Diary of a Gallery Girl
Subject: Off the record
Date: Friday, Nov 7, 2008 10:10
From: gallerygirl@artreview.com
To: office@artreview.com
"We're all just feeling so terribly nostalgic", gushes my new boss to the museum's director of exhibitions, waving her glass of champagne dangerously close to the photographs she’s referring to. The exhibitions director visibly flinches, and no wonder – even though my glamorous new boss, head of an art foundation for 'site-specific happenings and situations' (their words), has obviously had some very expensive work done to her pretty little nose, she can't be more than a day over 40, and yet the mainstay of the beautifully composed shots of the former Eastern Bloc surrounding her are circa 1930.
Day 17 in my new job and I'm still finding my feet, as well as asserting myself among the company at large to ensure I stick to work one would imagine suitable to my new job title. This should not include searching department stores high and low for a scented dog brush (no further explanations will be given, so please don't block artreview.com with queries) nor spending an interminable amount of time at a printers trying to explain exactly how a dinner invitation must be folded and inserted into an envelope, all the while wearing what I hope to be an expression that explains these are not personal requirements. I have however started work on reordering the foundation's entire library, ensuring they have at least one copy of their own books as well as weeding out some of the seemingly unnecessary numbers, as my official new role is in publications.
The foundation puts on big-cheese projects in cities throughout Europe and the US, pulling strings left, right and centre for permission to fill disused cinemas with foam, project artists’ films onto skyscrapers and city landmarks, and organise for dance troupes to perform on working railroad bridges. Impressive amounts of government cash and fat-cat donations are raised to support the independent programme run by the 25 women working at the foundation. To quote Miss Marple, the women are like a British village, a perfect microcosm of society, with a series of different agendas for being there. There is the similar sort of divide you find in any number of galleries, between those earning a living (that is, working in a job they like which also just about pays the rent) and those living an earning (in search of purposeful activity, no funds for rent required).
Everyone at the foundation is devoted to the boss, K., who gives the entire place its atmosphere – she's at once incredible and terrifying. A typical whippet-thin redhead (with, I'm convinced, hair extensions), she disarms men and women alike, charming her way into getting by-laws changed, wangling the use of auction houses free of charge for fundraisers and persuading difficult big-name artists to alter what they actually want to do to fit with a commission. She completely seduced me during my interview, to the extent that when I left I found myself canvassing for the foundation to friends rather than discussing how I had fared answering the questions fired at me and persuading them of my dedication to making projects eternal through the production of catalogues.
K. is also the most direct person I've ever met, which after three and a half years in London is suddenly a bit hard to take – I'd become more accustomed to the British inability to mention (shhh) money, than I'd realised. On this particular evening, I've been selected to attend a gala dinner with K. for "introductions, daaaaarling"; I can only assume it's to see how I fare in such rarefied society, though given the look that was shot at my sweatshirt dress and boots on arrival, I fear I've already stumbled. Money in London gives you a certain status in the artworld, though heaven forbid somebody should be so vulgar as to mention it (other than when you're out of the room); what is discussed in money’s place is 'integrity'. In New York money is discussed as freely as the weather or a bad exhibition review, and possibly more so as we slide into the grip of a new recession. I clutch my glass of champagne, adjust my high-street dress and flash a smile to rival my new boss's.
See this article with full illustrations, plus the entire December issue of ArtReview magazine free on your screen, here.
Date: Friday, Nov 7, 2008 10:10
From: gallerygirl@artreview.com
To: office@artreview.com
"We're all just feeling so terribly nostalgic", gushes my new boss to the museum's director of exhibitions, waving her glass of champagne dangerously close to the photographs she’s referring to. The exhibitions director visibly flinches, and no wonder – even though my glamorous new boss, head of an art foundation for 'site-specific happenings and situations' (their words), has obviously had some very expensive work done to her pretty little nose, she can't be more than a day over 40, and yet the mainstay of the beautifully composed shots of the former Eastern Bloc surrounding her are circa 1930.
Day 17 in my new job and I'm still finding my feet, as well as asserting myself among the company at large to ensure I stick to work one would imagine suitable to my new job title. This should not include searching department stores high and low for a scented dog brush (no further explanations will be given, so please don't block artreview.com with queries) nor spending an interminable amount of time at a printers trying to explain exactly how a dinner invitation must be folded and inserted into an envelope, all the while wearing what I hope to be an expression that explains these are not personal requirements. I have however started work on reordering the foundation's entire library, ensuring they have at least one copy of their own books as well as weeding out some of the seemingly unnecessary numbers, as my official new role is in publications.
The foundation puts on big-cheese projects in cities throughout Europe and the US, pulling strings left, right and centre for permission to fill disused cinemas with foam, project artists’ films onto skyscrapers and city landmarks, and organise for dance troupes to perform on working railroad bridges. Impressive amounts of government cash and fat-cat donations are raised to support the independent programme run by the 25 women working at the foundation. To quote Miss Marple, the women are like a British village, a perfect microcosm of society, with a series of different agendas for being there. There is the similar sort of divide you find in any number of galleries, between those earning a living (that is, working in a job they like which also just about pays the rent) and those living an earning (in search of purposeful activity, no funds for rent required).
Everyone at the foundation is devoted to the boss, K., who gives the entire place its atmosphere – she's at once incredible and terrifying. A typical whippet-thin redhead (with, I'm convinced, hair extensions), she disarms men and women alike, charming her way into getting by-laws changed, wangling the use of auction houses free of charge for fundraisers and persuading difficult big-name artists to alter what they actually want to do to fit with a commission. She completely seduced me during my interview, to the extent that when I left I found myself canvassing for the foundation to friends rather than discussing how I had fared answering the questions fired at me and persuading them of my dedication to making projects eternal through the production of catalogues.
K. is also the most direct person I've ever met, which after three and a half years in London is suddenly a bit hard to take – I'd become more accustomed to the British inability to mention (shhh) money, than I'd realised. On this particular evening, I've been selected to attend a gala dinner with K. for "introductions, daaaaarling"; I can only assume it's to see how I fare in such rarefied society, though given the look that was shot at my sweatshirt dress and boots on arrival, I fear I've already stumbled. Money in London gives you a certain status in the artworld, though heaven forbid somebody should be so vulgar as to mention it (other than when you're out of the room); what is discussed in money’s place is 'integrity'. In New York money is discussed as freely as the weather or a bad exhibition review, and possibly more so as we slide into the grip of a new recession. I clutch my glass of champagne, adjust my high-street dress and flash a smile to rival my new boss's.
See this article with full illustrations, plus the entire December issue of ArtReview magazine free on your screen, here.
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