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david kefford

Day Job

January 26, 2012 in art, discussion, event, job, research

A link to an article in Sunday’s online guardian:  Don’t give up the day job – how artists make a living

http://m.guardian.co.uk/culture/2010/jan/24/artists-day-jobs?cat=culture&type=article

Bob and Roberta Smith’s worst ever job is worth a read.

The article reminded me of some of the conversations at our first talk, Show Me the Money and Anthony Spira’s suggestion that artists who are not represented by a commercial gallery and have a day job can potentially have more freedom

Anthony:

Some of the best artists I know have not been represented by a gallery, they don’t have those kinds of constraints, they have day jobs which give them incredible freedom to pursue their interests in the way that they want. They’re not dependent or set on finding a buyer and actually you can experiment with ideas much more. Gareth Jones is not represented by any gallery, he worked as a picture editor at The Guardian for many many years, he does a lot of teaching to be able to live. It gives him incredible freedom to explore his own personal agenda.

Julie:

I would argue that more freedom would be found on not having to have a day job to pay bills but to be able to make his work full time, maybe a stipend through representation or some kind of other way. Though its seems like it’s freedom because he’s not connected to a gallery, a big chunk of his head space is taken up.

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david kefford

Inside the Index: Private Funding

January 24, 2012 in art, data, notice, research

In the second part of Simon Trevethick’s five part investigation into the UK Arts Index he focuses on Private Arts Funding (first was Public).

Interesting to read that the East of England received an increase in contributions from Trusts and Foundations – 88p in 2007/08 to 94p in 2009/10 – an encouraging statistic given the climate of recession, but still alarmingly far behind London in terms of financial backing.

Read the whole article here

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david kefford

Materials and bits and bobs

January 18, 2012 in art, art education, discussion, gallery

“The world is looking for new ways of seeing. Art practice – the collective performance of art making (between materials, artists, artworks and others) is an inherently inter-disciplinary reflexive process that supports us to rethink and reconsider our realities. Arts organisations are an organisation of artists and others, materials and bits and bobs. They are art practices: perhaps a ‘bigger’ collective artwork.”

This quote from Julie Crawshaw in Susan Jones’ new online Guardian article seems to strike a chord with me.  Read the article Pitching up: where is the place for art in full here

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Alistair

Professional Artists Quiz

November 17, 2011 in art, art education, discussion

Q1: Where was I when the Phyllida Barlow Kool-Aid was being ladled out?

Q2: Just what is it that makes today’s homes so different, so appealing?

Q3: Who do I have to blow in order to get on the Turner Prize shortlist, because it clearly has nothing to do with talent or achievement?

Q4: When are some contemporary art galleries going to start actually showing contemporary art instead of just modern(ist) art?

Q5: Is Ryan Gander the sexually mature, post-metamorphosis form of Ryan Gosling?

Actually, it wasn’t that type of quiz. It was the Guardian’s live Q&A of last week, ‘Quiz the Professional Artists’, with myself, Lisa Snook, Rosalind Davis, Hilary Jack, Dany Louise, Pippa Koszerek and Rob Turner discussing the joyful, depressing working lives of artists in Britain at the fag end of capitalism.

http://careers.guardian.co.uk/careers-blog/professional-artist-careers-advice?commentpage=all#start-of-comments

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