Booking the Courtyard Gallery at Ballroom Arts early enough has allowed time to consider how we might arrange the display and what would it be useful to change or add to improve the exhibition.
The exhibition will be a joint affair with my partner Linda Mayoux who will be exhibiting photographs of the Shingle Street area together with several books that combine her photography and poetry. This seems to be a perfect way that we can both benefit from providing context for each others work and creates a theme that is relevant for the exhibition space.
After having long discussions about how to approach the arrangements and curation we have decided that the overall title for the exhibition would be simply:
SHINGLE
We would then each have a sub-title relevant to our work and these will no doubt evolve nearer the time, but by keeping the title simple it allows for a wider range of work to be included and also keeps the exhibition relevant for Aldeburgh as well as Shingle Street.
In terms of publicity material we currently plan to produce a joint poster/flyer and have individual items as well. The gallery provides an A2 size poster case outside the gallery and two A2 size posters may be displayed in A boards near the entrance. I will need to remember that they require the posters and publicity material one month before the exhibition date as they issue press releases to “our social media, and as listings in a range of online arts and events sites which currently include Arts Council News, a-n news, Art Rabbit, Aldeburgh Gazette, Waveney & Blyth Arts website, Visit England website. As part of BallroomArts overall promotion, at our discretion, we may include details of shows in regional and national press.”
Having a dimensioned plan of the gallery is a great help in working out what space is available and together with photographs I have taken at other exhibitions at the site it is possible to get a reasonable idea of how things will look.
The plan at present is that in the main gallery room we will have one of the long walls each together with each side of the window in the end wall. This allows us to each decide on how much space we have and what this will mean for selecting the artworks.
One consideration that arose during discussions with my tutor was the idea that it is useful to have some smaller pieces especially when selling artworks as this will provide a wider range of possibilities for purchase. With this in mind and having been looking at the work of artists such as Helen Thomas, I have decided to create a series of smaller paintings (30 x 30 cm) that will still fit with the theme of ‘Shingle’ and are still relevant to the area including Aldeburgh.
The gallery also provides a range of plinths suitable for sculptures etc. and my plan is to use these to display the stones and shells that were used as the basis for my paintings giving a visual link between the physical and the abstract. We are also considering having a range of mounted prints of Linda’s work in a print rack and a selection of cards and/or postcards.