gallery choices

[KenC]

I know most people don't do abstract(ish) stuff, but I was wondering if anyone here has had a similar experience. I'm trying to help a neighborhood non-profit gallery raise money by donating a framed print for them to sell. The person in charge, when I asked what sort of thing they might want me to donate, said that I should submit what I felt represented me.

OK, so I sent a jpg of one of my images of a partially destroyed sign. It was pretty clear what was in the image. I said in the e-mail that if they didn't think they could sell this I could submit something more "mainstream."

The response I got was, to paraphrase, "what's this a picture of?" I sent a less abstract image, with which they are content, and I'm not upset about it, having figured that's how it would go and having left them an out in my message. However, I just don't understand the response - what difference does it make what I had photographed (which as I said was pretty clear anyhow) - if it wouldn't sell, then we would go to "plan B" but what was the point of this question? Sorry about the long ramble.

 

[Buckster]

Simple curiosity?

 

[The_Traveler]

I would guess that the gallery doesn't want to go to plan B because that is additional work.
Galleries generally do not give a crap about your dearest work, they want two things only:

• Your work attracts attention -or at least doesn't keep people away
• Your work has a chance of selling to their clientele.

Maybe that query was an indirect way of saying that, if they couldn't figure it out, their clientele wouldn't either.

 

[KenC]

@Buckster - perhaps - I think I was focusing on the process of picking a print and didn't see the question as relevant to that, but it could have been just a minor digression

@The_Traveler - yeah I know their interest, which is why I offered to send another print ("plan B") and we settled on that fairly quickly, but it hadn't occurred to me that it could have been a comment on suitability, although kind of an odd way to go at it

 

[vfotog]

can we see the image they didn't understand?

 

[KenC]

can we see the image they didn't understand?

 

[Derrel]

So, you're telling us the gallery peeps' response was sort of a flat affect, right?

 

[BananaRepublic]

To be honest when I saw it first I thought fake moon landing photo but I looked more got more from it. I think what the traveller said is true, maybe if the gallery had more of a higher brow then it might have got a better response.

 

[KenC]

maybe if the gallery had more of a higher brow then it might have got a better response.

Perhaps. I don't blame them because I think it came down to what they thought they could sell, and I anticipated this by offering something else if they didn't like it. Having said that, it still struck me as a weird way of communicating that, and I like to think they underestimate their market, but I'll see what it seems like when they open the show.

 

[sm4him]

Do you know what kind of stuff this non-profit gallery generally tends to include in their exhibits? Because the "what's this a picture of?" response seems to me like the classic non-artistic-view response. I tend to be very, very selective in what exhibits I even attempt to submit my abstract work to, because it does seem to take a very specific sort of gallery/exhibit to appreciate abstract work, especially in the photography genre. It's funny to me--a painter can slap up a bunch of seemingly unrelated colors and lines and such (and I'm using the term "slap up" for humor, not because that's what they are really doing) and a gallery won't blink twice, but give them an abstract photo and they just don't quite know what to make of it, literally.

I have a couple of abstracts I'm quite pleased with, and I'm bolstered by the fact that my sister-in-law, who is a Chief Preparator for a DC Art Gallery and a board member of the UGA Art School agrees that they are excellent. But the two or three times I've submitted them to shows or exhibits, they have not been chosen, and I'm certain it's because those particular judges just had the "what's it a picture OF" mentality.

 

[KenC]

Do you know what kind of stuff this non-profit gallery generally tends to include in their exhibits? Because the "what's this a picture of?" response seems to me like the classic non-artistic-view response. I tend to be very, very selective in what exhibits I even attempt to submit my abstract work to, because it does seem to take a very specific sort of gallery/exhibit to appreciate abstract work, especially in the photography genre. It's funny to me--a painter can slap up a bunch of seemingly unrelated colors and lines and such (and I'm using the term "slap up" for humor, not because that's what they are really doing) and a gallery won't blink twice, but give them an abstract photo and they just don't quite know what to make of it, literally.

I have a couple of abstracts I'm quite pleased with, and I'm bolstered by the fact that my sister-in-law, who is a Chief Preparator for a DC Art Gallery and a board member of the UGA Art School agrees that they are excellent. But the two or three times I've submitted them to shows or exhibits, they have not been chosen, and I'm certain it's because those particular judges just had the "what's it a picture OF" mentality.

I've had this reaction before, but it was from a camera club, almost certainly the worst place to show this sort of thing. One of my images showed parallel strips which were the only remnant of a sticker on a dark background, and one person doing "critique" there complained that she couldn't read what the sign said. Photographers elsewhere have said very nice things about some of the stuff I showed there.

This gallery shows mainly straightforward photography (portrait, landscape, still life of recognizable objects, etc.) and the most "abstract" I've seen there is nature close-ups (which is what I ended up giving them) and reflections in windows (maybe next time).

When I got this reaction from the camera club I felt like showing them some work by Aaron Siskind, who did abstract photos of signs and other markings on walls in the 40's and 50's, or some even older stuff and asking them where they've been the past 75-100 years.

 

[Derrel]

I dunno...I am still really diggin' the profile of the silhouetted, walking Continental Army soldier there in the lower right corner...and that small triangle! I LOVE that small triangular shape! Especially the way it plays off of the other triangular shapes.