At this point I knew that I wanted to do a project based on gallery and fine art culture, and the public's reception to art and maybe design. This was fuelled when I came to the realisation that even as an art student I know very little about classic or modern or fine art in general, and began to wonder how that had been, and whether this was necessarily a bad thing.
For the half hour drawing task we were given I went to the small gallery inside Leeds University to draw and observe the environment. There were very few people there, but maybe that is to be expected due to its location away from the general public who may not necessarily be in the know of what is on offer.
For the preliminary images task I continued drawing and sketching, but this time went to the bigger Leeds Art Gallery. The location, notoriety and the fact it was half term meant there were far more people there. The gallery is also currently housing an exhibition called British Art Show 8 which is also to attract more visitors.
I found myself being particularly interested in how children would react to the art, and how their parents would encourage them.
The children seemed to be more interested in figurative work that they could identify with, if only physically.
And sometimes they'd ignore it completely and took advantage of the large amount of space to run around in, which isn't unexpected! One mother showed some exasperation as she "tried to get [her very young son] to appreciate art", I couldn't tell if she was being sarcastic or not.
A group of teenage girls spent a lot of time just sat in the gallery, mostly appearing to chat amongst themselves or use their phones. They showed most interest in the more modern/ controversial piece of art in that room. I wasn't there to judge, but I wondered why they spent so long in that room if they weren't going to look at the art - and it didn't seem that there was some sort of authority keeping them there. Maybe the gallery is a cool / nice space to hang out, who knows!
A middle aged man walked past the same piece of art that the girls had taken photos of and seemed to laugh nervously. I like the idea that art can be received humorously even if not intended so. I think the thing with 'art' is that once in the public domain you can't control how people react to it, and I think how people react to it makes it what it is, more so than any intentions of the artist.
There was one particular room filled with TVs with just a film of words on the screen that I noticed many people avoided or walked through at pace. It was definitely one of the more 'out-there' pieces and upfront offered very little explanation and one would have to read the description to understand- and even then it was complicated! It didn't prove itself accessible to many people and so many wouldn't stop to see it. Should an artwork be measured in how people can interact with it? Honestly, I didn't understand it, but I don't want to project my own feelings on to this.
A quick thought about the difference between art and illustration, and how size seems to be so important. The bigger the better. I remember seeing very very few small pieces of work in the gallery.
I like how people stand when they look at art, with their hands together at their fronts or their backs. It looks uncomfortable and stiff, almost protective. I do it too.
And a girl who was wearing heelies in the gallery just because it made me laugh.
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I think it was interesting and helpful to get information first hand, but I also need to start reading critical and academic texts so I can put more thought and direction into what I'm doing.
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