Erik at wip:sthlm has been wonderful in getting everything sorted out so that I have the studio from 1 August.
I can’t quite believe how well it is all working out. After meeting Erik and seeing the studio on Wednesday afternoon I agreed to take it for the three months. On Thursday afternoon I was able to collect the keys and leave my details for the contract to be drawn up.
The studio is great; big, clean, light. The windows are double-glazed and there are radiators. It makes my studio in London look very poor.
I said hello to my studio neighbour and two other artists. It is fairly quiet there at the moment as most Swedes take summer holidays in July.
The bookshop is an open area immediately inside one of the entrances, it is clean, neat and full of books. I can’t imagine that a studio with nearly 100 artists could have such a bookshop in London or anywhere in the UK.
The studios are divided into four ‘zones’, each zone has a large shared kitchen and toilets, there’s even a shower.
The studios are on the second and third floor of a large modern industrial building on the south-west edge of the city centre. And even though I will be staying on the south-east side of Stockholm it shouldn’t take more than 30 minutes form door to door. I’ll find out this afternoon when I go there …..
FANTASTIC!
I just logged on to my email – the first time since arriving in Stockholm – and see that I have been offered the residency studio at wip:sthlm.
I’ll call/email Erik at wip:sthlm to arrange to meet him and see the studio next week.
It feels as though things are coming together – and I’m not just here for an extended holiday. I can start to call this a “residency”. I can be in Stockholm as an artist.
I will get to meet other artists, make new work and new networks!
FANTASTIC!
Great meeting on Monday with Ken and Julia from M2 Gallery. We first met in Norway last year, Julia was another of Michael Petry’s Golden Rain artists. Since that first meeting over Margaritas in their suite at the Stavanger Clarion I’ve got to know them better and really admire their passion and enthusiasm for art, design and architecture. They are an incredibly generous couple, and it’s always a pleasure to spend time with them. In another of my tiny world venn diagram experiences it turns out that I taught some of Julia’s jewelry students when I used to teach theory at Middlesex (a good eight or nine years ago now).
They’ve invited me not only to show in the M2 Gallery, but also to install work in their house for London Open House 2009. I love their home – and feel incredibly honoured that they’ve asked me. It feels absolutely right.
So on Monday Ken and Julia came to my studio to select work and for me to show them the piece I’m proposing for the gallery. I want to make something specific for the gallery and have planned something that I thought was simple and low tech – however it gave Ken more than a few anxieties. There were other pieces that could have gone in the gallery but I really wanted to see my ‘site-specific’ idea become a reality.
Back at theirs, and after a lovely dinner (thank you very much!) I think we’ve resolved the practical issues that I hadn’t foreseen.
The show opens on the Sunday of the Open House weekend (19 & 20 September), so this evening I booked my return flights from Stockholm! I like that I have a return visit during my sabbatical. I don’t expect anyone I meet in Sweden to come over for the weekend but it means that I have a live project to talk about and should have some great new pictures once it’s installed …
Sometimes I can’t tell if I’m being an artist or playing at being an artist!!
Whatever it is it’s great fun and I am thoroughly enjoying myself at the moment.
visit www.quay2c.com
Studio:
I’ve really enjoyed being part of the studio. We all get on well and are very supportive of each other. I realise that in one way (financially) we have been very lucky to have such a lax Landlord, I haven’t had a ‘rent’ rise in the six years I’ve been there. However that is my good fortune and the result of the Landlord not really managing our licenses. I am a professional and responsible person and if there had been reasonable annual increases managed through new licenses I would have paid them. However it feels as though the situation is becoming increasingly fraught as the Landlord realises that he and his office have allowed considerable debts to accrue – not least an entire year of rates.
It is inevitable that my monthly fee will have to increase to cover the future costs of the Non-domestic Rates. My feeling is that the increase will make the studio more expensive than one of a comparable size with a studio provider such as ASC. If the Landlord tries to recoup previous costs the increase will be massive.
For the time being I will wait and see what happens. The worse case scenario (which isn’t that bad) is that I am served with one month’s notice on my current license and offered a new one that I’m not prepared to accept. So I might have to come back from Stockholm for a few days to put things in storage.
Other artists have suggested routes “we” could explore: getting charitable status, and asking for a long-term lease.
• I am not interested in applying for charitable status. I’m aware that the criteria for this have become a lot tighter over the last few years and as I’m not interested in doing anything at the studio that could legitimately qualify for charitable work (i.e. education work) so I think it’s best if I make the positive decision not to get involved.
• I’m also not interested in taking on a long-term lease (or being part of a ‘group’ that does). This is too big a commitment at the moment. And I do not trust the Landlord sufficiently to enter a more complex arrangement than the one I already have.
I have to wonder at how acute the Landlord’s business sense is. I am still on the license that he acquired from the previous freeholder when they sold the property over fours ago. At the time the monthly fee was sufficient to cover maintenance and other costs the Landlord incurred. Obviously it is not now.
From the increasingly frequent lists of available studios I’m receiving it looks as though the current economic climate is making the studio providers very competitive …
Annual Pride Exhibition: Clifford Chance
Clifford Chance opening was very good. Very well attended by a good mix of city and arty people.
The speeches, one by someone from Clifford Chance (whose name I missed) and Michael Petry’s, really brought home how significant such a show is. For Clifford Chance it is a very visible and public demonstration of their commitment to their LGBT staff and clients. And for Michael it is an opportunity to show “museum quality” art and artists who are out and proud, and who do not conform to many (or any) of the stereotypes of ‘gay art’.
I have to applaud Clifford Chance for putting on such a show, not least because their clients and peers as well as their own staff will see the exhibition. The exhibition is throughout the corporate entertaining and meeting floor.
I’m incredibly flattered that Michael invited me to show; I really appreciate the support, interest and friendship he has given me in the three years since I met him when I bumoed in to him at his London Gallery. It’s a great boost to my confidence, as were all the positive reactions I got on Wednesday.
It’s all good preparation for my Swedish ‘sabbatical’.
