Not funded by ACE, and a little foggy why

Howler Chaser - Fog at Durlston | June 2021

With budgets stretched to the limit, I am just one more disappointed artist who didn't get her Arts Council funding, but I still want to talk about it. Because I feel there is something wrong with arts funding when so many people put in so much effort that fails to materialise into money -- and all they get back is a curt one-liner.  

In my case, it was a Project Grant of £12,579 to work with Megan Calver at Durlston Country Park & National Nature Reserve in Dorset on a self-directed residency, working title: Howler Chaser. We were planning to look at the architectural and archival traces of a radar signalling system called OBOE, pioneered at Durlston and used in blind-bombing during World War II. This was to be used as a new lens for audiences to view the rich array of wildlife on the site, particularly those aspects that are ephemeral or concealed. Our outcomes included a four-week on-site exhibition and a participatory public event.

Overall, we worked (mostly unpaid) towards this application for about 12 months, building relationships, doing preparatory research and figuring out how to get the best possible results for us, our partner organisation and our audiences. All while dealing with the difficulties and restrictions of a pandemic. Although not all of that work is wasted, much of it is. Rejection always had to be factored in as a possibility, but its impact on my practice, my career and my livelihood is nonetheless considerable. Here's why:

1) In the final stages of applying, I gave up the equivalent of 15-20 days to research and write the application, time that I could have used to earn money to support myself and my practice. 

2) I had to pass up on other opportunities for 2022 that looked interesting but would have clashed. 

3) I wasted the time of friends, colleagues and potential partners enlisting their support.

4) Most disappointing of all, I put my heart and soul into shaping a really good project that I genuinely believe would have generated new knowledge and awareness, and new opportunities for people to engage with art. And now it can't happen.

Perhaps if you fund-raise for a living, you can decode ACE's feedback effectively but, as an independent artist, their decisions process remains almost opaque to me. I can't even say I've learned from this rejection. Despite immersing ourselves in pages and pages of guidance and several webinars, and utilising detailed cheat sheets, we can only guess what it is about our public engagement and marketing that the Arts Council found so lacking. When reapplying after one knock-back, we did our very best to cram all of our enhanced plans into the 1000-character limit, but apparently ACE still needed more detail. Oh, and second time around they revealed we possibly should have included a marketing partner (even though our project partner Durlston has its own well-established marketing and engagement programme, and a dedicated member of staff to deliver it). I am sure there were rational reasons for our rejection; it's just that I'm genuinely puzzled about what they were.

I refuse to see this as a failure. Our ambitions for this work clearly do not fit the funding criteria of a particular government organisation, and we would be wrong to bend too far to do so. But there are other things about this rejection that evoke a real a sense of loss.  

This project cannot now happen at Durlston with Megan. The timeline we had plotted and the events we had scheduled start rolling in mid-January 2022, so there is no chance to re-apply again in time. Neither do we have the possibility of rescheduling for 2023. Both Megan and I now face pressing personal commitments that will make major collaborations such as this very difficult for at least a few years. 

So that's it. We will make use of the material and research we've generated so far to create some kind of more modest work, maybe even a small exhibition. But the project will lose its deep connection with the site and community that inspired it. 

And I will start the new year trying to fill a giant hole in my income, my plans and my practice. 

Unfunded logo from flaneur.me.org

Limited edition 'Salt-cat' print on sale

Gabrielle Hoad & Megan Calver | Salt-cat (keeps them at home) | 2021 | Limited edition screen print

This newly released screenprint draws on a site-specific installation I created with Megan Calver for 'Open-Up' at Hestercombe Gardens (2020-21).

Salt-cat was a type of cake made by pigeon breeders to entice their birds to stay or return home. Our installation included 16 fragments of text relating to this historic practice. They were drawn from Hestercombe’s archive, as well as sources such as The Sportsman's Dictionary of 1800. We've combined three of these texts in a new limited-edition print. The colours reference the plumage and feet of Columba livia domestica, the homing pigeon.

This edition of 30 was screen-printed for us by George Barron at Double Elephant Print Workshop in Exeter. They are hand-pulled three-colour prints on Fabriano 300gsm paper and measure 49cm x 36cm (a little smaller than A2). Individually signed and numbered, they are priced at £60.00 each unframed including UK postage & packing.

The print will shortly be available from the Hestercombe Gallery shop and also direct from my Instagram as part of the Artist Support Pledge.  Alternatively, contact me or Megan via our websites.

Correspondence 01 extra

 
While Savinder Bual and I were working on our individual submissions for Correspondence 01, we made a shared piece of work: Time Travellers. 

As artists, we have common interests in art and science, and the measurement of time and space. As a starting point, Savinder shared the animations of Al Jarnow with me. We started thinking together about shadows and sundials, and looking for ways to physically experience the movement of the Earth in relation to the Sun. We also wanted to make simultaneous work together that would span time and distance. 

At an agreed time, we started walking towards each other from our separate locations, she in Hitchin near Letchworth, me in Exeter. We kept going for the duration of the time difference between us by the Sun (as opposed to our shared official time of GMT+1 / British Summertime).

We later documented our action as a more formal score that can be performed by people anywhere in the world.

Correspondence 01

Photos by Corey Bartle Sanderson from the Correspondence 01 install at Broadway Gallery, Letchworth

 

Savinder Bual | Sundial, True Time, Letchworth | 2021 

Savinder Bual | Sundial, True Time, Letchworth | 2021
Gabrielle Hoad | Two-handed timekeeper | 2021

Correspondence01, curated by Kristian Day and Matt Burrows

17th August - 5th September 2021

Broadway Gallery,  2 The Arcade, Letchworth Garden City SG6 3EW

Exeter Phoenix, Gandy Street EX4 3LS

Alexis Soul-Gray Oliver Kirkham Gabrielle Hoad Andy Cluer Adam Garratt Molly Rooke Janet Sainsbury Tobias Francis Jackson Sprague Will Luz Abi Freckleton Anna Fairchild Maria Meyer Jessica Wetherly Magdalena Gluszak-Holeksa Liz Harrington Jack Anthony Taylor Helena McGrath Freya Pocklington Savinder Bual

Two-handed timekeeper

Two-handed timekeeper (left & right) | 2021 | Three minutes of digital video x 2

“The railway time is shown by a silvered minute hand, 

the minute hand denoting the true time being gilt.”* 

During the mid-19th century, with the coming of the railways, many of Exeter’s public clocks had two minute-hands, one showing Railway Time (or GMT), the other Local Time, which was approximately 14 minutes behind by the sun.

Two-handed timekeeper is derived from a recording of shadows moving across a playing field in Exeter on 14 July 2021. The footage has been split, superimposed and speeded up to make visible the solar time difference between Letchworth and Exeter. 

This work arose from shared research and experiments made with Savinder Bual during the Correspondence01 project. It reflects on human-made rules and scales of measurement versus the independent movement of celestial objects.

Two versions of the video will be shown simultaneously: one at Exeter Phoenix, the other at Broadway Gallery Letchworth.  The video still above combines both versions into one image.

Left: Two-handed timekeeper  ̶  Exeter and Letchworth (Longitude -3.542433 and -0.22703)

Right: Two-handed timekeeper  ̶  Letchworth and Exeter (Longitude -0.22703 and -3.542433)

Correspondence01, curated by Kristian Day and Matt Burrows

17th August - 5th September 2021

Broadway Gallery,  2 The Arcade, Letchworth Garden City SG6 3EW

Exeter Phoenix, Gandy Street EX4 3LS

*The clock at St John’s Church, Fore Street, Exeter, as described by the Exeter Flying Post in 1845. Source: Clive N Ponsford Time In Exeter (1978)

Ghost Moth and other manifestations

Gabrielle Hoad & Megan Calver | Ghost Moth | Exeter Phoenix Platform | 2021

Between 2nd and 8th August, I was lucky enough (along with Megan Calver) to be part of Exeter Phoenix’s Platform series, which offers artists based in the South West region opportunities to test out ideas, new work and recent developments in their practice.

Our opportunity took the form of a short, experimental residency, during which we reconsidered our predominantly site-specific practice for a gallery environment. Working quickly with a limited range of low-cost and recycled materials, we created a number of test pieces and prototypes, with particular focus on scale, impact and use of space.

Although there was no pressure from Exeter Phoenix to be visible to the public, an audience felt important in the context of what we were trying to do, and so we challenged ourselves to have work in progress on view through a ‘porthole’ we created in the whited-out gallery doors. We also invited a few colleagues and contacts to come into the space by appointment. Curator Matt Burrows provided additional mentoring and support throughout.

It was a great opportunity to ‘think big’ and scale up our work. We were able to experience how different objects, materials or presentation styles read in the formal gallery setting, and how they ‘talk’ to one another and shift in meaning.

Some of the work was made quickly and spontaneously, some developed over the week, some was abandoned after only brief display, some was intentionally ephemeral, and some made purely for ourselves.

Gabrielle Hoad & Megan Calver | Exeter Phoenix Platform | 2021

The above image is from Monday 9th August when we dismantled the temporary weekend exhibition and, in doing so, made a whole new iteration of a sculpture we nicknamed 'the lighthouse' – possibly my favourite version of all.

https://exeterphoenix.org.uk/events/calver-and-hoad/

Platform residency

The Buffer Zone | 2016 | Photo: Susie David

I will be working with Megan Calver as part of Exeter Phoenix’s Platform series from 2nd to 6th August 2021 (Covid restrictions permitting). Platform offers artists opportunities to test out ideas, new work and recent developments in their practice.

During this short experimental residency, we will reconsider our site-specific practice for a gallery environment.  Expanding on our shared preoccupation with language and communication, we plan to improvise activations of space, body and matter, and explore new ways of presenting our outcomes. The residency provides us with an invaluable joint workspace to develop a new project.

We'll be working in the gallery Monday 2nd - Friday 6th August, with additional work on show through the gallery door in the evenings and during 7th and 8th August.

Exeter Phoenix Galleries, Gandy Street EX4 3LS