Feeling inspired after a day of meetings and presentations. The artists’ run art-scene is a truly wonderous place full of people who with often very limited resources make incredible and ambitious things happen both locally and internationally.
Land404 is a relatively recently established initiative running residencies and an exhibition programme in rural southern Sweden, and it was fascinating to be in a meeting (themed on ‘Curator as conceptual artist’) with them alongside Jason St-Laurent from Galerie SAW Gallery, Ottawa which has been going for 45 years and is in the midst of a massive expansion funded by the Canadian arts council. Listening to them speak about how they work with artists and audiences opened up the spectrum of possibilities and at the same time illustrated the strengths of having clear ambitions.
I am enjoying ‘representing myself’ as the PNP coordinator puts it and at the same time scouting about with the view of making contacts for what I referred to as the ‘artists’s collective’ that Klas and I are establishing in Enköping. Over the weekend I am going to meet-up with Gideon from Artist Run Alliance and register our Enköping project with their digital network – literally putting us on a virtual (international) map!
It is perhaps part due to the particular context of (modern) Sweden that Swedish artists seem to like/need a structure in which they can operate. The idea of a project or association developing organically seems quite an anathema to them – so I am coming around to idea of making a framework that will allow them easily to engage and particpate in something that (hopefully) will never be as fixed or as static as perhaps they might like! I have in mind a hybrid of an iceberg and a swan – a visible and serene portion above the waterline, a considerably larger and dynamic powerhouse operating unseen in deeper waters.
