"Do you have an anti-bullying policy?" "What about risk-assessment?" – just more questions I was asked this week. And my response:"We haven’t even got a proper sink yet." What do we do if it starts raining cats and dogs and we didn’t have enough wellies to go round? You see, this whole business is sending me mad! You put up a few partitions and rent out some spaces and all of a sudden you are supposed to have all this paperwork in place.
I have just spent a week at the edge of Bodmin Moor. The weather was a bit rubbish but the break has helped me to reboot. No internet and no mobile phone. Lori and Sheila fielded the phonecalls and emails and it was remarkably calm in my absence. Thank you both!
I have received a few applications for the 3 remaining spaces. We will be holding a meeting (at the end of August) as a group to make a decision. We are also triyng to work out a constitution, but we are still at the embryonic stage. I think it is important to get the structure right. This was the message I was getting from studio groups I researched before we got the keys.
Creative Launchpad have offered their services for free to help HMS artists develop their professional practice. This includes one-to-one meetings as well as training sessions. They are also going to help me develop my business skills in relation to HMS. In particular, forming a cooperative and issues relating to health and safety. Brilliant – I have someone to bounce ideas off.
Rang up the electrician today and it seems he may be able to start as early as next week. The Arts Council money will also be on its way – so fingers-crossed.
Had a fright: my computer died. It wouldn’t boot up and all the files relating to HMS were locked inside. I dropped into the store where I bought it. The assistant took the battery out and plugged it into the mains and hey presto – it worked. I could have cried. This happened last week and it served as a wake up call to back-up. The necessary drive arrived yesterday. It was £80 and another one of those ‘contingencies’ – or unexpected costs that arise – along with extra keys and the rise in the price of copper.
I had a letter which began, "I am pleased to let you know…" from one of the solicitors. It went on to say the deal had been concluded in relation to the SIPP. I thought good. I failed to notice the significance of the line which went on to say we had elected to pay VAT. Jem read it and went bananas. Apparently he had been at pains throughout the negotiating period to stress that we did not want to pay VAT. It would mean that whilst we could recover VAT on any building works, (which aren’t that extensive) – we would have to charge the artists who colud not recover it. It looked like an expensive mistake. We spent a sleepless night until a phonecall first thing revealed it was a typist’s error. It was one of those copy and paste letters which got paste-happy.
started some small oil paintings this week. Turps never smelt so good. Just when I thought things were getting more creative, I had to deal with STUFF. I arrived at HMS to find a locksmith was fitting a new lock to the turret. Noone had thought to let me know. The locksmith told me he had been instructed to do all the buildings for health and safety reasons, and as we didn’t own the stairs there was no obligation for the company to tell me. We may only be a minority shareholder but we do have rights.
The immediate problem was to get keys cut for everyone. We have artists from 20 miles radius so deliverng them personally was out of the question. Four of us were at the mills today and between us we have managed to sort it.
After the talk – the tortuous post-mortem. I keep thinking – I forgot to say this… I hope it didn’t sound like that… and I really meant something else. I do yhis every time. The trouble is you can’t edit it. I remember saying that I wasn’t looking to set up studios, which is true. We weren’t looking for buildings or to develop this project. It was by chance we saw a beautiful building with potential to create workspaces. So I think it gives hope to artists who are actively searching for buildings.
I also touched on the delicate issue of funding which is always a problem – raising the cash to get the project off the ground. We haven’t got huge resoures but we achieved this by putting the property into a Sipp or self invested pension plan. This creative solution was my partner’s idea, demonstrating you don’t have to be an artist to have lateral thought.
Met up with the electrician today to sort out the upgrade. The price of copper has gone up since he gave us a quote. It seems the thriving Chinese economy is not only impacting on the ozone layer, but is affecting the price of commoditities, which is filtering down to HMS. A little more complicated than that, but our appetite for ‘bargains’ at Primark has knock-on effects. In other words our bill for the electrics is higher. Or am I being naive thinking there would be no increase?
