What's the weirdest thing a gallery ever asked you to change? Mine wanted my hare to look "happier"
Right, I'll go first because I'm still not over it.
Years back I had a small gallery take a run of my linocuts, the hare ones, the big black one mid-leap. Grand, delighted with myself entirely. Then the woman rings me up a week before the show and asks, very gently, would I consider giving the hare "a bit more of a smile about him." Said he looked fierce. He's a hare. He's supposed to look like he's about to fight you.
I said no, obviously, and she hung up fairly sharpish. Still sold three of them on the night so who's laughing.
But it got me thinking about all the small asks people get handed. Not the big obvious ones like the 40% or the "would you mind paying to hang." The wee ones. The "could you make it a bit smaller," the "any chance of a brighter one, it's for a hallway," the "the customer wants it in blue."
So what's the strangest thing a gallery has asked you to change? Not the worst, the oddest. The one where you stood there going, sorry, what now.
Tell me yours. I want to feel less alone in this.
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A gallery once asked me to swap the smalti in a piece for something "less expensive looking," because the client coming in wanted to feel like they were discovering something. I said the gold is the whole point, that's the piece. Same as your hare. You can't put a smile on something that's meant to be fierce, and you definitely can't swap out the reason the thing works.
Respect for holding the line. And yes, three sold, so the woman's taste was worth exactly what you paid for it.
The smalti one is the part that gets me. Gold in a mosaic is doing actual work, it moves with the light and the whole surface reads differently from every angle. Swap it for something that "looks less expensive" and you haven't made a discreet version, you've made a dull one. Though I'll admit I've been on the other side of this once, a small place asked me to take the scaffolding off a facade sketch so it would look "timeless." I did it, and the drawing went dead in my hands. Never again. Some things are the piece, na.
Ah now, the scaffolding. You did it though, that's the thing, and that's how you learn it. I did the same kind of thing years ago with a heron print, fella wanted the reeds taken out because they were "a bit busy." Took them out, pulled a proof, and the poor bird was just sat there in a void like he was waiting for a bus. Put the reeds back in that night feeling like a right eejit.
But you're spot on about the smalti. Gold isn't decoration doing a lap of honour, it's the whole reason the surface breathes. Take it out and you've not made a quieter piece, you've made a dead one. Same as my reeds. Some things aren't the trimming, they're the load-bearing wall.
The line that's stuck with me from all this is that she wasn't looking at the hare at all, she was looking at the wall it'd hang on. Never thought of it that way before and now I can't unthink it.
The smalti one has me howling. Swap out the gold for something "less expensive looking" so the client can feel like they're discovering something. Discovering what, that you've a cheaper version of the same yoke? That's not discovery, that's a fella at a car boot sale telling you the knockoff is the real find.
And you're dead right, the gold is the piece, that's the whole argument of it. Take it out and you've a nice tidy nothing. Same as my man above. The fierce is the point. You sand that off and you've a hare that looks like it's waiting for a bus.
Fair play for holding. How'd it land, did they come round or did you walk?