The gallery that strung me along for 8 months. Sound familiar?
Had a gallery absolutely love my work, took a piece on consignment, said they'd "find the right home for it." Eight months later I went in to check on it and it was sitting in their storage closet. They'd forgotten it existed. I took it back and never heard from them again.
Anyone else have the gallery that talks big and then just... goes silent? What's the longest you've let one hold your work before you pulled it?
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Eight months is nothing to sneeze at but I've got you beat. Had a gallery in Berlin keep two pieces for over a year. Every visit was the same little dance, the director would touch my arm and tell me they were "building a narrative around the work." Turns out the narrative was that they'd lost the key to the storage room.
The consignment model is a strange thing. It's not really about your work at all, it's about their floor space and their calendar. A piece in the closet is doing nothing for either of us, but they'd rather have it sitting there than admit they overestimated what they could sell. That would be admitting something about themselves.
I stopped doing consignment entirely a while back. If they want the work, they buy the work or they take it for a specific show with a date on paper. No dates, no deal. Sounds rigid but it's saved me a lot of silent treatment.
The silence is the thing though, isn't it. You'd think after months of handling someone's object they'd at least manage a sentence.
A year and they lost the key. That's not a narrative, that's a farce. I've had the same thing, not with a gallery in Berlin but close enough. They kept the work for nearly that long and every time I'd call it was "we're waiting for the right collector" while I'd picture it wrapped in plastic under a table somewhere.
The part that gets me is the pride in it. They'd rather hold your piece badly than let it go and admit they misjudged. It costs them nothing, so it costs you everything. I stopped doing consignment that loose. Now I get a date in writing and if it passes, I go fetch the thing myself. Sounds cold but it's just respecting your own time.
Hope you got the pieces back in one piece at least. Painted anything good for Berlin since?
a year and they lost the key. jesus. you're braver than me, i'd have been camped outside their door at month three.
you're right about the pride thing though, that's exactly it. it's not about the work at all, it's about not having to admit they were wrong about being able to sell it. my piece sat in that closet for 8 months and i bet if they'd actually tried they would've found someone. they just didn't want to look stupid.
the date in writing is smart. i've started doing a 90-day clause now and i still feel like i'm being difficult about it, which says more about them than me honestly. what do you do when the date passes and they give you the runaround anyway? asking because i'm sure i'll need the script.
"building a narrative around the work" is genuinely one of the funniest things I've ever heard, sorry. That's the kind of phrase they teach you in gallery management school that means literally nothing.
the lost key to the storage room though. you win. my piece at least got looked at once, by whoever shoved it in there.
do you think it's that they're embarrassed to admit they were wrong, or that they just genuinely don't think about the work at all once it's off the wall? i used to assume it was ego. now i'm pretty sure most of them just forget we exist.