Pixiq

The overwhelming opposition to SOPA and PIPA across the internet recently has made me think more in depth about the role the internet plays for artists today – case in point, for photographers in the fine arts scene.

I’ve shared my work online for nearly 6 years now, in various places including my own site and blog, and mostly centred around the photo-sharing site Flickr. I've often gone through intermittent phases of doubt about photo-sharing, and how it sits as part of being a ‘professional’ artist/photographer. I quickly learned in the early days that galleries don’t generally like artists independently using the internet to showcase and sell their work, as it reduces the gallery's autonomy over the artist’s work. I saw that it’s obviously not in their commercial interest, so I knew I had to hang onto my rights to sell my own prints online. But there’s still always been a kind of resignation to the idea that 'photo-sharing' is not that classy, or your real aspirational home, because anyone can do it. What marks out a real artist is to make the move into galleries, right? Transition your main operation from the virtual to the physical, because that is where you start to proliferate two sought-after things: money, and recognition – through ‘safe’, respectable, traditional ways.

You are an artist because you create art. Simply that. And yet, we go through these intense periods and even lifetimes of doubt because definition of an artist is so constantly depicted as dependent on your outward recognition.

The CV template

When I had my first exhibition in 2006 I was excited to go ‘from the virtual gallery space to the physical’. We as artists get taught by example that our accolades are our currency and therefore our sum worth, and physical exhibitions in bigger and better galleries is the hallmark of a successful artist. It’s a indisputable given. Pick up any respectable photography art magazine; the content of an artist's work has to be validated by the hinge of at least one accolade: where they’ve exhibited, or where they have studied art, or which awards they’ve won, or which important name they've worked with. Sometimes the credentials leave no room for talking about the art at all - and it will by convention be written in third person – by a journalist or critic worthy of talking about 'art', not by the artist themselves.

I’ve built a CV of physical exhibitions whilst sharing my work online, but I’ve been victim to the common thinking that sharing your photos on the internet had less to do with being a real artist than having pictures hang as real ‘art’ in a gallery. I watched how my photo show credentials acceptably fleshed out features and blurbs about me. I carried on sharing my work online because I always enjoyed the validation it offered through direct interaction with people, but I hadn’t truly grasped how significant the internet is as a tool. I guess I’ve taken it for granted, and only subconsciously felt the power.

But now I realise that sharing online is more than just about immediacy, the pleasure of being able to edit my representation (pictures, bio etc) whenever I want, the pleasure of outside appreciation and seeing the numbers of comments and favourites swell before my eyes. I realise that sharing work online is the most powerful force an artist has today, and that sharing work online can be, in itself, the validation of a real artist. That does depend on your perception of what an ‘artist’ is. I am not using the word purely as a label of commercial profession. Here, I am using it to identify a genuine inner vocation. A 'real artist' creates art that feels completely genuine to them, and is unaffected by others’ opinion, interception or censorship (though to what extent they are influenced by others' work is of course another discussion in itself). They do what they want, how they want, to raise whatever message (or not). They think about their inspirations critically and constantly remix and question.

Going further, the artist that I aspire to be is one who values the importance of pursuing truth over anything else, and seeks to make art based on how moved they feel to expose that truth. They still make the art primarily their own pleasure, but they translate it to a higher universal purpose, raising negative issues to make positive change. They ultimately want to liberate humanity, to question the human psyche and the wider picture of the world. This moves toward a revolutionary artist.

Wide web of worlds

So, the internet is amazing. First, you create what you want. You write with it what you want (I'm rediscovering the power of accompanying text). Putting it online, you control everything about the presentation of your own material. Anyone is able to respond, irrespective of their credentials (obviously that has downsides, but here I am highlighting the principle of open sharing that is important.) You create, share and control completely on your own terms. Of course, some sites have their limits (Flickr has filters, Facebook inhibits any nudity, etc). And it’s very important to note that general freedoms are being threatened – not all of the world has the freedom to share as they wish, and not everyone will be able to view your work. I know a chunk of the world can’t even see my website because of the nudity. And bills like SOPA and PIPA threaten artists like never before, which is why fortunately we all clubbed together to oppose them, killing or at least maiming them (for now).

In sharing our work online, people generally appreciate that warm glow of individualism we get in being able to express ‘our creativity’ to others, and that has made our own cyber backslapping happy place – which is all very well. It’s only a recreation of so many other arenas in every industry and area of life. But what makes me particularly excited is to consider the powerful medium of revolution an artist becomes when he/she uses their work to try spread political and social commentary, to peel back the constructs in our world and lambast our threatened freedoms; to not be afraid to raise topics that are uncomfortable or even taboo. The audience may react with boredom at best or anger at worst. The important point is that eyes are looking, and some are being opened wider, and mouths move. Within a click, people can share your statement, and with photography, we break the barrier of having to rely on written text alone. With the right exposure, it can move around the world within minutes. Artists can be agents of awareness in a world that is, whether one realises it or not, on a pivotal precipice of change.

Fine-ite gallery

Getting your work into a gallery can be the opposite of this. How has sticking your work up in a room for only selected people to look at, and rich people to take away, become the milestone aspiration? If sharing your work online is like farming your work ‘free-range’, a gallery can turn your work into battery chickens, literally beak-snapped by the compromised refinement of which of your art is actually shown, the title of the show, the presentation and the overall appropriation of you and your work. The more important the gallery, the more exposure the show will get, true – but also, the more compromised it will be, because the gallery's swollen importance will go further to clip the artist's wings (I've always believed gallery and artist should strive to be equal entities). Non-profit galleries are not exempt from this elitist picture: their choice of artists is based on reputation of an artist's name; how well the artist’s name has been ‘bought’ previously. Some shows I've seen in public/funded galleries are amongst the most pretentious and credential-focused out there.

It is not the notion of an 'exhibition' itself that I'm critiquing here, because of course, there are several advantages of a physical exhibition over the virtual: the sheer difference in visual impact that can be had through size of the images, the tangibility of the audience walking and looking rather than squinting at a screen, the uncluttered sensory context allowing greater focus and less distraction. Contrast that to the internet which is crowded with lots of competing messages as well as an increasing saturation of advertising. A physical exhibition can do things a virtual exhibition simply cannot do. But importantly, it is not the physicality of exhibiting that is questionable, but the control exerted by the owner of the gallery (the business) selling it. What I am trying to communicate is an importance of owning your own work and your own message.

You don’t need a gallerist or a significant gallery space to be able to have a physical show – you can make an exhibition happen yourself, on your own terms. Indeed, a revolutionary physical exhibition can be had. What I am inviting you to question and re-prioritise is the aspiration of looking to another entity – in this example, a gallerist – to endorse your work. Gallerists are not God. They are just people with opinions. They don’t even have to like art or care about art: they have to be business people first and foremost. They don’t care about your diversity, your experimentation, or your messages unless it relates somehow to a selling point of the show, oriented around saleability. This is because they don’t need to care, they just need to take a liking to your easily-digestible wares. This is not evil, just inevitable: gallerists don't have the time to fully get their head round the multi-faceted quality of human nature, and neither do they see the buyer market as a place to explore it.

Simplified selling points are necessary, but moreover, those selling points are mostly favoured to relate to easy and comfortable visuals, mostly in the quest of growing flashing lights around the amazing artist’s name. Gallery exhibitions have never really been about freedom of expression, and the reason is simple: sharing powerful, challenging or uncomfortable messages/images has never been the way to make money. Money in most all situations is made through the selling of recognisable objects – and in this current climate, it’s mostly about the safest, most homogenised material: all across arts, music, fashion, movies (nicely summed up this by Benjamin Kanarek, 'Being the Same is the New Original'). I've been advised by some professional fine-artists that it's not the place of the artist to discuss instigating any kind of environmental or political change, which makes me further recognise that the fine-art world is hinged on conformation.

Worth wile

Last year I had a meeting with a reputable commercial European gallery. Even though I was confident in my work, there was undeniably a string of questions in my head, that positioned the gallerist into a position of authority of ‘art’, even on determining whether I was a ‘real artist’ or not - almost like there was a risk I would play my cards wrong and lose my hand. That feeling was unnecessary. In the meeting, I showed too much diverse work, hoping to cover my bases, which just confused him. One thing mentioned was that he did not like the mixture of b/w images and colour, saying he never exhibits both together, and that he thinks I am good with colour and should stick with it – a discouragement that was disguised as praise. I left the meeting with a doubt in my mind of whether to keep doing monochrome or not: I asked my friend, but he said I have to make my own choice about what I do. That is all obvious now. Who wants to look at art done by someone who was told what to create?

Of course, if you are purely centred on gaining personal recognition and to make money, then you can go ahead and make the art that others/the industry want you to make. You will follow the ‘trends’ and might even accept gallerists’ say on the content of your actual work, as well as its presentation. You will be a success but most likely won't be very happy or fulfilled deep inside.

The message I want to send out here particularly to aspiring and emerging artists, is not to dismiss exhibitions (wherever and with whomever) as a useful and rewarding opportunity, but to reconsider what a gallery, a gallerist and an exhibition really mean. A gallerist’s view of your work has little, if at all anything, to do with your own meaningful substance as a real or revolutionary artist, a person, a thinking and ticking mind. Rethink whether you really aspire to a certain big gallery you dream of hanging in. Reinvigorate your self-confidence by considering that your ambitions might lay elsewhere, and that your dreams are not all about ‘you’, but something higher.

So if you get a meeting with a gallery: go for it with open eyes, knowing that the gallerist is basing their response on their own view on how well your work can be commodified. Don’t make the mistake of thinking that gallery meetings and exhibitions are the be-all and end-all of your work. It does become necessary to learn to some extent how to market yourself, to get the stepping stones you need to access other opportunities you seek. Learn about ways to market yourself, and do research on how to play ‘your cards’ right in any one context – choosing the most suitable pictures for a competition, gallery meeting, submission of any kind – but keep a line firmly drawn as to how much you are compromised, challenged or curbed. (For example, you might not accept a gallery telling you an image should be changed back to colour from monochrome; but you might agree that the b/w image be omitted and only colour pictures be shown.)

There is nothing wrong with finding ways to make money from your art, but just remember that making art is all you need to be an ‘artist’. We each all find our own degree to which the pursuit of money is comfortable enough not to damage our art's genuine flow. Choose to only work with people that will accept your final say on your work and its presentation. Don’t wait around for a blessing from a gallery, make your own exhibition and define yourself. Make your own opportunities and speak your voice. Be proud to be a modern-day artist and express yourself exactly as you want. Make art, enjoy, open up eyes and get people talking, which is what the world needs right now.

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All images in this article are my own work (www.missaniela.com, or wider array at www.flickr.com/ndybisz)