Quiet work day..

I want to be relevant!!

I’ve spent the last year working at a commercial art gallery (specializing in Contemporary Art) and although that experience has been extremely enlightening and has been a position where I have grown very much personally and professionally, the clearest lesson that I have to take from my experience is that working at a large commercial gallery (or even a small one) is just not for me. It’s not for lack of ability but the absence of passion.

Some aspects of the gallery circuit I love and am thrilled by – such as the relationship between galleries and the artists that they represent. A gallery (and the people behind it) have the ability to promote and uplift talent where they find it deserved, and being able to help an artist that I truly believe in and find important succeed and be recognized for their talents is extremely rewarding.

That being said, this is barely the complete foundation and goal underlying the relationship of artists and galleries, and especially not in the case of large galleries in Chelsea where the rent demands a very different set of standards. In truth, the gallery world (at least that of New York, which is highly international versus the more local scenes of Boston or Philadelphia, for example) is one where artists are often stepped on and exploited, collectors are like dollar signs to be chased and fought over and dealers, gallerists, curators and critics endlessly battling internally the issue of integrity versus getting the rent paid.

What I really don’t like the most about the commercial art world though is how incredibly inclusive it is. What I just described above are the primary players in a fairly consistent cycle where only a tiny percentile “win.” I guess there is a certain glamour to New York and having an art scene where everyone seems to know everyone and things are just fabulous. Truthfully though, my mother has never and likely won’t ever visit galleries in Chelsea. Nor will my brother or my cousins or any of the kids I grew up with in Brooklyn. Most people don’t care about this, understandably, but I do, to these people that I find so much more important and make up so much more of the community and world I know, I want to be relevant!!

I wish I could pull out...

my old art history notes. Well, more precisely, remember that particular artists working *right* around the time figuration made a come back.

Anyway, James Benjamin Franklin:


So clean and graphic and yet gooey at the same time too.
My favorites of his usually has two main figures (two people..lights...etc.) whose the direct connection/relationship to one another feel very thoughtful and sincere. Obviously they are mute since it is a painting, but even if the sound was "on", they seem like pairs that could really bask in the silence together.
It reminds me of how I feel when I do some type of art and feel very close to it. : )

(poem)

Daddy,

How do I explain?
The things that I do
are not for my health.

The sweet taste of liquor and
the burn of the smoke
percolating.

It is one thing to be ignorant

and quite another to be deluded

Ok, I admit it...

the last post was pretty "emo"

*shrug* I'm gonna try taking it easy

There's a noodle in my brain

It's scary sometimes to be honest with oneself, but being honest with myself is also the closest I've ever been to maturity or adulthood or whatever. So lets take a deep breath and go under.

I've spent the last few months trying to reconcile things with my exboyfriend, who, I still love, but in what capacity and under what definitions, I do not know. What an incredibly hurtful and painful experience. One where I hurt him, myself, and he, the same. The fact that neither of are innocent has made the distribution of blame and sympathy a difficult situation. I feel both guilty and victimized.
I can feel this discomfort and overall sadness in my body, not quite located at the heart but perhaps slightly behind it. Not quite about heartbreak or love, but perhaps viewing this whole situation as a critique of who we are. Of thoughts about purity and perfection and goals and wants...spending years finding them and having them ripped from your throat by someone you love or maybe even yourself. Falling short of the expectations you set for yourself and set for you by others and still being loved. Finally getting to where you want to be and rejecting love...

The day after I catch the stomach flu I feel drained from everything I lost the day before. I'd like to go to sleep now.