The Exhibition

Well, if you were expecting a full review with photo's this post is going to be a bit of a disappointment! I've just got myself a decent camera phone, and it didn't even occur to me to take any pictures! Oh, except this one, which is of one of the swans that was part of the fountain in our shopping centre for many years.


They removed the fountain and the swans about 20 or so years ago - before renaming the shopping centre "The Swansgate Centre"! This swan now hangs in the museum, where the exhibition was held.

There were actually three ceramic artists this time, including myself, whereas Stella is usually the only one. Her paper-mache sculptures were amazing as usual. Yeah, I should have taken photo's. The one's at the exhibition are not on her website, but I recommend that you take a look.

So, how did it go? Well, for me, the preview evening didn't seem to have the same atmosphere as the exhibition that was held there in November last year. There was live music, played by children, which I have to say was absolutely awful. I'm sure they tried their best but I was slowly losing the will to live (or at least the will to stay) and I have to wonder if this affected the mood of the viewers. One lady fell over, straight into the display board thingies, which thankfully was caught by other viewers, other wise quite a few paintings would probably have been damaged. No one managed to catch the falling lady though, and she smashed her wine glass and cut her hand. I probably should have got a photo of that too. :)

For me personally, the preview evening wasn't a great success. Firstly, a leaf broke on my vase. I would have preferred to just take it out of the show, but everyone insisted it was fine. Strangely, I wasn't so much upset that it was damaged, but upset that I had listened to others and displayed it in it's damaged state. I feel that as a "newbie" I want to set a certain standard for others to expect from me, and damaged goods isn't it.

Also, on the preview night, there was a table full of glasses of wine and nibbles set out in front of the table with my pieces on it, which wasn't ideal. Again, I should have taken a photo so that you could see the lay out. Later, when the lady fell into the display boards, one of them was taken down and leant against the table with my pieces on, obstructing the view. I tried to pretend I hadn't noticed, but the lady in charge quickly moved it when she noticed me glance across at it.

The final straw was just before I left. I noticed the dirty glasses had been collected and placed right beside my pieces! I went home very unhappy, and the next day I had virtually made up my mind to collect my pieces and bring them home. Things were better when I got there the next day though. The extra tables for food and wine and been removed, and being quite near the entrance, I thought maybe my pieces were in a reasonably good position after all.

One artist, who had just spent 3 months in the Arctic, told the man in the cafe downstairs that he liked my Polar bear. Another lady told me she liked the vase, and said what a shame it was that it was no longer for sale. She didn't realise that I was the person that had made it, but I explained to her that I didn't feel comfortable selling something that was damaged.

And that's about it. I was looking forward to a productive summer and then exhibiting with the FPAA again in November, but I was told that the November exhibition is only for paintings/hanging pieces. Given that my first experience of exhibiting with them wasn't that good, and that I won't be able to exhibit with them in November, I'm wondering if it's worth renewing my membership.

I plan to look around and see what other exhibitions there will be later in the year, that I can take part in. If nothing else, I am glad I have met Stella through the fellowship. She is an absolute joy to talk to about art.


(Apparently "leant" is British for "leaned". Of course, I didn't know this because I've always said leant. But the spell checker didn't recognise it, so I looked it up) :)