The Collaborator

The meeting with Yu-Chen Wang last week was really lovely and I was in a particularly good mood in my birthday sunshine! I went to visit her at the Chinese Arts Centre and happily got to nosey round the residency space again: the main workspace is my favourite – it’s large and bright with a high ceiling and a ladder leading up to a hole in the wall where the sleeping cabin is. The feeling of being set sail to sleep must be quite relaxing.

Yu-Chen talked to me about her work, particularly her performance work, which I found very interesting from a collaborative point of view because she doesn’t perform herself, but rather drafts in professional actors, whom she then directs. Her particular brand of direction/curation/creation is quite unusual I think. I admire the boldness.

As Yu-Chen spoke about her work, I realised that although we hail from different continents and produce markedly different work, we do actually have a lot in common:

· A love of paper – more specifically, the way it curls
· An obsession for composition – stemming from graphic design experience
· A love of objects – their secret humour and potential
· A current wish to tie up various strands of our practice
· Finally, we have both had the odd experience of being presumed to be men (in both cases, it was our names that did it)

After discussing her beautiful and witty work, I walked Yu-Chen over to Rogue Studios, pointing out the “worker bee” symbols on the way – that little bee is always at the back of my mind somehow – and explaining its appropriateness to Manchester’s industrial past. When we got to the studios, I showed Yu-Chen my work and she was straight in there with insightful questions and comments. I was particularly pleased when she looked at my big wall of inspiration (see picture) and immediately got the various threads running through it: “You’re telling a story” she said… spookily, no-one has ever noticed that before – I think most people just think the pictures are stuck up willy-nilly; but as with anything creative, there has to be a reason, otherwise I won’t do it. I think Yu-Chen might be of a similar frame of mind.

Yu-Chen’s plan while she’s here is to do a weeklong studio swap, followed by joint exhibition with a local artist as part of her overall programme of work. She’s meeting a few different artists with this in mind, so I’ve no idea whether we’ll get to do something together, but I’m keeping my fingers crossed. If nothing else, it’s been fantastic to be reminded that we work in a world of echoes, coincidences, similarities: someone, somewhere always understands.

On Wednesday I am meeting with Yu-Chen Wang. Yu-Chen is doing the Breathe residency at the Chinese Arts Centre (http://www.chinese-arts-centre.org) and is looking into the possibility of collaboration. I’ve been looking at her website (http://www.yuchenwang.com) and enjoying her exquisite drawings. Although we don’t work in the same media at all, I’m hoping that a shared interest in the idea of “transformation” will spark off some ideas…we’ll see…

Busy, busy, busy…

The “Open West” private view last weekend was great – the show was thoughtfully curated and the work was really varied. The award winners were Shan Hur, Helen Murgatroyd, Ellen Nolan and David Theobald – and they all thoroughly deserved their prizes. I got some great feedback about “Down”, meeting some interesting characters in the process (always plenty to spare at any art event) and sharing some rejuvenating giggles…. I love this time of year, everyone seems to get sparky as we come out of hibernation.

Apart from making a start on the big new work that needs to be ready to show in December, I’ve been writing up and sending out a press release for Darren Nixon, a painter whose new pieces I’m presenting at Rogue (http://www.rogueartistsstudios.co.uk/projectspace.asp) in March.

Darren’s work appeals to me because it acknowledges the blues caused by familiar artistic battles and aims to find a way through them. These issues are seemingly binary – for example, he questions whether to paint in an abstract or figurative style – but his solutions echo something that collaboration has taught me many times over: namely, that there is always “another way”.

Thinking about choice only as an “either/or” is incredibly limiting – if you can identify 2 differing creative paths down which you might travel, there are likely to be 4 or 16 or 256 others… they don’t necessarily make immediate sense or provide instant satisfaction; but they tend to acknowledge life’s complexities in a way that only art can.

Over the weekend, I went to Cheltenham to set up “Down”, ready for the Open West preview on Friday. The curators have kindly given “Down” its own dramatically dark room in which to be displayed and as I worked away on arranging the 12,000 hand made feathers, I thought about assistants…

As my solo work gets more ambitious in scale, I am often asked whether or not I use a) cutting technology and/or b) assistants. So far, the answer to this has always been “No”. I want to make the work myself and feel the burn – my solo work is just that: a deliberately solitary activity and I need it that way because it provides a counterbalance to collaborative practice. I’m not against artists having things made for them – if I got the chance to do a really big project, there’s just no way I could do it on my own. I would hope that the skills I’ve learned through collaborating would see me through.

Some work cries out to be made by anyone but the artist, as it suits its concept (Andy Warhol being the obvious example). It’s hard to tell where an artist’s art actually lies – in the idea? in the execution? in the promotion? Use of assistants is not a modern phenomenon – Rubens only painted works himself for the right price; Bernini left the really fiddly bits to someone else…

…BUT maybe there is a problem with the way that the use of assistants is presented (or hidden, as the case may be). “Where does assistance end and collaboration begin?” is not going to be a commonly asked question amongst certain big name artists because they don’t have names like yours and mine – they have a Brand Name and all other names must be subsumed to the brand: it’s not fair, but that’s the way big business works.

P.S.
In reply to Jane Boyer’s post and the topic of “Can a work of art really be connected to the artist when the artist hasn’t made it or perhaps even touched it?”…

Firstly, about Jeff Koons – this is an odd one for me, as his is normally the kind of work I detest. When it comes to factory-type art, there is very little of it that I find aesthetically pleasing. I really do think Jeff Koons has a genuinely good eye for form and colour though – even if all he’s done is spot it elsewhere. It seems to me his intent is both to annoy and to delight and he seems to be very good at both. About him taking the piss… surely anyone wanting only to make money from art would become a dealer rather than an artist? Having said all that, I can totally understand why people dislike him/his output, but I have to just shrug and say “I like it”.

Secondly, and weirdly, Richard Serra is an artist who makes the kind of work I would normally say I like (abstract, sculptural, conceptual), but – and I promise you Jane I am not being deliberately provocative– I really don’t like his work at all! Funnily enough, I think there is a cockiness that Koons and Serra share, but it comes out in their work very differently. The monumentality of Serra’s sculpture doesn’t work for me for me because it always strikes me as invasive, rather than taking account of its surroundings. When it comes to monumental work, I prefer Maya Lin or Nancy Holt. Yet again, I can totally understand why people like Serra, but I just have to shrug and say “I don’t like it”.

For me, the idea of the artist’s connection to a work of art is so broad as to be impossible to define… ultimately I can only ever say what “works” for me and what doesn’t, regardless of how it was made or who made it. This is why I find myself able to like trashy works whilst simultaneously enjoying more serious art – what I find hardest of all is blandness. I also have very, very, very little faith in the idea of originality, but that’s a whole other load of posts for the future…

“When I look through my own recipe for the perfect cup of tea, I find no fewer than eleven outstanding points. On perhaps two of them there would be pretty general agreement, but at least four others are acutely controversial. Here are my own eleven rules, every one of which I regard as golden…”
A Nice Cup of Tea, George Orwell, 1946

A friend asked me the other day how I manage to balance the different areas of my practice (studio time; solo work; collaboration; research; admin; promo; breathing etc). Given some of the postings across Artists Talking recently, this is something that is clearly on people’s minds.

If only it were as simple as working out eleven personal golden rules (however controversial); but trying to work out a way of getting art practice as conveniently streamlined and efficient as possible is far harder than actually getting art made. I’m not saying making art is easy, but it’s easier than all the other stuff, because that’s the bit that I actively want to do and enjoy doing.

In coming up with an answer for my friend, I thought about what I try to achieve on a yearly basis:

· One major collaboration (currently knee deep in funding application with great apprehension about my chances of success)

· One major solo project (this year’s is site-specific and luckily, I’m working directly with a gallery on it, so admin time has been cut right down to a minimum… phew, at least that’s a current positive)

· Pursue avenues for previous year’s projects (this year that means getting “Down” in particular shown as much as possible)

· Continue with smaller side projects, both collaborative and solo (waiting for final piece of writing from the architectural writer I’m collaborating with; get next Tenneson and Dale piece sorted; carry on with Still Lives series)

· Keep looking for new opportunities…

… but it’s not really that simple, as all of the above is always subject to so many factors I cannot control, which might best be abbreviated by the word “life”. Perhaps I should just believe what the swirls in the bottom of my mug tell me:

· Expect change, surprise, stress (and more tea).