On Wednesday I spent the day in Edinburgh with a group of colleagues discussing, amongst other issues, curating craft exhibitions.

Amongst all the doom and gloom of funding cuts and the difficulties of making exhibition happen in the current climate it is easy to lose sight of how important the curation of high quality craft exhibitions can and should be.

Lizzie Farey - Spirit of the Air (detail)

An exhibition can inspire, enthuse, teach and give pleasure but at another level it can change your way of thinking and move your own work on a new creative journey. And that is just for the audience!

For the maker, creating work for exhibition can give you the freedom to create new work within a framework – an exciting proposal that can free you from the constraints of the day to day of making and move your work onto a completely new level and direction.

You can gain respect from your peers, acknowledgment from the public and all this often leads onto new opportunities. One of the greatest pleasures is reading comments from people who are not friends or family and who have been moved to write about your exhibition in a positive way!

Our second year of Spotlight exhibitions will open on the 30th April 2011 and our four Making Progress makers are all planning and working away on their designs. Not only do they have to concentrate on new work but they also have to think about layout, the practical constrictions of the space, display, publicity, openings, invites and a hundred other things.

So often the public just think all this happens without too much effort; you spend 30 minutes looking round a show, think ‘that was great’ and walk away not realising how much blood, sweat and tears went into it all!

I had this brought back to me at the end of a wonderful and inspiring talk on Wednesday by Professor Lesley Millar about the exhibitions she had curated, often with Japan. See www.texturalspace.com.

Just seeing the list of funders and sponsors at the end made me sigh – all those months of funding applications, report writing and waiting with baited breath to see if your dream can happen. And then the joy of knowing it can go ahead and wondering what on earth you have taken on. And then the months and sometimes years of pulling it all together – you can only do this is you are truly passionate about your subject, anything less and you would give up!

Or the disappointment of going back to the drawing board and trying to think of other ways to raise funds and make it all happen and not giving up with the setbacks.

On my way home I had the real pleasure of finishing off my day by a visit to the City Art Centre and Lizzie Farey’s ‘Spirit of the Air’ exhibition. To see how she has moved her use of materials from basketmaking to wall and aerial sculptures is inspiring and moving. Drawing in air with willow has freed her from the constrains of closely woven structures and has moved her work in a really exciting direction.

The pleasure for the public is immense but for Lizzie on her creative journey it must be life changing. As all good exhibitions should be!

Pamela Conacher
18/02/11