Making Deliberate Strides

To raise my profile, whatever that means, is sometimes tricky to figure out. The art world can be a bit of a mystery. As an artist, Im no ones employee with a set of policies and procedures to follow within an organisation or team. Getting recognised and paid as an artist has no clear promotional structure. So where do I go and who do I ask?

When I finished my BA years ago, in Southampton, I had a lots of fantastic opportunities in a short space of time, a residency at the Solent Showcase gallery, also at the Bargate Monument gallery and I was chosen for the New Contemporaries (2014). This early success was put on hold for the pursuit of a career as an art psychotherapist. I moved away to the west country, away from my creative network, friends and studio to start something totally new.

And, I did it, I qualified after 3 years of study and carved my way forward into a good job as an art therapist, which is hard as the roles are limited and there is a lot of competition. Now it's 5 years after qualifying and Ive now got more time to focus on furthering my art career. I find that most artists tend to take a similar route to furthering themselves and I am starting to see that my route is different.

I have applied for arts council funding so I can focus on developing the ceramics and woodwork as well as getting some mentoring and attend a residency. I hope to get my own kiln, maybe a raku kiln and also learn how to make some natural glazes. This would connect my work further to the landscape.

I was speaking to a lovely person yesterday, who advised that I do some workshops, which I had not really considered before. I really like the idea and could add in some of my art psychotherapy knowledge. This would support me to network, connect to galleries and would hopefully be fun! So far I have two ideas, one for a workshop on clay, working in an automatic way, unpinned with theory from Cornelia Elbrecht. The other looking closely at the creative process, linked to the neurosequential model and heuristic research methods. Let's see if anyone finds these ideas interesting, Im yet to flesh them out.