So much of my commitment to writing this blog is also given over to responding to and leaving comments on other artist/blogger’s posts. It’s formed an ongoing, reciprocal exchange and it’s the interactions with others that have contributed to the strong sense of community I’ve felt here, on Artists Talking. Leaving long written responses on Jean McEwan’s blog the other day and more recently on Marion Michell’s, it struck me how much like real-life, two way conversations it felt – the sort I might have over a drink in the local pub. Twitter has sometimes had the same impact.
In the past few weeks, I’ve been thinking a lot about the effect social networking has had on my own creative practice. Eighteen months or so ago, I first made the decision to start a blog, to continue to post images of my art on Facebook and to get involved in Twitter. It’s undoubtedly time consuming and I frequently wonder whether my time might be put to better use. But it’s led me to some amazing, far reaching connections with other artists and more recently, it’s led to being involved as one of fifteen participating artists in an exhibition, This ‘Me’ of Mine, of which identity is the main focus.
The This ‘Me’ of Mine exhibition is a long-running project initiated by artist and curator Jane Boyer. Jane writes about the importance of on-line communication in relation to the curatorial process: ‘I live in a remote area of south west France, so nearly all my communications are done digitally – it is necessary for my daily functioning! However, it also became the structure of the whole project.’
Being a part of the show has meant thinking still deeper about the impact of social networking – the overall premise of this blog after all, is looking at how much maintaining it might affect my creative output.
Yesterday evening I was at the second launch night for the exhibition, This ‘Me’ of Mine in Folkestone. I was struck by how many people I ‘knew’ solely through the Artists Talking blogs and via Twitter. The same applied to the pv night at the APT Gallery in Deptford when This ‘Me’ of Mine was launched for the very first time.
Despite Jane having created a solid, online group identity for us over the past year, it’s the first time that some of the fifteen participating artists had met face to face and had any direct interaction with each other. This in itself fascinated me because, despite Twitter photographs and Facebook images giving some hint of who we are, the majority of us had never properly met. This of course is all relevant and highly pertinent to the main emphasis and focus of This ‘Me’ of Mine – who we are as individuals, how we define ourselves; how we present ourselves on social media, how we present ourselves as artists; how our artwork defines us and so on. How different are we in real life from our on-line personae? How does the on-line ‘Me’ compare with the actual ‘Me?’
And how much of ‘Me’ is affected by those who surround us – by what other people bring to us?
I had a fascinating conversation with an artist recently, the conversation starting with her apologising for perhaps, appearing too forward and ‘over familiar’ with me whenever we met.
‘It’s just that I feel I really know you from your blog and feel like we’re good friends – but then I realise I hardly know you at all!’
I’ve thought about this conversation a lot ever since. Being open and honest and wearing your heart on your sleeve inevitably leaves you more open to the possibility of feeling vulnerable and exposed.
It’s a little late probably, for such ruminating as over the past year of writing about my experience of being an artist, I’ve already shared some quite personal information about myself. Not consciously – it’s just that I’ve used the blog primarily as a space for self-reflection about what it really feels like to be a practising contemporary artist – a relatively new one at that, self- taught and somewhat naïve. My feelings consequently, have often been very much on the surface, leading to some quite frank and personal revelations. I’m not sure yet where all this thinking is leading me but I do know when I’m beginning to tire of my own voice …
Yet again then, I find myself feeling the need to get on with creating some new work.
