DO IT OURSELVES: ART COLLECTIVES RE-DEFINE OPPORTUNITY

by Fionn Meade
Clicking on title is a link, but it is also here:
http://www.artisttrust.org/services/prof_dev/collectives

(excerpted from the Artist Trust Journal, Spring 2003)

Where collectives fit into the landscape of a given arts community has been somewhat of an under recognized barometer of social and aesthetic trends? Whether speaking of the collectively designed Dadaist publications of the 1910s, such as 391 and The Blind Man, or the loosely knit association of multidisciplinary artists that comprised the Fluxus movement of the 1960s and 1970s, the importance of collectively instigated and self-produced art activity is often more appreciated after the fact as the back story of recognized individual artists.

Likewise, the impact of an artist collective or artist group is often not fully realized until a community is faced with the gap in activity that occurs when a group folds (local examples include Project 416, Fuzzy Engine and, most recently, Vital 5). The familiar eulogies of “they closed?” or “what happened to…” or “the rent was raised, what can you do” often come as ready justifications for why the closure of an artist collective or alternative art space was all but ‘inevitable’. That said, independently organized collaboration as an alternative to or an enrichment of individual art practice is an idea that is increasingly in the air these days.

As New York Times art critic Holland Cotter summed it up in a recent article, artist collectives are increasingly “Doing There Own Thing, Making Art Together” (January 19, 2003) and people are taking notice. Referring to such highly successful collectives as The Royal Art Lodge (which recently exhibited as a group at The Drawing Center in New York) and Forcefield (a multi-media contributor to the 2002 Whitney Biennial), Cotter points to the emphasis on “shared resources and dynamic interchange” as the consistent organizing principle of the new collective model. Both in creative and economic terms, artist groups across disciplines are re-invigorating the collective model as an innovative alternative to market-driven expectations of individual artists competing against each other for limited resources and opportunities.

While no means exhaustive, the following five groups offer insight into how local artists are embracing updated versions of the collective model, all of them addressing issues of sustainability with innovative approaches.

Stronghold, a nonprofit group of artists working in different disciplines formed as a pro-active response to the increasingly limited availability of artist live/work space in Seattle. As their mission statement puts it, “changes in the economy and its attendant factors consistently push artists out of urban centers. In order to combat this process, Stronghold proposes to build a ‘fortress’ for the arts community through the acquisition of property… that can weather gentrification when it hits a developing area.” Having recently secured a group of buildings on Beacon Hill in order to turn them into functional artist studios, Stronghold has already taken a big first step toward realizing their goals. As member artist Jordan Howland puts it, “Stronghold is first and foremost a mission: to serve as site and catalyst for the arts.” Stronghold embraces somewhat familiar ideals but with a circumspect and practical strategy for taking hold of real estate and securing their place as artists.

Similarly, d9 Dance Collective formed in 1992 in an effort to pool their resources and take control by creating their own opportunities. “d9 was created in order to put the power in the hands of the dancers and satiate a wider pool of talent than the normal outlets can sometimes support,” says member Kate Kerschbaum. d9 identifies and commissions work that they would like to perform, or choreographers they would like to work with as a dance collective, and then produces that work. Currently consisting of seven dancers, each member of the collective also takes on an administrative role in addition to their role as a performer. The reward, according to Kerschbaum, is “the collective’s power to create opportunities, maintain artistic control, and pool our resources to make new work happen.” An added bonus, says Kerschbaum, is the hands-on education in “how all the components of an organization work.” Nevertheless, says Kerschbaum, “it can lead to more meetings than dancing.” As it stands, the considerable success of d9 Dance Collective over the years led them to incorporate as a nonprofit organization in 2000 in order to “address its long-term sustainability.”

Put On the Dog is a digital design collective of four “created out of necessity,” offers co-founder Laura Blanchard. Looking to avoid the overextended and often directionless business ventures that became so commonplace in the dot.com boom and bust era, Put On the Dog developed a consortium of in-house designers that work on projects for nonprofit and private sector clients alike. “No office, no employees, only three of us as regular players—that was a lot for people to swallow four years ago. It still is, but we can demonstrate that it works successfully,” says Blanchard. Promoting a more agile, customized business model has allowed Put On the Dog to avoid common mistakes. “We aren't forced to take work to support a large group, so we can turn down work that looks like a black hole,” reasons Blanchard, “which allows us to focus on getting the best work, not just collecting a paycheck—something our clients take notice of.”

Begun in 1999, BuyOlympia.com offers a grassroots entrepreneurial take on the consortium model as it sells the goods of a group of Olympia-based artists to an online client base that continues to grow and grow every year. Indeed, as co-founder Aaron Tuller states, “the initial and ongoing goal has been to bring the creative forces of Olympia to people outside of Olympia.” With a product list that has grown from offering one item—Olympia-based artist Nikki McClure’s 2000 calendar (featuring original prints)—to over 250 items in their main online store (including a diverse array of artist books, artist-designed clothing, toys and accessories, as well as new titles from local record label Kill Rock Stars), BuyOlympia.com has grown quite organically. “We meet face to face with our artists, take the pictures of their products, process the orders, and ship the work out,” says Tuller, “allowing for artists to concentrate on their work.” As McClure attests, “their work (co-founders Pat Castaldo and Tuller) has been invaluable to me, allowing my work to find advertising and distribution through major magazines and, as a result, find an audience as far away as Japan and Finland.” While primarily conceived of as a tool to for wider distribution of original work, BuyOlympia.com has also served as a community catalyst, assisting local organizations such as the Olympia Film Society and LadyFest Olympia with their computer savvy, but also, more importantly acting as a pro-active conduit for local artists. “A sense of community among the makers has been a real benefit of being involved,” offers McClure.

The mission statement of another Seattle-based collective uses a more familiar precedent to get fresh results. Founded in 1996, “SOIL is a not-for-profit cooperative space established, supported and operated by local artists,” reads their mission statement. “SOIL exists as an alternative venue for artists to exhibit, develop and advance their work.” This streamlined vision has carried SOIL through the turmoil of three venue changes in seven years and a close to bi-annual turnover of member artists. Rather than impede its mission, this state of flux seems to be part of the plan as SOIL continues to put on provocative shows and present some of the best emergent art work in the city. “SOIL is a real mix of wonderful creative energy and irritating frustrations,” says Kiki MacInnis, a member artist and sometimes curator (The Gun Show, September 2002). “Without specific committees and without fixed rules and procedures SOIL reinvents itself over and over,” says MacInnis, “and I can’t decide if its looseness is a strength or weakness.” Funded largely out-of-pocket through membership dues and an annual auction, SOIL skirts the question of whether to become an institution in the local scene and focuses instead on the artwork.

Do it ourselves? Five innovative answers to the question of how to create your own opportunities.

MMMMellowvison

lovely

The tyranny of reality

Thanks Robert :)

Those of us who sometimes mentor and instruct students are
familiar with trying to get people to really look at things.
Recently, after a few days walking around in a subject-rich
environment, I was agog with new possibilities. Burdened with
reference, I returned to the studio and proceeded to paint the
worst thing I've done in some time. It was one of those
paintings that has you considering a career in accountancy.
During the fiasco I began to better understand a syndrome I've
had all my life. It's what I call "the tyranny of reality."

Let me explain. When we are overloaded with subject matter, we
have an automatic tendency to neglect style and imagination.
Subject matter is no match for spirit. Too much observation can
change the creative event from one of spirit to one of
rendering. Surprise, chance, illusion, personality, audacity,
confidence and desire are the most affected. Abandonment and
even desertion may have to be contemplated.

Sad to say, but glorious nature stomps on creativity. The
artist becomes not a master, but a slave. On the other hand,
reflecting in tranquility, uncluttered by overabundance and the
need to get reality right, one is free to pass to another
level. "Reality," said Joyce Cary, "is a narrow little house
which becomes a prison for those who can't get out."

In 1970, the distinguished critic and social theorist Roland
Barthes wrote, "Painting can feign reality without having seen
it." When I first read that statement a door opened. Time and
again I've seen the idea make timid artists brave. Those who
dare to "feign reality" are in the agreeable business of
surprising themselves. Believe me, it's anticipated surprise
that keeps us at our easels. I hardly know of an evolved artist
in any field who doesn't understand this. "The job of art,"
said Francoise Sagan, "is to take reality by surprise."

Bogging down in detail will spoil the fun every time. I can't
think how many times I've failed to break down that door. Clive
Bell, another critic lashing out in the age of hyperrealism,
noted, "Detail is the fatty degeneration of art." He has a
point. Fat is tyranny. Reduce.

Best regards,

Robert

PS: "The aim of art is to represent not the outward appearance
of things, but their inward significance, and this, and not the
external manner and detail, is true reality." (Aristotle)

Esoterica: Many significant artists might say that the opposite
is true, and for many, it is. Artists with no respect for or
understanding of reality can be a slave to their own
imaginations. When these imaginations are shallow, which they
sometimes are, there's nothing like a shot or two of the real
world. One of the hazards of art instruction is where you
suggest one person might loosen up, and you tell another to
start looking more carefully at things. Within earshot, people
are getting the opposite information. It's not like accountancy
at all.

Birthing Future Art" Careers

Feeling anxious about my upcomming BFA exhibition I found this gem.

by Emile Ferris

As a junior at SAIC, when I think about my participation in next year’s BFA Show I am reminded of the sobering moment back in the eighth month of my pregnancy when I realized I was really going to HAVE this baby. Soon, it wasn’t going to be about the hilarity I experienced when my fetal daughter went “alien” on me in a restaurant and cart-wheeled so much inside my belly that she freaked out the other diners. It wasn’t going to be about having neighborhood parents giving me knowing smiles or even about kindly gang members offering me their seat on the “L.” No, I realized; terrible pain plus blood, sweat and curse-laden screeching tirades would be required, and there was no reasonable way around it.

Throughout your first three years of undergrad at SAIC, the BFA Show looms in your future, a monolithic inevitability. You put it out of your mind. “It’s a long way off,” you tell yourself, and then, during your last semester, the BFA Show is suddenly upon you. E-mails about mandatory meetings and space claims prompt a fine sweat to bloom at the back of your neck.


Considering the level of pressure involved, as well as the fact that this show is the culmination of years of hard work, accomplishing a gallery-quality exhibition can be a daunting challenge. The widely held belief, says graduating senior Rich Greene, is “that this event will make or break you because of all the contacts.”
Graduating painter Christina Sucgang suggested that one of the best ways that artists diminish BFA stress is to “show the work they’ve been doing during their time at school and not make work that is either specifically for the show or to get attention.” She stated that being honest in this way gives artists the time required to try new things and to prepare and perfect their craft. Graduating artist Natalia Ivancovich agreed. In preparation for the BFA Show, she advised undergrads to “explore materials and experiment with disaster.”

Long-time Chicago gallerist Carl Hammer, in an interview with F Newsmagazine, confirmed the wisdom in Sucgang’s sentiment and Ivancovich’s philosophy. Hammer stated that in past years he felt that the work shown at the BFA exhibition was “too slick, too polished” and that it didn’t represent the artist’s personal vision with enough heart. When asked what he looked for at the show, Hammer said, “I look for artists that are interpreting subjects in a new manner, one that’s thoughtful and that exhibits craftsmanship.” The gallery owner stressed how much he enjoyed seeing experimentation in student work and felt very pleased with a great deal of the work he saw at SAIC’s undergraduate event.

Despite the fact that graduate Ben Cowan had pushed his limits and ultimately created work he was proud of, he admitted that he “felt stranded” while preparing for the exhibition. “Even after I made a painting, I still had to think about how I was going to display it,” said Cowan. “Classes had not prepared me for how or if I should frame work, how to light it. Then I had to figure out where to get postcards made and how to get some publicity for the event. It was all very rushed and too exciting.”

How does one surmount such a mammoth task of exhibiting without having a nervous breakdown? SAIC printmaker Michael Argyelan took a systematic, almost scientific, approach. By process of elimination, he boiled 100 prospective pieces down to ten and then e-mailed digital images of those finalists to his most trusted faculty members. “I made a log of who liked what,” stated Argyelan, who eventually narrowed his display down to three works deemed strongest by his SAIC consultants.


Graduating senior Nate Wolf agreed with the idea of showing a limited number of works. “Keep it simple, don’t overcrowd your space. It’s not your last show, so don’t do a salon-style hanging.”
Most of the seniors that were polled by F Newsmagazine considered a few things necessary for BFA stress reduction: simplify everything as much as possible, think ahead, practice proper time management, and communicate promptly and effectively with the exhibitions staff.

“It is extremely helpful for participants to pre-plan, read all the guidelines and FAQ documents that are posted on the [SAIC] portal, talk to faculty members and staff about what they want to show and approach the installation with a spirit of ‘creative problem-solving’ to address the unexpected—as the unexpected will always occur,” said SAIC Exhibitions Director Trevor Martin. “Putting up an exhibition is a time-intensive process. It takes as much planning and concentration as making art. And if the artwork may challenge the School’s rules about safety and security, artists should speak with the exhibitions staff.”


Sculptor Helga Dangel, whose set-up requirements were complicated by a sound bleed from a neighboring artist’s installation, cautioned artists to “talk with the G2 organizing team right after space claim about the nature of their neighbor’s art work.” She stressed the importance of doing this “before starting to install because prior to installation, room rotations are still possible.” Dangel also encouraged future seniors to “start as early as you can, because everything takes longer than you think.”

But Cowan, a painter, disagreed on the usefulness of mandatory meetings and extraneous information. “Unless you are going to have a goat eat your painting in the gallery ... attending meetings about how to check out media, getting instructions on not setting things on fire or on hanging stuff from the ceiling is time wasted. All I did was hang a painting and leave. I would tell painters not to go to all of the mandatory meetings.”

Photographer Annette Martinez added that graduates should “try to stay focused, be organized and have a friend that can help.”

Argyelan, who consulted with his wife about specific aspects of his exhibit, extolled the virtues of Photoshop. Argyelan used the program to decide what paint colors would look best on his section of wall. “We looked at all my work in Photoshop, assessing it against different colors.” The printmaker, who ultimately chose a two-toned background, further recommended that artists use vinyl letters for their signs and make a self-published book prior to the show. “[The book] was only about $87,” said Argyelan, who felt that the price was justified when the full-color publication enabled him to show more of his body of work to interested gallerists, collectors and curators.


Flatfile Gallery’s Susan Aurinko, who brought her entire staff to the show, expressed her dislike of artists standing right beside their installations. When the art is good, “it jumps out at you,” offered Aurinko. Having a book in the display space allows patrons to view more art with less pressure. Yet, Flatfile’s Assistant Director, Aaron Ott, felt that this year’s artists’ statements “were far too derivative.” He advised graduating artists to find fresher, more thoughtful ways to communicate their work.

Aurinko and Ott were especially impressed by the work of two artists: Sucgang and Ivancovich. Argyelan was also among the artists whose work received positive comment from the Flatfile staff. Aurinko asked the artist to participate in a group show at her prestigious West Loop venue. The best way for jittery seniors-to-be to prepare for the BFA Show and to get noticed by gallery representatives at the event, according to Argyelan, is to go to a gallery. In his opinion, graduating students should scrutinize the ways galleries present work and model their own exhibition on what they see in professional circles.

“There are standards out there about how to display and how to promote,” noted the senior, who credits some of his pre-show savvy to a thorough reading of a book by David Bayles and Ted Orland, Art & Fear: Observations on the Perils (and Rewards) of Artmaking.

“Just make your work and don’t worry about the show,” Argyelan suggested. Despite the perception of the BFA Show’s importance, he cautioned seniors against seeing it as their final exhibition. Again, I return to the metaphor of birth. Maybe the BFA Show is just the birth of an SAIC artist’s vocation; perhaps nurturing a fledgling art career is a lot like nurturing an infant child. New art careers seem subject to something like colic—they squall and struggle, trying to fit into the world, but are not yet developed enough to be fully comfortable here. The profession requires commitment through tough times. Fragile in the beginning, the life of the artist involves many sleepless nights and hours of dirty and thankless effort. As Argyelan noted, “The BFA Show is not what opens doors for you. It is just the beginning of things.”

May 2006

Excercise and Experiment

When all is only exercise and experiment, where
questions give more delight than answers, and results are the
lesser of process, we are given a special kind of energy. It's
shifty sand, though. Joy can be stolen because an artist has to
put enough technique under the belt to be simply confident. To
see a painting that never was, as it is to hear a tree falling
in a forest, witness is during, not after. What happens after
is really someone else's business. And one mustn't be fooled,
as I almost was, into thinking that it was some of my business
where they all end up.


From Robert Genn's weekly esoterica.

Getting to "must"

Thank you Robert Genn

Psychologist Abraham Maslow has written, "A musician must make
music, an artist must paint, a poet must write--if he is to be
ultimately at peace with himself. What one can be, one must
be." The question for many would-be creators is simply how to
get to "must."

Maslow spent a lifetime researching mental health and human
potential. He emphasized the study of healthy minds and
successful systems rather than the abnormal and the ill. He was
particularly interested in the hierarchy of needs, meta-needs,
self-actualizing persons, purposeful play, and peak
experiences. Leader of the humanistic school of psychology, he
referred to his ideas as a "third force"--beyond Freudian
theory and behaviourism.

Maslow saw human beings' needs arranged like a ladder. The most
basic needs, at the bottom, were physical--air, water, food,
etc. Then came safety needs--security, stability, comfort. Then
psychological or social needs--belonging, love, acceptance. At
the top were the self-actualizing needs--the need to fulfill
oneself, to become all that one is capable of becoming. Maslow
felt that unfulfilled needs lower on the ladder inhibited a
person from climbing to the next step. For example, someone
dying of thirst is not likely to write or paint. People who
managed the higher needs are what he called self-actualizing
people. These folks, he found, are able to focus on problems
outside themselves, have a clear sense of what is true and what
is phony, and are spontaneous, creative, and not bound too
strictly by social conventions.

Here are a few of Maslow's ideas for artists wishing to further
evolve:

Systematically study, understand and neutralize the effects of
lower needs. Accept the world in all of its complexity, mystery
and ambiguity. Take cues from the winners in this world, not
the losers. Keep the company of the doers, not the talkers.
Play your personal game on as many levels as you're able. Fall
in love with your processes, innovations, dreams and higher
ideals. Be sensitive to and welcome the arrival of peak
experiences. Have no guilt when you see yourself becoming
compulsive and proactive. Allow yourself to be swept up in your
personal "must."

Best regards,

Robert

PS: "Where was the human potential lost? How was it crippled? A
good question might be not why do people create, but why do
people not create?" (Abraham Maslow, 1908-1970)

Esoterica: Peak experiences are profound moments of love,
understanding, happiness or rapture, when a person feels more
whole, alive, self-sufficient and yet a part of the world--more
aware of truth, justice, harmony and goodness. Maslow found
self-actualizing people have many such peak experiences. Acts
of art can be structured so an individual sets himself up for a
series of them. He feels good, becomes habituated and demands
their repetition. Maslow was not a snob about his conclusions.
"A first-rate soup," he said, "is more creative than a
second-rate painting."