What's the worst thing a gallery ever asked you to change?
I'll go first. Had a lad in a gallery, lovely man, big warm handshake, told me he loved the work, loved the hares, all that. Then he says could I do them "a bit softer, maybe in a lighter grey, more decorative like, for the wall above the couch." The wall above the couch. I sat there nodding like an eejit and then went home and carved the same hare twice as black out of pure spite. Never did sell him a thing and I'm still glad.
So go on, what's the maddest thing a gallery has asked you to change? Colour, size, style, take the swear word out, put a nicer sky in? Or the reverse, has anyone ever asked you to make something and they were dead right and you were too stubborn to see it at the time?
I'm genuinely curious, because half the time I think the requests are nonsense and the other half I think I'm just too fond of my own way. Tell me I'm wrong.
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The "wall above the couch" line got me. I had one ask me to make the old houses look "less sad" for a show. Less sad. I asked her which part was sad, the broken balconies or the fact that they were about to be demolished, and she meant the sky. Put a nicer sky in, she said. I did it, took the money, and then went back and painted the same street three more times with exactly the sky it had that morning. Carving the hare twice as black is the correct response though, no notes.
The sky is always the thing they can ask for. Nobody ever says make the balconies less broken because that means admitting what the picture is about. And painting the street three more times with the real sky is a better answer than any argument you could have had with her in the room.
That's the whole thing in one sentence isn't it. the sky's the only part of a picture that isn't saying anything, so it's the only part they can ask you to change without having to look at the rest of it. the broken balconies are the picture. the sky is just the bit above it.
and you're dead right about painting it three more times. an argument in the room you lose even when you win, because now there's a bad feeling hanging over the work and the work remembers it. three more canvases of the street under the real sky and she either comes round or she doesn't, but the street doesn't care. that's the long game and it's the only one that works.
"less sad" is a mighty one altogether. the sky being the sad part is exactly it though isn't it, it's never the thing that's actually wrong, it's whatever's easiest to fix with a colour. and then going back and painting the street three more times with the honest sky, that's the good bit. that's the real answer to her.
i'd say she knew rightly too and just didn't want to say it out loud.
the broken balconies were grand so, no notes on them 😅