Filed under: session | Tags: aims, business plan, design, make, money, objectives, planning, practice, presentation, profile
Professional Practice, Planning & Presentation – this is the section that makes me panic inside. I don’t know what happened at the session today. Last week I had my goals up on the screen, felt clear and relatively confident about what I wanted. Today my mind went to mush with the enormity of the task before me – The Business Plan. Thankfully we are putting it together in chunks, part of which is to be handed in as our first assignment later in November.
Here’s the main rub: My Aims.
We indentified three main aims of why we want to go down the art-as-career route. To raise our profile, to make money and for self fulfillment (the love of creating work). So far, I have been designing and making for the love of creating. Sure recognition (without serious self promotion) has been nice, as has been the times when I get paid for something I make – but it really has been for the joy of learning new skills, experimenting with different materials and giving to other people.
I now have to find a way of telling my brain that this is not enough – unless I REALLY want to stay in the admin 9-5 job for the rest of my days (No.)
So the priorities (my new mantra) will go like this: I am going to raise my profile to sell my work and make money, I get an added benefit in that I love what I do
How lucky am I?!
But….the sneaky pre-Connect part of my brain says “But what if the money and the raising of your profile makes the designing and making a chore, no longer pleasureable…?” Well, I won’t know until I try and there are so many different ways of going about this that I can always change my plan.
Actions for the week – Research shows & exhibitions to attend :: Write artist’s statement :: Look further into what my options are for my objectives
Filed under: reflection, session | Tags: , emotions, experiences, feelings, group, intrigue, presentation, support, themes, work
Today was….exhausting…..entertaining, nerve-wracking, fascinating, very tiring and a complete relief.
I wondered this morning how varied we were as a group. We are so different in our work that it is hard to make any links. Despite there being 2 jewellers, 2 textiles, many painters no two are alike in any obvious way. There are themes that join us and experiences that are similar but the work is very varied. It fills me with intrigue as to what our show will look like.
I am finding the group experience a lot more supportive than I had anticipated. Having worked by myself for so long it comes as a surprise and yet it shouldn’t be – we’re all in the same boat. I suppose I also have my last experience of structured education, my degree course to compare it to – that was a very competitive and less sharing environment, I don’t think I thrive very well in those sorts of scenarios.
The atmosphere when travelling home was as though we had suddenly leapt from meeting one another only a handful of times to feeling as though we’d been together as a group for a year. The day distilled our purpose and opened us up to one another on many levels. It feels as though something has been revived in me.
Filed under: presentation | Tags: excited, group, images, nervous, presentation, structure, writing
I worked for 8 hours on my presentation yesterday. The thing I find hardest is the writing, knowing what I want to include and how much to say. I sorted out the main headings first: About Me, My work, The Future and whilst putting points down under each one I discovered that there was definitely a flow to it that wasn’t in the order of the headings as they were laid out. It was easier to introduce my work and then look at where it came from, why I do what I do and my history. My background led more easily into what I want to do next because of what my experience has taught me.
Once I have my ’script’ down, organising the images to illustrate / accompany it is the best bit (of course!).
Knowing what you want to say dosn’t stop you from being nervous, does it? I feel like there is so much riding on this. If I don’t get my points across clearly then it could affect who I end up with as a mentor and getting that wrong would feel like such a missed opportunity. And there is excitement mixed in with the anxiety – I get to see what the rest of the group do, we already know we are a mixed bunch – but how varied are we really?
Butterflies…
Filed under: knitting, reflection, supplies | Tags: , evaluation, experiments, market, methods, presentation, pure wool, quality, shop, techniques, yarn
Went to the yarn shop in the markethall this morning to buy some cheap pure wool (UK produced, at least) to do some tests. Mainly for felting but also to play with forms and construction.
I am thinking about the work I have made so far (with a view to selecting images for next week’s presentation) and I came to the conclusion that I have used many techniques and explored many methods but they tend to stop when I feel I have conquered them within one object. Whilst this drives me to move onto the next method, it often means that the last one remains in a sort of limbo: explored, creation complete, but without the quality and ’wow’ factor that comes with an object where you know truly what you are doing and how it will turn out. What I am trying to say, so far they have all been experiments.
Now I have a chance to look back over what I have done, evaluate what I like, what worked well, how it could be used again and pull this all together to make some pieces that I feel are of a standard I am going to be happy to exhibit. If I put one up here per week from now until the New Year, it will keep me focussed on all that I have experimented with until now and highlight things that I might like to work on.
Second day of school and I have come back feeling enthused and challenged.
It’s already kicking in, this course is pinning me down, making me think about and do the things I have been avoiding for a long time. Perhaps in the past I wasn’t ready for it, but having had a bit of experience and a wealth of feedback I am now ready to give it my all.
The presentation next week is going to be a big step in itself. Knowing what I want – always been a bit of a tricky one for me in any situation, my mother used to get exasperated at me when dithering over a decision.
One way to deal with it is to have a list of all the options open to me and then cut it down to maybes and definites. Definites can be prioritised and put into short term, medium term and long term plans. Maybes can go into the backup file. I’ll give it a go.
Actions for the week – weekly schedule :: order yarn samples :: presentation for next week
