Day 3 was, unfortunately, a complete wash out - I had to attend a physio session, which caused me to miss the first two lectures of the day - I made it into the 3rd lecture, but was in considerable pain after being pummelled and kneaded, and half way through, I had no choice but to leave - I think maybe I should have taken the physio's advice, and rested for the day . I do have some notes from the part of lecture I was able to attend , and think that there is just enough there for me to give a little feedback .
Working with and in Art Galleries -Oriel Davies - Amanda Farr, Director of Oriel Davies
Amanda began by explaining that she was going to look at the way people work within galleries, based on the model of The Oriel, which is situated in Newtown, Powys.
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| Oriel Davies Gallery |
She went on to explain the aims of the Oriel -
*To connect people with art in the local area
*To provide opportunities for Welsh and International artists
*To provide a centre for Contemporary art and culture.
She added that the Oriel has around 9000 visits per year, including repeat visits.
The Oriel is an independent public art gallery - i.e., NOT run by the local council. Its not a commercial gallery, but a registered, non-profit charity. Some funds are raised from the shop and cafe, and these are invested back into the gallery.
It owns no art collection, but has a large amount of exhibition space. Its main reasons fro 'being' are to exhibit art, and for education. It organises tour exhibitions is collaboration with other galleries. Its governed by a board of up to 12 trustee's, all of whom give their time freely and tend to stay on the board for around 3 years - its made up of a panel of people who have expertise in area's like finance, legal, retail and marketing, and they hold 3 monthly meetings .
Amanda then went to explain the different types of work opportunities and roles that exist within the gallery.
Educational work - artists are brought in by the board to work with local students.
The roles within the gallery are divided into different departments:
Visitor services - retail, house manager, guides
Programmes - curator, education and marketing officers
Operations - building, technical, caretaker
Financial management
Additional Operations - cafe
The Artistic Director oversees everything .
She went on to talk about some of the off site projects that the gallery organises for example, artist Steve Messam created this 'wool' covered piece, called 'Clad'
Sadly, she reports that the building used for this work was later destroyed by fire.
Amanda said they also run training programmes for young curator groups - these last for several months and culminate in the students involved putting on an exhibition.
The age range of students runs from 15 to 24
Poster advertising one of the Young Curator exhibitions.
It was at this point that I reluctantly had to leave the lecture. My main reason for attending was simply that I enjoy visiting galleries and exhibitions and I was curious to find out a little more about what goes into the running of them - And, as several lectures have rammed home the point about the importance of collaboration, and about being able to work with a variety of creative people, as being advantageous, I felt it would maybe prove to be beneficial at some stage in the future, if I had just a little idea of the work involved in galleries and exhibitions. Although I was only able to stay for around half of the lecture, it was well delivered and interesting, and I do feel I learnt at least a little about the subject.
Day 4.
The Chip Shop Story (Or was it Visions?) _ Andy Cheetham.
Firstly, please excuse the confusing title - I approached the lecture, expecting to attend 'Visions' - was told the lecturer had swapped the two lectures he was doing round, and it would now be 'The Chip Shop Story' - but once inside the lecture, after a somewhat convoluted explanation by Andy Cheetham, I was left not quite sure which lecture I was attending ! I suspect it was 'Visons' after all, being as there was neither a reference to a 'chip shop', nor any explanation of the lectures title .
Andy left Glyndwr in 1986. In 1992, he and his partner Bell, started the CheethamBell advertising agency. This merged with JWT Manchester in 2001, to become CheethamBell JWT. 2012 is their 20th year in business, and they are mainly involved in TV advertising.
There then followed a 'showreel' of 20 examples of the advertising that the company had been responsible for, over the last several years.
First up was an add for Umbro, advertising the new England kit - the company based the advert around the film 'The Great Escape'. Following this came a sample of the adverts they had created for Vimto - this campaign ran for around 8 years, and were based around the poems written by Purple Ronnie.
I actually remember these ads!
Andy continued with the show reel, featuring commercials they had done for Phones4u, where he also talked about the responsibility of delivering the goods, no matter what the size of the budget; Then Lemsip, United utilities, Benefit fraud - here he talked about how you have to be creative to negotiate restrictions - the ads were supposed to warn people off committing benefit fraud, but no threats could be used - so they used a 'menacing voice', instead. CheethamBell came up with the tag line 'Lambrini Girls', obviously for Lambrini and he talked about how they had even created a 'dance' as part of the publicity campaign. They were also responsible for the Kellogs tag line 'Drop a Jean size' - Kellogs were not allowed to claim the cereal as a diet food, but wanted to imply it - the tag line was the way CheethamBell accomplished this. ChicagoTown Pizza's, John West, Century Radio - there is no doubt that the agency have had an impressive client list.
Then we came to numbers 17 and 18 on the list.
Number 17 was a campaign they created for the work clothing firm 'Scruffs' - Scruffs wanted a very near the knuckle approach, that couldn't be used on the TV - so Cheethambell came up with the idea of a campaign based around them making a DVD of basically a short, soft porn film that was to be given away, free, with purchases of the clothes . We were given the option of leaving the room, if we felt that we would be offended by the film, and as I am not easily offended, I decided to stay - it was pretty dire, to be honest - embarrassing more because it was so bad - not even 'good' soft porn! (Well, not unless you have the mentality of a 12 year old boy, I would imagine!) . I've swithered about writing what I'm going to say next, but in for a penny - I was more perturbed by the speakers attitude after we had seen this clip. One of the actresses in the film was a trainee teacher at the time, and presumably short of cash, which is why she agreed to be in it. Later, when a teacher at a 'rather good' school, the video resurfaced on 'youtube', and caused her no end of problems. Now, choosing to 'star' in a film like that is a pretty dumb choice if you are training to work in a field like teaching, in my opinion, but hey - we all make stupid decisions at some time. But the cavalier attitude shown by Andy was a little unsettling - he seemed to think the grief she got was pretty amusing, and wasn't even sure how the matter had been resolved for the teacher involved (Though he thought it was all 'OK', eventually) . I wonder if she knows that this film is being paraded in University lectures - and if she knows the creator of it is still having a chuckle at her expense? Andy spent quite a lot of time talking about this particular campaign - for the life of me, I can't think why !
Number 18 actually really annoyed me - a commercial for Gamestation, built around a stereotypical image of a Mum who clearly is incapable of understanding anything at all technical or games related, and can't even get the words and terminology right . . . I'll stress that I am not a militant feminist, though I believe in equality - BUT, I wonder if any of the incredibly talented Female games students that we have at Glyndwr would have been amused by this ad?
In my notes, at this point, I quoted what Andy said immediately after showing these two clips - he said that he is "very proud of what we've done" - in brackets after, I've written my response - "Really????" - I think that about sums it up.
Another couple of ads followed, and the lecture was running over by about 15 minutes by the time I left. I'm going to try and be fair in summing this up. There is no doubt that Cheethambell is a highly successful firm, I'd seen many of the examples shown on the reel several times on TV in the past. In terms of relevancy or useful info - well, there were some examples of the sort of problem solving involved in advertising, but not a lot else. Despite this, the lecture ran on and on and on - which was annoying, but bearable - until we got to the porn film and the rather patronising and sexist ad for Gamestation . The overwhelming feeling I got as I walked out, was slight shock, that such a laddish attitude is still so evident in a profession where you would think that that sort of nonsense has long since been dispelled.
Life in the Afterworld as a Freelance Artist (Photography) - Alison McClean.
Alison graduated in 2010, and is owner of The PhotoFoundry
The PhotoFoundry
Alison ran her own business providing financial services for 15 years, before a career change to a becoming a public Speaker, and Martial Arts teacher.
The first part of the lecture, she titled 'Birth' - this was the point where she decided to 'chuck everything in' and return to university to study Creative Lens Media . She said she just wanted to learn, and advised us to make the most of every opportunity that comes our way - to get into the studio and 'pester' the tutors and techs for information on how to use the lights and so on, to take advantage of the knowledge we have around us, and to tackle our dissertation early in the Summer holidays so that our last year can spent on doing the work we enjoy - all very relevant advice .
The next section she titled 'After Birth' and basically was about her life as a graduate, what worked for her - and what didn't. In her case, she says having a 'break' after she finished studying, to re-charge, worked for her, but that might not be the case for everyone - she said that if you do take a break like she did, or even in thecearly stages of setting up a business, its a good idea to work part time - just to see you through financially, either whilst you decide what to do or whilst you are getting a business off the ground .
Her first piece of advice about starting a business was getting a website, and she had a good list of tips, resources and information for us.
*Think about the name of your website - a good resource is 'namesco.co.uk', to check out if the name is used elsewhere.
*Look at free websites, e.g. 'carbonmade'
*Wor5k with a graphic Designer to create the site - maybe exchange services, with a fellow student who has the expertise, if finances are tight .
* She talked about the importance of grammar and spelling on your website - she suggested using 'Ghotit.com - poor spelling and grammar look unprofessional.
*Get a friend to look over the site - not someone who will tell ou its 'great' just because they are nicve, but someone you can trust to give constructive feedback and criticism.
*Look for simplicity and a 'clean' look to your website .
*Improve 'traffic' to your site by using video, links to blogs and other social network sites, tags - if there is video content on your site, it can generate up to SIX times more hits.
*Encourage interaction on your site - offer some freebies and competitions, provide encouragement for people to come and look, and take part .
* Keep your website up to date !
Alison then talked about the importance of Business Cards, and again, provided us with some useful guidelines.
*Think about your branding and how its presented on the card.
*Get as good a quality as you can
*Make it uncluttered, so the information potential customers need is easy to zoom in on.
*Consider postcard size - for a photographer, these are very useful, as you can include snapshots of your work.
*Check out 'Moocards'
*Futureproof - including dates onthe card - for example, information on special offers or competitons with a 'ends by date' gives the cards a 'short' useful life.
Spreading the Word - ways to publicise and generate work -
'Word of Mouth'
You need to get over any reluctance to or coyness about saying what you do - confidence goes a long way. Take your camera with you, wherever you go - its a conversation starter at events and so on.
Use your family, friends, colleagues, fellow students, referrals.
Professionalism - you have to be professional - under promise - but over deliver.
Don't rely just on web sites - get out there, to events, festivals, galleries.
Social media - use it! twitter, Face book, Blogs, Flickr, Pintrest - link everything, use google plus, linked-in (A professional network) - Alison said that Blogs, especially, are the way forward.
Networking - got to Exhibits, graduation networking events, look at 'Fusion' (the Foundry in Wrexham), events, go to the Chamber of commerce, the pub - and Redeye.
She gave us a list of groups to look at and become involved with to help us start out - Redeye, Welshoot images.eo.uk (these run workshops, at a cost of around £20), local Camera Clubs, 'Photernative (Fine arts group for photographs, interested in alternative products); Insideout Art Group, Open Eye Gallery in Liverpool, Blank media collective in Manchester, and Ffresh.
Her next advice was on how to keep being inspired - use Twitter, Redeye, Welshot, get involved in collaborations, Look at the the Art House co-op (a website - all free or minimal costs, lots of projects going on), Eager (Dutch company, sets photography projects), and keep a file of all your idea's - you never know when one will inspire or be useful at a later date.
Continuing Professional Development.
Keep up with -
*Redeye or similar
*Current trends
*Photography skills
*Competitions
*On-line magazines
And when going into business,
*Zone
*Tax and business courses
*Have a business bank account
*Go on Moneysavingexpert
*Keep accounts
*Get Insurance
The wealth of solid, sensible, useful information in this lecture was fantastic - and it was delivered clearly and in a really interesting way - Alison was down to earth and approachable, and the fact that she was speaking from extremely relevant and recent experience added validity to all the advice she gave. Photographically, I found this the most useful lecture of the week, and I am really glad that I attended it.
Show Passion In Your Next step (photography and video) _ MinimalMedia.
Minimalmedia are a group of 3 students who graduated from Glyndwr last year (2011) . All 3 are photography/media based - and all 3 are absolutely passionate about what they do.
The 3 members are -
Graham cooper - his main interest is film, studied at Yale to develop his film skills. He started a business in 2007,which folded after 5 months, so went to Glyndwr - where he met the other 2 members of the team.
Hollie Harmsworth - originally came from a fine arts background, and started to study fine arts at Chester - but it wasn't for her. She dropped out, and in a change of direction, did her HND - and liked the film side. Came to Glyndwr because the creative side being offered alongside the technical side was really appealling.
Alan Whitfield - his main genre is photography. Previously, he worked for 10 years in a factory - he returned to education, firstly at GCSE level, then A level, HND, then Glyndwr.
Alan spoke first, about the lows and the highs of getting to where he is now - the main piece of advice he had was to not let yourself be pigeon holed - just keep going and try new things, don't say know just because its not where you think you want to go.
Graham then talked about the necessity of not turning work down - he was asked to film an agricultural show, which didn't appeal at all - but he went, he did it - and got a lot of work off the back of it. he said its just as important to get experience as it is to ge a good grade - having a good portfolio and show treel is vital.
They then talked about Professional Development.
Alan spoke first, advising us to take anything that comes our way - its all experience. Accept that sometimes you just have to deliver exactly what is wanted in any brief given - even if you have ideas of your own, the ability to give the customer just what they want is important.
Hollie told us to make out own opportunities, and spoke about learning to work with others on briefs and so on.
Graham reiterated the importance of grabbing and creating opportunities - and said be prepared to push, to make contacts, especially with local companies.
"Resonance made us Believe"
Alan spoke about how they were approached by a 'guy' who wanted to make a film called 'Resonance' - Alan agreed to produce, and it snowballed with him being involved with a host of different things - team selection, auditions. he said its worth taking the initiative to get involved with other projects.
he also at this point reiterated what so many speakers have said this week, emphasising using social network sites, blogs, advertising tools - "network, network, network". he talked about the necessity to be hard working and passionate.
Graham added that 'Resonance' was the vehicle that brought them all together, in the sense that it made them realise how well they worked as a team.
He also added that owning their own equipment had proven to be of huge benefit.
Alan then spoke about using 'Go Wales Freelance Academy and Workshops' - this is the second time this week that I've heard this mentioned as a really positive and useful thing to take part in, and I certainly intend to follow this up.
Graham carried on with the 'story' of 'MinimalMedia' he talked about how the 3 decided to join forces and create their own company, and described how finding the right name was really difficult.
Like Alison before, the 3 had business advice to give - they said we need to consider tax (check out the HMRC website) and insurance implications, look at the different types of company we could become involved in - limited, sole trader, for example - as each carry different implications. They also reminded us that currently, if you intend to do any work with children, you need to apply for and have a CRB check.
Graham then spoke about having a good showreel as part of your portfolio - he said make it varied, so it showcases all your talent and achievements.
He then talked about how difficult it can be to learn how to approach people - personal contact is better, and more professional, than e mail and texts, especially for an initial approach in business. Gaining the confidence to do this isn't easy, work experience of any/every kind helps, and it does get easier with practise. Meeting people in person forms bonds - it matters. Additionally, you need to have the confidence to 'keep in touch', and be able to do it without 'pestering'.
They also talked about how this type of work often involves long and unsociable hours - be prepared for and get use to that idea .
In October 2011, Conwy Castle provided the screen for projection of images as part of the Blinc digital arts festival.
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| An image taken of the castle, during this event - sadly, I wasn't able to find any images attributed to minimalmedia. |
The team talked about their involvement in this event - apart from the enjoyment from just taking part, participating has generated more work for them.
To finish, they talked about their latest project - a commercial for 'Publicate' - a new publishing site on the internet, aimed to be a useful tool for getting your information out there. Graham had only just finished work on this, very late the night before - so we were the first 'proper' audience to see it.
The lecture finished with a quote, by Paul Carvel,
"Passion is a positive obsession. Obsession is a negative passion".
I found this lecture really interesting - to have people, so newly graduated, come in and talk enthusiastically about what they have been able to achieve, in a relatively short time, and to see that they were really enjoying the whole experience was both inspiring and reassuring . Some useful tips and info, and despite them claiming to be nervous, I thought it was pretty well delivered.
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