Saw James Lowther on friday. He was the arts officer for Durham and has now taken over at Berwick running the visual arts there. He is a really good officer, he always gets involved in the projects and has really strong project management skills. I spoke to him about my work, surprisingly he liked a project I did called ‘A ring Cycle’, where I got people to pass instruments. I have always really liked that project, which I did more for myself, but have always thought it is something I would have liked to develop and done more properly. He wasn’t that into the orchestra flashmob works, which is something I often find with people in the visual arts, even though they do well on-line, they never do that well in festivals and with galleries. James works with the Berwick film festival which seems a good opportunity for artists’ videos as they take an installational approach to much of the work they show. We spoke about how to succeed with applications for residencies and opportunities. He thinks that if you put something in it should have a connection to the remit, that sounds obvious, but often people put in applications with no real research into the area etc and what they show. So when he was at the DLI one of the only unsolicited projects he took on was one that was about military history which fits in with the museum that houses the gallery. At the moment in Berwick he has installed a crazy golf artwork, as the gallery is near the local golf course. We then got talking about why I work with over 50s in some of my projects, which led me to some deep soul searching as to why I do this, maybe I can at times be funding led. I guess that made me start to think about entertainment and the pleasure principle and how that fits into my work, the need I have to entertain with the product I generate and is that authentic or do I just want to be liked. Hmm lots to think about. I have booked in to see Mike Stubbs from Fact on Friday.
people make musing by passing instruments
