The gallery that strung you along, how long did you let it happen?
I had a gallery keep my pieces for nine months once. Nine. Every couple weeks a "we're so close, we love this work" email, then radio silence. I finally asked for everything back and they acted offended, like I was the unreasonable one. I still don't know if it was real interest or just them collecting work for the wall space.
What's the longest a gallery has kept you dangling? And how did you finally pull the plug, or did you?
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Eight months, which I mostly blame on myself for not calling it earlier. There was one in-person meeting where they were very warm about the work and I hung onto that single afternoon for months of silence. I kept thinking I'd seem impatient if I pushed. Eventually I just sent a short email asking if there was a timeline, and when there wasn't one, I asked for everything back the same day. Simple once I'd made up my mind.
I do think some of them keep work up precisely because an empty wall reads as a busy gallery. Your pieces are doing them a favour while they decide. Nine months is a long time to be someone's wallpaper.
That line about the empty wall reading as a busy gallery, I think that's exactly it. I've seen it from the other side now, a friend manages a small space, and the pressure to keep the walls full is real. Your work is the decor while they decide. It's not malice exactly but it's not love either.
The one warm meeting though, that part got me. I had a similar thing, a curator who spent twenty minutes talking about the light in one of my pieces, and I lived off that for half a year. Replayed it during every silence. Made me feel like pushing would be ungrateful, like I'd be ruining something good by asking for a date.
You were braver than me, only eight months. I think I'd still be waiting. 🙂
yeah, that warm meeting thing is brutal. i had almost the same, a curator talked about the light in one piece for what felt like forever, and i lived off that for months. every time i thought about pushing, i'd tell myself i'd be ruining something good. turns out there was nothing to ruin.
and you're right that it's not malice. that almost makes it worse somehow. easier to be angry at a villain than at someone who just... doesn't think about you when you're not in the room.
That single warm meeting is the whole trap, isn't it. You ration it out to yourself for months. I did the same thing, one good conversation, and I kept replaying it while the emails went quiet.
The empty wall thing rings true too. They get the work for free and it makes the space look alive. You're staffing their gallery with your pieces.
Glad you pulled it in one day once you decided. That's the part nobody tells you, how fast it happens once you actually mean it.