It’s spiritual visiting a gallery space when the work resonates. I rarely visit arts and crafts style exhibitions. I’ve always felt they’re for the average public and, maybe, read between the lines here; “grannies”, not to say I’m somebody higher who always wears a beret, but let’s say they tend to fall more on the side of handicraft than high art. That may be an old-fashioned view, or maybe I’m now picking the better shows to attend. Today has been a spiritual encounter.
It can be important to own Art you love; books or prints. Not getting self-obsessed with seeing other people’s art as something that only exists to inform and inspire your own ‘next piece’. I hope this doesn’t make me sound elitist, not everybody can afford to buy prints, but we spend thousands buying car tyres, cavity wall insulation and garden flagstones and scoff at an £80 print, a print somebody’s heart and soul went into.
Carrying on from my “Screw the Internet” mental shift, I’m trying to relive an earlier time when art was something you had to go searching hard in real life to find. It was worth the effort. Exhibitors where keen to talk to me about their work and as I have a knack of picking up on the emotional response the artist wanted, learnt from an adolescent reading of too many Art and Zen books, Artists where excited that “I got it”.
I saw lots of work that strongly resonated that I didn’t want to buy. There was a handful of artists who inspired me, very deep thinkers who have made me realise my own artistic strategies have a long way to go. I think for people who keep saying “good art speaks for itself”, think again, to hear the reasons why an artist did something, the things I'd overlooked and ignored; that has been more enlightening than 100 trips to see a Rembrandt at the Williamson. Nobody has inspired me more this year than an artist whose work I didn’t want to purchase.
There seems a growing desire for the mystical, the esoteric in Art. On occasion even I became a bit shy that too many people were overhearing my conversation about resonating experiences at Avebury. It has become something sanitized out of Contemporary Art but once you go just outside of the Establishment it is starting to gain in prominence. I doubt we will see a complete rebellion of contemporary Art, but I really feel where at a point in time when there’s academic art and art people actually like.
There is a sudden panic that goes through you when committing to buy a print, An artist had a few I liked. Lost in deep thought in the coffee shop I thought “Buy the one that grabbed me”. Necking the Latte and storming back to buy the print. “Shit, the one I like isn’t the strongest composition” Then I start imagining the print on my wall. “Double bollox, its quite dark and my hobbit house has almost no natural light” I ended up with a print I had previously overlooked. It was a more refined and restrained palette, lighter than her previous work. It felt more right for the house. In some ways I’m surprised I even had such a realisation, being so emotionally drawn to art. I assumed Id go for whatever pulled me the most. This has made me realise it’s hard to get “The perfect print”. Have variations on the themes, lighter, darker, bolder, subtler. It’s better to have a considered and refined spread of prints. Getting that Goldilocks print could be elusive, especially for each viewer. This artist’s work seemed to exist in “all her prints” she didn’t seem to have a show of one-hit wonders. Each print offered a different take on her. The other point is “Wall Art” (god I hate that term) does need to be considered as something hung on the wall, no matter how damn determined you feel your next piece is going to be wall worthy.
I ended up with a print from a young Ellie Cliftlands who had tapped right into my love of Albion Pastoral Folk, a little unlike my usual tastes, I was won over by astonishing detail and a weird feeling I'd seen this print in a previous life, maybe children’s books illustrations, who knows but I had to purchase it. The larger Sally Adkins print touched on my sensibilities as a landscape photographer, the subtle signs of the mystical without resorting to tricks or effect. The print she gets from the copperplate seems to have a charcoal-like quality I’m finding mesmerising.
