Our last two sessions - workshop March 14 and tutorial March 21, were about our Exhibits.
I was a little disconcerted by what was discussed at the workshop, I have to admit. We were told we had to organize our own exhibits/shows so I went ahead and got mine planned out, as have the others. In the workshop it seemed an overall encompassing theme and title was desired by our professors. Even if there are tenuous connections between our work (which, given that we are humans, artists and live in the same world isn't a surprize) why do we need to be connected with a title and statement when we aren't exhibiting together?
My materials state this is my year-end show for my MA Fine Art at the University of Plymouth. I certainly can, and will be promoting the others' shows via posters or handouts they provide, but as everything in my show is my work and my story, I don't want to fog up my theme with something else. Our work is completely separate.
I made a Gannt Chart back in January, booked a venue, poster has been in distribution for a few weeks now (and shared in a previous blog post here.)
I keep my chart up-to-date as I work on items, and add in new as they come up. I'm well organized and working on my show catalogue and other print materials for the event already.
Various art projects in production include - several large scale works (A1), a mobile, free standing pieces, and smaller works. Most will involve print making, woven paper and mixed media. As well a retrospective sampling of my older work to illustrate how I've transitioned in my style and media as my vision has changed which is the entire theme of my show.
My biggest cost is mounting and framing - we've bought some large frames but the sizes are a bit off so I need to have custom mounts cut. I've been checking out charity shops, and plan to hit the Scrap Store next week, on the hunt for useable frames and mounts/mats.
I'm producing items for sale as Devonport Live will be selling my work (for 20% commission) going forward. Things I've got planned are handmade notebooks/journals, original prints/art prints, and note cards/postcards. Packaging up original prints to sell unframed seems like a great idea - hopefully, they will sell. I'm going to be using up a lot in making original art cards too. I always am recycling art I make - I don't see the point in having it lay around taking up space if I can make something else with it. But it would be great to sell it before I end up reusing it!
Yesterday's tutorial with Laura was good. She had a couple of comments that I will definitely be building on. One was that I need to ensure that all my print materials are LARGE format... I mean, I am visually impaired so why would I not provide everything in a format suitable? I hadn't consciously thought about that at this stage of design of my catalogue and signage, but.. yeah, I need to do that. Which means my plan for an A5 catalogue will now be an A4! And my signage/cards will all be more poster size than the usual small cards.
Laura also thought I should have a narrative running through the retrospective - documenting the stages of my vision deterioration to the work I was producing. I think I'll incorporate this into a more extensive narrative in the show catalogue or instead of just having title signs up on the walls, add in a paragraph about what was going on with my vision at the time I made the specific work.
AND... I've had one of my pieces accepted in a show at The Ford Studios in Marion, Virginia, USA! Show is called "ADMIXTURE: A Sum of the Parts" in June/July of this year. The theme is Layers.
This is A3 and is two offset prints that I've woven together. I have two that are extremely similar (the print was A1 that I'd taped off in sections to print:) one will head to the US and the other will be in my show. I called this (for the purpose of submitting to the gallery) "Lattice in Cyan & Yellow" - I use the colours in the names of my work a lot.
It is March 22 today, and we aren't back to campus for sessions until April 25. My plan is to have most of what I plan to exhibit finished and, fingers crossed, mounted. We are having final critiques on May 2 - so I need to take in a selection of works for it.
Yesterday morning I had my second cataract surgery - now both eyes are cataract free. I can now just worry about the retinopathy, macular oedema and maculopathy.
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