Project Me

Browsing the news pages here I was surprised, and pleased(!), to read that not only is Sally Tallant about to take over as director of Queens Museum (NYC) but that she also has an OBE.  Sally is what I guess I could call (and to mis-quote Julian Clary – I think) my close personal art-world friend*.

 
Sally was in the year above me at Dartington College of Arts in the late eighties where we were both on the wonderful Art & Social Context course.  Dartington was a small (intimate) school and at the time had only just starting awarding art degrees so there were just two years of students.  To be honest I was rather intimidated by Sally.  Actually I was rather intimidated by most of second year students – they seemed so tough and together, and there was I an overweight, shy, awkward, closeted youg gay man from south-east Essex.  I don’t think that I exagerate when I say that art-school, and probably Dartington in particular, saved my life.  If I had not gone there I am pretty sure that one way or another I more than likely would not be around today.

 
By the time of Sally’s degree show I was on my way to having some confidence and I summoned up the courage to ask if I might buy one of the paintings in her show.  I think she wanted ten pounds for it.  I still have it and only recently was I thinking that when I (eventually) get around to decorating my apartment it will nice to show the few artworks by other artists that I have – of course including Sally’s.

The next time that I meet Sally was about six years later when I visited Bristol (where the Art & Social Context course had moved to a couple of years after my graduation) to ask a former tutor to be a referee for my application to the Slade.  Sally had gotten together with the tutor – another Sally – and they were both involved in the contemporary performance art scene in Bristol.  Thankfully by this time I was a much more mature person and was able to enjoy their company and hospitality.

 
I was accepted at the Slade and Sally at Royal College on their curating course.  We met up a number of times during our first years in London.  While I was dealing with the deaths of two close friends just as I was finishing my MA Sally was good at inviting me to the openings and events at the Serpentine where she had started in the education department.  When the Serpentine went stratospheric and openings became strictly A-list Sally and I used to see each other at other galleries.  I remember telling her about my plans to move to Sweden at the opening of the Royal Academy’s Summer Show.  It was about the same time that she had just been appointed director of the Liverpool Biennale.

 
And now I read what for me is a double whammy of her OBE and her move to Queens Museum.  The fact that I read about it rather than hearing it from her directly shows how we have lost touch again as our paths have taken us away from London and in very different directions.  I can not call Sally a friend now – to me a friend is someone whom I have regular and personal contact with – however that does not prevent me from being delighted to hear about her success(es) and wishing her all the best.

 
One thing that New York City and Enköping have in common is that they are a far far cry from the hilltop art school in the heart of the Devon countryside.  Life is fantastic and I hope that I never cease to be amazed at how it unfolds … I wonder if Sally and I will run it to each other at some time in the future.  It both would and would not surprise me!

* I am pretty sure that Julian Clary used the phrase ’close personal show-biz friend’ to refer to celebrities that he didn’t actually know, or not well enough for the to be really close or personal friends.  The insertion of ’show-biz’ was his way of referring to the lovey-ness of his profession where it can seem so important to give the impression that one is on intimate terms with the stars.

The Swedish Immigration Service has amended information on its website regarding the timescale in which it ’must’ process applications for citizenship made by members of other EU states.  Until recently it said that all applications would be dealt with within 24 months, now it stands at 23 – 26 months.  It also interestingly explains they are not required to process applications for 1 – 6 months, and that the average waiting time for acquiring citizenship is 7 – 8 months.

 
I made my application in October 2016 (which was as soon as I had fulfilled the necessary five years permanent residency in Sweden).  When I made my application the only time frame mentioned was an average of 3 – 5 months from submission of the application to receiving an answer.  I am now in that 23 – 26 month period but am becoming increasingly nervous that the Immigration Service might well move the goalposts again and increase their working window as the result of a recent change in legislation requiring them to award residency to all asylum seeking teenagers turning eighteen who are registered as studying at high-school.  It is common knowledge here that the Immigration Service is under-resourced, understaffed, and over stretched.  The plight of asylum seekers is of course urgent, it is also a hotly debated subject in the Swedish media.  The unprecedented rise of the right-wing Swedish Democrats in September’s local and national elections are interpreted by many an indication of anxieties concerning immigration.

 
Under other circumstances I could say that this worries and upsets me – as does the increased popularity of nationalist politics generally.  However I now feel justified in claiming that this concerns me – literally.  It would not do so if the UK had not voted to leave the EU, or if everything was in place for a smooth transition period that included clear rights for UK citizens living elsewhere in the EU.  Hearing British and European politicians fears for ”no deal” and the UK simply crashing out of the EU in March next years worries me greatly. My right to live and work here is soley based on my coming from another EU country – if that changes overnight so does my right to work.  As a part-time employed and freelance artist I would have a hard task to convince the authorities to grant me the work-visa required by non EU workers.

 
Last week, on Wednesday I think, it dawned on me just how much the uncertainty of the situation is affecting me.  In the summer I had begun casually reading the Guardian online – limiting myself to articles about the UK leaving the EU.  I had not properly looked at a paper in a long time.  Several years ago, while John was alive but ill, I made the positive decision to avoid ’hard news’.  I realised that waking up to Radio 4’s Today programme and listening to the headlines and interviews for a couple of hours made it virtually impossible for me to go to studio and make anything of any sensitivity, wonder, or dare I say it – beauty.

 
The enormity of the UK leaving the EU and particularly my own situation lured me back to ’hard news’, during the heady days of the hotest summer on record, I began with the headlines and opinion pieces of the Guardian.  Online newspapers are not the same as the weighty paper tomes that I used to deliver early every morning on my teenage newspaper round.  Digital papers can, and do, update their content and stories numerous time throughout the day.

Understanding this and my hunger for some crumb of certainty had me, by mid September, online reading lengthy articles and following links to related stories three, four, … even more times a day.
And of course I never got the fix that I needed -the clear and simple sentence that told me that everything would be alright.  What I got was deeper and deeper into the complexities and intricacies of the differing fractions and the seeming impossibility of agreement.

Thankfully I woke up to myself and saw what was going on.  I was going to the studio and there in the peace and quiet my mind was developing kaleidoscopes of worse case scenarios.  The work that I should, and want to, be getting on with was not just simmering below the surface – it was becoming more and more submerged under a chaotic maelstrom of worries and frustrations.

Then it came to me – I could stop looking at the news -with immediate effect.

I was at the studio for just a few hours on Thursday.  It has been odd not clicking the familiar web-browser tab to refresh the Guardian’s front page over breakfast that morning but it paid off.  I started sketching and thinking about next year’s project in Uppsala.  It was great to be there with charcoal in my hand trying to capture something of the feeling I want to evoke.  It has been a long time since I sketched like that.

And all of a sudden something completely new began to form itself.  Quite unbidden I found myself sketching something that needed to come out, and that needs to be realised.  I felt excited – a feeling that has been absent in recent months.  Excited about this new thing, but the excitement was infectious and soon I felt a renewed excited about the piece for Uppsala’s Art Cube.

 
It is several days later now and the temptation to look at the news is quickly lessening.  In its place I have energy and enthusiasm for what I am doing in the studio.  On Friday I placed an order for a couple of hundred of pounds worth of materials for M (the working title of my Uppsala piece) – something that I had pushed to the back of my mind.  And yesterday evening at home I was compelled to get my sketchbook – an idea that demands exploration came to me while watching a wonderfully distracting You Tube video by a passionate cupcake decorator!

I am so pleased to have rediscovered my own passion for my own practice – something that was being quashed by distractions that I am unable to influence more than I have already done.  I feel re-engaged with my commitment to be the best artist that I can be and with my belief that by doing so I will make something worthy of exhibition.

Two weeks ago I began writing a post. Since then it has been sitting on my desktop. Why didn’t I finish and post it at the time? I am sure that it felt somehow incomplete, now I am overly conscious that it must lacked something but I have no idea what and in addition it feels outdated! So as a reminder to myself to get things done I am going to publish it as it stands and repeat these three words to myself three times – ”little and often” …

Last week I became aware of the scale of the Konstkube (Art Cube) project that I am working with. It is definitely the largest project that I have been involved in as an artist. I am one of three artists each of whom will have a three week show in the Konstkube – a shipping container redesigned as a mobile gallery – at one of three locations in Uppsala city early next year. There were ten of us sitting around the conference table fine-tuning the schedule and looking at the associated public programme. The group consisted of artists, the artistic coordinator, the head of arts for Uppsala county, the head of public arts for the city along with two post-graduate placement students, the head of programme at Uppsala Art Museum, and the city’s cultural stategist – two men (both of us artists) and eight women.

Initially the shows had been planned to be slightly shorter and span the Christmas and New Year period. However the feeling at the meeting was that things might easily get lost in the festivities and that pushing things back to February March would be in everyone’s best interests. This was also thought to be more readily agreed by the police and other authorities that are required to give permissions for siting the quite considerable cube in various parts of the city centre. My particular site is the Main Square in the heart of the retail area. I will really have to create something spectacular to compete with the lure of the shops and restaurants in this bustling intersection of shoppers, cyclists, bus passengers, tourists, and students moving between the university’s many disparate campuses. This location was not one that I suggested when we were asked which two of the three options we were most interested in – I had selected the small but central park or the train station. However the coordinator together with head of arts for the county reasoned that my work was the most visual and best suited to grab attention in the already dynamic and vibrant environment.

Often when I am in the studio or just going about things I make (mental) notes of things to write about.  Last week it was about ‘packing’ – specifically how I was packing artworks to deliver to a large group show in Stockholm.  I did not get even get close to actually writing anything before I was engaged in other activities that lead me down different paths of thought.

Speaking with a friend last night I realised that I keep myself too busy.  I really enjoy doing things and perhaps do too many things at the same time.   It is easy for me to prioritise doing practical visible things, so when I speak of being busy it is usually refering to physical rather than mental engagement with something.  Yet I wonder if these two components might be equally necessary to move things forward in a more sustainable and holistic way.

For as long as I can remember I have admired artists who have good packaging for their artworks.  It is something that I aspired to and I toldmyself that when I am successful I too will have well made boxes tailored to individual pieces.  Last week I unpacked and re-packed works in preparation for taking them to Stockholm.  The studio was soon covered in bin-bags and old cardboard boxes.  While I justify these materials in terms of their inexpensiveness it did cross my mind that perhaps I was undervalueing the importance of packaging doing its job well – that is to say protecting the artwork.  Size appropriate wooden crates lined with polystyrene (or some environmentally friendly alternative) will provide far greater protection for the increasing number of glitter objects than the doubled bin-bags and ill-fitting old cardboard cartons that they currently occupy.  Whether I am consider myself sufficiently successful to warant such investment is not a relevant question – I see now that my youthful ideas were somewhat misplaced.  It is not about success, it is about taking myself and my artworks seriously.  If I do not take them seriously can I really expect other people to do so?

It has been on my mind, and to do list, to post about Glitter Ball for several weeks now.  However getting on with Glitter Ball has taken up all my time leaving none for writing here.

What I can (very) happily say is that there is now www.glitterball.se where there are pictures and information about what is going on and who we are. As my much quoted tutor said ‘don’t get it right, get it done’!

I am all too aware that I need time and space for reflection, and I have enjoyed writing posts to that end, if I could just find time ….