the purpose of the project: there is a lot of this redefining and reassessing going on. CN4M was set up in as a mechanism by which community, voluntary organisations and individuals could contribute to decision making in the city. It is organised into thematic pools, which shadow the Manchester Partnership (council and statutory agencies) and geographic areas and communities of interest – see www.cn4m.net for more information.
Each of the artists has opted to work with one or more of the themes / areas of CN4M and in some cases across all of them. It’s an artist research project, instigated by me, through the Culture Pool. My idea was that artists were more likely to engage with CN4M through art, than through meetings and long beauraucratic processes, and that their findings might be useful or interesting to CN4M itself and its members.
I met all the artists individually, during December and January. I've also been researching to determine ultimate exhibition venues.
The initial idea I had was to exhibit the work at community based venues: community centres, libraries etc, where grass roots community organisations might see the work, and then to culminate in a central Manchester exhibition space, where interested parties in CN4M and the art audience would come together.
I sent out a request to all the geographic pool co-ordinators of CN4M to get back to me with suggestions. This hasn't worked. I had a response from only one and he's going to take me on a tour of North Manchester next week.
In the meantime I've been thinking about showing the work in different sites – but not all together. This was reinforced by Kwong Lee, curator at Castlefield Gallery, who agreed to host the first meeting of all the artists, at the beginning of March. The logistics of showing all the artists, together, in up to 6 venues, might over-show the work – by the time we arrive in the final venue, the audience might be exhausted. And so would I!!
