Restarted

On Friday, I went to a PV of a group exhibition I’m in : ‘The Town is a gallery ‘ at Convenience gallery – a space made available at a former M&S store in Birkenhead  by East st Arts.
The space was available by ESA that is, not the set up of the gallery !

Anyway, I’d been busy all day  so I couldn’t get there when it opened at 4pm . An early start, but it was on til 10, so plenty of time .

I’d already been sent a photo of my work by a friend who’d popped in there earlier, so I had an inkling of what to expect .

I thought it was odd that the label was low, but I didn’t actually read it until I got there.

I’d sent the title by email when I submitted my work and also had a label on the back AND on the wrapping with the same info, but they had bizarrely printed something entirely different.  Not even a typo – just a totally different one.

I had a moan to the few people that were there , but didn’t approach the organisers as they were busy socialising- which I should have been doing really .
I hate PVs at the best of times and as I hardly knew anyone there, I went home after a short while, slightly disgruntled .

Having the time to think much later, I wondered if I had overreacted.  My name was right and the work looked good.

Does anyone actually read labels ?

Did it really matter?

I started writing blog posts a couple of times and then abandoned them.
I had too much going on outside and writing seemed a bit irrelevant.

I delivered my ‘Make a Bee to remember’ at the museum, which was successful but really exhausting. As well as it being a full house, 5 men turned up and that never happens. Why is it usually only women that go to workshops?

It added an interesting dynamic to the group anyway.

Later on, I went to the pv of the Liverpool art fair. The marketing for this was really impressive , with a huge turnout .  The exhibition is on til mid August and it seems to have a steady flow of visitors. Whether my works sell is another matter. They seemed so small in the midst of such a vast array of styles.

So as per usual, I posted images on social media and got the usual sprinkling of ‘meh’.

In between workshops , artwork and PVs, I had family stuff going on, decorating my own house and helping my son with an apartment/ flat (whatever you want to call it) in the City.
Not wildly interesting you may think, but when I got there I realised that the building was the setting for a group exhibition we had many years ago.
The building – a former warehouse and offices , had at the time , been converted to apartments.  One of the art handlers  ( we all worked at Tate Liverpool at the time) knew someone associated with the building  who let us set up an exhibition in the vast corridors . It really looked impressive and I only wish I still had images from the time .
But I posted an IG image of the present courtyard anyway to remind me of that happy time.

Surprisingly, that got quite a response from people who never comment or like anything I post.

It got me thinking – or rather it reminded me, that we’re not just artists, we are people with lives .  People who follow us on social media are mostly artists who are bored to death of seeing other people’s artworks and especially ‘success stories’ , so I have to remember to be more varied in what I post or write.

And on that note, if anyone is interested, I went to see Beyond Van Gogh , the ‘immersive experience’ at The Liverpool exhibition centre yesterday.

It wasn’t something I was vastly interested in and at £26 admission charge, I completely dismissed the idea.  I then received a discount voucher code by email.  At such a reduced rate, I gave it a go.
Despite going late morning on a week day, it was surprisingly busy . Peeping over to look at the cost of other visitors tickets and comments made to me later, I know most people paid the full price.
It was just one room with projections on the wall and despite the huge amount of visitors, there were very few seats.
I did enjoy it, but I think I’d be annoyed if I’d paid full price.

I’d taken my son’s dog for a walk first thing ( yes I’m dog sitting again) so I could leave him for a few hours while I was out.  I then miscalculated how far the walk was from the city centre to the exhibition centre , so by mid afternoon I’d clocked up 12,000 steps and over 4 miles.

So no, I haven’t done any artwork. I’d be surprised if I even moved today 🙄