This article covers some of the types of galleries and exhibition spaces available to artists and students to exhibit their work. Given are the basic descriptions of the types of galleries with some local Wellington examples.

First of all it’s important to understand that different galleries and exhibition spaces operate in various ways and offer different services. Before you approach a gallery, you can do a little homework and find the best place for you as an artist. As well as exhibiting, it can also be a good idea to hook into some of the ‘opportunities’ out there for artists like – competitions, group shows, assisting artists, etc. The Big Idea is a fantastic website to find these opportunities and also to keep in touch with what is going on in the NZ art scene.
TYPES OF EXHIBITING SPACES:

Café/Bar/Restaurant – Some artists choose to exhibit for the first time in a café as it is a good entry-level option and it is usually free, although some places will charge a commission or fee. This is only worth paying if they have a history of sales. It should be a good deal for both the artist and the café. Some café’s, are better than others. There are some café’s set-up as established exhibition spaces; they will have good spotlighting, clear white walls and good hanging systems.
(Deluxe Café)

Rental Galleries – The deal here is that you pay rent on the space for each week and you do most of the work around the show; for example you hang the work, design the invites, put on the opening and possibly even staff the show- because of this it can be a good to use a rental gallery with a group of artists.
(Thistle Hall, DAF106)

Co-Op / Non-Commercial Galleries – These are artist-run galleries. In a co-op gallery, artists invest in the galleries running expenses by paying a membership fee. The advantage to this is you are immediately hooked into a community of other artists.
(Enjoy Gallery)

Institutional Galleries – these are large government or council funded galleries. Sales usually only happen in the attached gift shop. Whilst you can approach them with exhibition concepts and proposals, they usually have fully booked spaces. They can have spaces reserved for artists to display in but it is usually biased towards more conceptual or installation type work. As these are publically funded, they do have to take care as to what work is accepted.
(NewDowse in Lower Hutt, Pataka in Porirua, City Gallery, Te Papa Tongarewa, National Library Gallery, NZ Academy of Fine Arts, Adam Art Gallery)

Art Dealers – An art dealer typically seeks out various artists to represent, and builds relationships with collectors and museums whose interests are likely to match the work of the represented artists. An artist/dealer relationship can be contractual. (See Commercial and Dealer Galleries)

Commercial and Dealer Galleries – These are temporary exhibitions from artists, who are represented by the gallery. Some focus on emerging artists whilst others only take on artists with an established sales history.
(Bowen Gallery, Photospace, Ferner Galleries, Solander Works on Paper, Page Blackie Gallery, Peter McLeavey, Roar Gallery)

Art Shops – these spaces may have a small space reserved for a featured artist or an exhibition but are more like art shops than galleries. Their mark-up may be considerably higher, the range of work and the number of different artists in these shops is always interesting. (Kura, Ora, Tamarillo)

Studio Gallery – An exhibition space that is attached to an artists’ studio.

Online Gallery – Websites that offer art sales.

Street Gallery – Contemporary Gallery with a ‘Street’ style.
(Manky Chops, Eyeball Kicks)

There are lots of ways of finding out about ‘who is where’ – ArtZone is a local rag that has a fairly comprehensive list of galleries throughout New Zealand and the Artists Alliance publishes a code of practice for artists and dealers in New Zealand.

Auckland video editor James Brown works for The Learning Connexion School of Art and Creativity by day, and is a painter by night. A voracious blogger James decided to bring his two great loves together and create a video blog. His video blog follows his adventure from creative conception to through to exhibition

James’ work is a complex melange of post-modern pop culture, which builds on traditions of collage. Essentially they are studies of James’ experience, reconstituted through a vision of a mythical future. His work culminates in a giant painting of goat boy, a futuristic historian who populates James’ works. This work was entered in the 2009 Wallace Art awards.

James has created a video blog, documenting the passion, excitement, but also the adventure of working as an emerging painter in New Zealand. Part 12 is the last entry in this series, as James selects final works to present to a gallery. Thanks to everyone who has been following him and we look forward to having him back when his works appear on a wall somewhere!!!

Part 12

Part 11

Part 10

Part 9

Part 8

Part 7

Part 6

Part 5

Part 4:

Part 3:

Part 2:

Part 1:

City Gallery Wellington celebrates its public reopening on Sunday 27 September, 12pm – 5pm.

Jo Randerson will lead the afternoon’s festivities which include bands Rosie Tin Tea Caddy (12:30-1:15pm), Little Bushman (2-3:30pm) and The Hardy Ha Ha’s (4-5pm). There is also FREE entry to the newly renovated City Gallery, closed since October last year, and the chance to be one of the first to experience the spectacular Yayoi Kusama exhibition, Mirrored Years.

Breaking The Sound Barrier
TLC’s 3rd annual Deaf / Hearing Impaired student exhibition.

With new work from: Hendrik Groot, Zalina Barrington, Rosie Solouota, Alesha Hudson, Lynette Newell, Charlie Stout, Josie Spring, Jane Daysh, Stefan Hall.

Opening celebration: Thursday October 8, 5.30 – 7pm

ROAR! Gallery
1st floor, 55 Abel Smith St (above Real Groovy)
Wellington

Runs October 8 – 24, we’d love to see you there!

This is a question many artists ask themselves. Some jump at the chance of having a free blog site to call their own, others shy away thinking it will be too hard and too time consuming. I am a blogger and I don’t like to imagine life without a blog. Recently I had computer problems which left me blog-less for a month. It was then that I realised how much I depended upon my blog for feedback from other artists, for a place to share new discoveries and for its ability to act as a visual diary. I also missed visiting blogs. I have ‘met’ some truly inspirational artists from all walks of life, from all art genres and from all over the globe. They’ve proven to be a real source of soul food and inspiration and it’s all come at the great price of…absolutely free. What’s not to like about that?

One of the keys I believe to successful blogging is to take good photos (or good video’s if that’s your flavour.) Keep in mind that you should post your photos low res so it doesn’t take so long to upload them and if someone does ‘right click and save’ your image they are too small for it to be worth there while. You can add watermarks or copyright text to your image before uploading them if you have a programme and time to do so. There are some blog hosts that allow you to disable the right click option, however this limits all right clicking and not just the ‘save image’ option. It’s also important to remember your blog manners. If someone says hello to you on the street you would usually say hello back so if someone visits you in blogland it is the ‘done thing’ to drop by and visit them. It’s not obligatory but it does go a long way with other bloggers. I’ve actually found it works two-fold as I am often uplifted by their comment on my blog and then inspired by theirs.

Birdhouse XVII by Mick Mather

Blogging also opens up options to collaborate. Recently I took part in a project that had over 100 artists from all over the world participating. It was a great to be part of a like minded community and I really grew as an artist from it. Another time an artist asked for permission to digitally alter one of my photos, the result was wonderful and it was really good to see the original photo take on a new journey half way across the globe. I’ve even had a digital artwork dedicated to me and received blog awards. This is the digital version of the certificates we got at school and it turns out even adults like to give and receive them! There are so many things that I could mention but like any good story there really are too many things to mention here.

Grounded.In.New.York.Zea.land by John Mora

I am not a computer expert and I don’t have loads of spare time but blogging is an easy and fast way of publishing my work. The blog sites do most of the work for you. You just write your text, select your images or video and press the publish button. Honestly! If you know how to use html codes and you want to post your feed to social networking sites those options are usually available but they’re optional extras. I use blogger and wordpress regularly and Shutterchance on occasion. There are pros and cons for choosing each host but in brief here are a few that come to mind.

Blogger has fewer templates to choose from than Wordpress but when you upload a photo (for the same post) it takes you back to the last album you uploaded from which saves time on digging around trying to find the image you want. This is not really a problem if you only want to add one or two photos to a post but I don’t seem to be able to stick to that!

Wordpress allows you to add pages to your blog; this is a good thing if you want to include a lot of information without plastering it all over your homepage. Blogger doesn’t have the extra pages option…but it is more widget friendly than Wordpress.

Shutterchance has two template options…black or white. It allows one photo per post and is aimed specifically at photographers as the name would suggest! It’s a good site and the community there is pretty friendly. I haven’t use mine as much lately but that is one of the joys of blogging. The commitment level you give it is up to you. If you don’t have time, don’t post.

‘Black and White’ Zine by Lisa Sarsfield

The last thing I want to add is that if you do choose to blog don’t gauge the success of your blog (or quality of your art work!) on the amount of comments you receive. It can be disheartening if you think comments reflect success. For example, my wordpress blog has had over 13, 400 views in the past year and from those visitors there were 734 comments left. It doesn’t mean I take bad photos and that 12, 666 hits were from people who didn’t like my work; it simply means I’m not the only one with other places to be and other things to see. Take it in your stride and if you’re happy then keep on creating!

Go well!

Lisa Sarsfield.

Altered Art and Collage

Altered Art and Collage
http://lisasarsfield.blogspot.com

Tauranga Daily Photo
http://lisasarsfield.wordpress.com

My photography for sale on Red Bubble
http://lisasarsfield.redbubble.com/

We can finally reveal the painting that Robert completed on his recent trip to Xiamen in China.

Here it is!!!

View a larger version.

You can read more about Robert’s trip on his blog.

He will be exhibiting this work at Pataka museum in Porirua from the 17th of September to the 4th of October.

We had an excellent turn-out for the exhibition opening on Thursday night. There was a real buzz of excitement and lots of awesome work to view from our amazingly talented students!

The Deaf tour has become a popular part of the opening night and was well enjoyed by all who took part – big thanks to Jaqueline and Ann!

Well done to all the students who put their work in for display, and fantastic work by Bridget Lee and Roger Hearn who were the student co-ordinators for this term.

It’s a fun atmosphere on the night, so if you have never visited us before put the 3rd of December in your diary now for next time!

Check out the slideshow to see some of the highlights:

Hallensteins is hosting a graffiti competition on a Saturday in November (to be confirmed). The Hallensteins front window in Willis Street will become a live graffiti zone for an artist, with the finished work being auctioned on Trade Me and the proceeds going to the Make A Wish Foundation.

The artist will be mentioned in any promotional activity related to the auction, as well as in-store where the work will be displayed. Paint will possibly be supplied.

If you’re interested in this great opportunity, contact Jessica Bennett at Hallensteins – 09 520 4894.

Adam Portraiture Award and Exhibition 2010
The New Zealand Portrait Gallery will once again be running the Adam Portraiture Award and Exhibition, a biennial event sponsored by the Adam Foundation, Wellington City Council and Wellington Waterfront Ltd. The exhibition will open on Wednesday 24 February 2010 and will run throughout the duration of the International Festival of Arts in Wellington.

The competition is aimed at encouraging New Zealand emerging and established artists to develop the theme of portraiture within their work. The 2010 competition is for portraits in the painted medium only. We regret that we are unable to include categories for sculpture, photography and multi-media art, although we are working towards these for another Award.

The prize for the winner of the 2010 Adam Portraiture Award is $15,000 in cash. The winning entry will be retained as part of the New Zealand Portrait Gallery permanent collection. In addition there will be a $2,000 Peoples’ Prize, which will be awarded at the end of the exhibition, and is voted for by members of the public.

The 2010 competition is to be run in the following way: your entry is initially to be submitted in the form of a photograph of your painting. This can be accompanied by slides or a CD with digital images, Those artists whose paintings are selected for hanging and the final judging will then be invited to submit the original work, which will then be exhibited in the New Zealand Portrait Gallery Adam Exhibition and after this may tour.

Please note that each artist is limited to one entry. This entry must be accompanied by an official Entry Form and the $45 entry fee.

See the website for an entry form and conditions for entry: http://portraitgallery.nzl.org.

What do you get if you bring together a sunny Waitangi Day morning with a Scottish born New Zealand painter who has a penchant for Aboriginal art? You’ll have to get down to the First Floor Gallery, St James Theatre, in Courtney Place to find out! Morning Sunshine Waitangi Day is the largest of the 33 art works on show by TLC graduate Morag Stokes. It was inspired by Waitangi Day sunshine streaming through venetian blinds  and falling over newly cleared ledges in her study at home.

“My husband took advantage of the Waitangi Day public holiday to tidy our very cluttered study”, Morag recalls,  “and when I came in, the window ledge and shelves below were completely bare, with bright shafts of light from the blinds falling and bending over them. The contrast between light and shadow made a great photo opportunity and I later used my photographs as the starting point for this painting. So, if Waitangi Day hadn’t been a sunny public holiday, this painting wouldn’t exist.”

An interest in Aboriginal art has prompted Morag to paint horizontally, sometimes sitting on her canvas on the ground while she works. “A work in progress is a very different experience when placed on a horizontal plane”, she says. “You can’t really see it properly  at least not as we are accustomed to viewing paintings. You can feel it, though, and as this painting developed around me, I began to feel its movement to the point of becoming giddy at times. When it was complete, I hung it for the first time, stood back and viewed it from a more familiar, vertical perspective. Wow, I thought, I’ve just painted a huge kilt!”

Watch Morag talking about her work.

Morag’s exhibition, MIND THE GAP, is showing at the First Floor Gallery, St James Theatre, 77-87 Courtenay Place until 21st September 2009. Open daily. Entry free.

For more information:
www.stokes.net.nz
www.stjames.co.nz