Creativity in the Year of the Snake

Boosting Your Creativity in the Year of the Snake

Two cow sculptures from an art installation by Liz Leyh.
Photo by S. Raymond.

Making art is never about the equipment, it is always about the artist. 

Without intention and action there is nothing. 

A New Hope

As the 2025 Year of the Snake is associated with the Wood element, it symbolises a return to creativity, growth, and renewal. Yet, many of us are on a limited budget after funding cuts and 'cost of living' savings, so how do we move forward again?

As artists, we are frequently buying better equipment, going on courses for new techniques, having to buy tickets to exhibitions.* All of that is valuable to update our skills, or when old equipment needs replacing. Yet, none of this is an act of creation. We often don't always need to use something expensive to create great work. 

Consider this: Liz Leyh's cow sculptures (and a replica by Bill Billings) were made with concrete and chicken wire, as part of a community art project. They became a symbol of the new city of Milton Keynes (see photo above). Would they have made as much of an impact if they'd been made in bronze or marble?

Artists Are Natural Hoarders

Many arts and crafts people have a studio space, spare room, a shed, or even just a cupboard, full of art equipment they aren't using. Added to which, we often store our old work there too, as an archive or until we exhibit or sell it. 

For example, last year a friend 3D printed a mini press, by the Open Press Project, as a birthday gift for me. I was delighted and would have liked to try it straight away. However, last year was quite chaotic on a personal level, so I eventually put it aside, unused, into a drawer. 

Recycle, Reuse, Reduce 

There are alternatives though. The 'Recycle, Reuse, Reduce' approach to life can also apply to our arts practice. It's also helpful when funds are low. So here's a quick list of ideas for how we can all make more from less in the year of the Snake. 

- Reuse your old print art and magazines - print works can be printed or painted over, used in collage, or in craft projects such as as book covers, or to make cards

- Many b/w photographs or prints can be transferred to other surfaces, to be painted over or made into print blocks

- Photographers: join a 'shitty camera challenge' and reuse your old cameras that have seen better days

- Recycle your old art materials and magazines by offering them to your local art clubs and community services. Libraries and charity shops will accept books and magazines in good condition. Charities that offer art therapy may accept materials, as may children's play groups. 

- Give your old art to your friends, family, or a library. Now it's both a gift and also someone else's problem to store or display. Tell them "it'll be worth a fortune in the future", which may even be true! The central library was loaned paintings by internationally-exhibited contemporary artists Boyd & Evans, which made it more accessible for many as well as helping the artists free up some workspace. 

- Get inspired by the Arte Povera movement - making great art out of unconventional materials 


What do you think of these art tips - do any resonate for you?


* HMRC self-employment expenses

A 2023 Review (Madeleine memories)

Memories Are Made Of This

The year 2023 had a quite gloomy start for the art scene. The coldest Winter for several years, combined with a 'cost of living crisis', and ACE funding slashed for many UK arts organisations, left the arts community feeling quite bruised.

Promotional image for the madeleine zine, with a list of contributors (including myself)

My initial sense of artistic salvation came via Mastodon, the Fediverse micro blogging service that I joined last year (see previous post). On this site, I discovered a lively arts and writing community. The latter led me to re-start reading a book that had been lying idle on my shelves, called The Artists Way. Whilst this book isn't really about contemporary art, it is all about turning on the creativity tap and restarting the flow of creative output. When I found a few writers talking about it online, I decided to give the process another go. This led me to try out the 'morning pages' exercises, to get my creativity restarted. 

My aim was to create more artwork but I soon spotted a writing opportunity that was just up my street. It was to write a short piece for a one-off zine on the topic of memories and comics, which was also fundraising for dementia support. I loved my experience of comics fandom many years ago, when I was actively part of it, and the fundraising aspect tied in with my experience of having become a carer for a parent with dementia.

There's more I could write about that but, to keep my piece simple, I started at the point where two UK fandom subcultures first overlapped in my life. That ended up being about 900 words about the way the science fiction and comics communities were interlinked and how that was important to my memories of the comics boom of the 90's. As a bonus, I found myself listed with several comics creators I admire, including Paul B. Rainey - a Milton Keynes comics artist who took a trajectory to fame in 2023, after his dystopian domestic drama proved a hit with reviewers. 

The zine project, called 'madeleine' (a reference to Proust's madeleine memory), was a project led and designed by Simon Russell, an artist/designer posting on Mastodon and Instagram. As well as rounding up 28 writers*, Simon created a successful funding campaign on Kickstarter, which found 108 backers. With Simon in charge of the editing and design, eventually the zine project turned into a small, smart-looking book. After deducting printing and postage costs, Simon was able to donate £411.19 to Alzheimer's Research UK. 

My personal 2023 domestic drama was an experience of recovering from burnout. More about that in the next post. 

Click here for more about the Kickstarter madeleine zine project.

* Madeleine was made by Brad Brooks: Nick Bryan: Dan Butcher: Dan Charnley: Lee Christien: Ben Clark; Eamonn Clarke; David Cranna; Oliver East; Hannah Eaton; Shari Emerson; Tony Esmond; Martin Feekins; Sam Hardacre; Alan Henderson; Nic Ho Chee; Paul Hudson; ILYA; Guy Lawley; Iestyn Pettigrew; Alan Purdie; Paul B. Rainey; Suzanna Raymond; Simon Russell; Jon Sapsed; Dez Skinn; Giovanni Spinella; Myfanwy Tristram.
* The book has been edited, designed and illustrated by Simon Russell

Ten top tips for ACE funding

Fundraising skills are in demand at charities and arts organizations.

Introduction

In June 2015, Milton Keynes Council and Arts Council England got together to host a free event which aimed to provide “advice on developing successful funding applications“.

Top Ten Tips for Arts Council Funding (2015)

1. Council Resources – Local Council arts development officers may have experience of arts properties, arts strategy, development and monitoring grants, making them an important source of local help. 
2. Creating Your Project – Aim to explain your project on one side of A4, in a jargon-free way. Identifying opportunities to collaborate with other groups and projects in England gets you extra brownie points.
3. Do Your Research – Get information on what’s happening in your field of interest locally and nationally.
4. Needs Assessment - Look for an identified need for your arts project in your local area. This information may come from a local funding organisation’s report, the council’s arts & heritage strategy or from looking through ACE papers and research (e.g. the latest Arts Council Plan in the Advice & Guidance section of their website).
5. Funding – Build in other sources of funding, such as ticket sales and donations. An ACE grant alone will not cover all your costs and you’ll be expected to show 10% match funding (which may be ‘in kind’ offers of space, for example). Other grant funders may require individual artists to work with an organisation, so look for partners to put in partnership bids.
6. Partners – Aim to do work that is mutually beneficial, e.g. running workshops for the host organisation and sharing expertise.
7. Timescale – Project managing your time is very important. Allow 3 to 6 months to bring in the funding. Your event timescale should include all elements of your project, such as workshops and time to report back to your funder, rather than just the final outcome.
8. Artistic Quality – ACE are looking for quality in your arts projects, which is determined by:  a) relevant artistic work, experience and achievement; b) who is involved and the quality of mentors and arts supports. Your executive summary should be about 100 words and is best written like the conclusion to an essay. 
9. Public Engagement – It’s important to explain the Who and the How of audience engagement. You also need to think about how you will measure the success of your events and define your target audience. These are all metrics that will also come in handy for marketing and reporting on your event. 
10. Your Research and Development events can provide data for future funded events, so keep records of attendance and results throughout. Again, this can be fed into your marketing strategy.

Notes

Check for updates to funding criteria on ‘Grants For the Arts’ on the Arts Council England website.

http://www.artscouncil.org.uk/funding/ 

A longer version of this article with more resource links can be found at Arts Development Funding 2015

Does anything need updating in this article? Let me know below or via my social media.

Arts Development Funding (2015)

Arts Development Slide

In my previous post, I was considering the skills that an artist needed to learn to operate in a way that was akin to a small business. I have mulled over this point and come to the conclusion that if we were to ask ‘Does an artist need to operate like a small business?’, the answer could be ‘Yes’, ‘No’ or ‘Maybe’.

In short, it all depends on how an emerging Fine Art artist wishes to make their living. Here are the options I've noted so far:

1. If you’d asked your tutors you may have been told, as I was, to get a full-time job and make your art in the evenings and weekends. As a degree student I was disappointed by that suggestion. It seemed to reduce our graduate efforts to the same level as a self-taught artist (and some of those are excellent), effectively making the degree merely three years of negotiating how to obtain a piece of paper with the university’s crest on it. However, some thinking suggests that getting a really dull job will leave your mind to be fully creative in your time off, without the worry of how you’ll pay the bills. 
2. If you've observed graduates working in arts admin and gallery jobs, you’d have seen the concept of portfolio working in action,  a strategy which requires you to fit your art projects around various part-time arts jobs. Working for arts bodies suggests that you’d be making valuable contacts all the while but you may risk get pigeon-holed as a technician or education officer, rather than as a practicing artist.
3. It seems to me that this leaves one other option, supposing you haven’t got a trust fund, an agent/manager, patron or a relative with deep pockets. That option is to make your own opportunities including looking for your own funding.  That may be a necessity anyway even if, as the Guerrilla Girls [1] might have put it, you have escaped the art world with your four free-lance jobs, since your income may still not stretch to a studio of your own and related expenses. So, the way I see it, once you start getting into the habit of organising your own events, promoting, selling and funding your own work, you effectively need the same skills as any other small business person.

Arts and Culture Development Day (June 2015)

In early June, Milton Keynes Council arranged for an ‘Arts and Culture Development Day’ with Arts Council England [2]. There had been a similar event last year but this time the format was different, apparently because Milton Keynes arts grant funding applications had been less successful than usual, which was a concern for ACE and the MK Council arts team.

This was a free event “For artists, arts organisations and those who use the arts in their work. Come and join us for talks, advice and discussion on the development of arts and culture in Milton Keynes. The event will include advice on developing successful funding applications as well as a chance to hear more (and have your say!) on arts and culture opportunities in Milton Keynes. “

As usual I made lengthy notes but I’ll stick to the key points in this post. Lucy Bedford* has also allowed me to share the event slides, which I have put in the cloud here. [3]

Key points from my notes:

• Council resources - Lucy Bedford*, in MK council's arts and heritage team, now has 10 years of experience of arts properties, arts strategy, development and monitoring grants, so she’s an important source of local help. Likewise, if you’re outside MK then it’ll be worth checking what arts officers may be able to offer at your local council.
• Creating Your Project – Aim to explain your project on one side of A4, in a jargon-free way. Identifying opportunities to collaborate with other groups and projects in England gets you extra brownie points.
• Do Your Research – Get information on what’s happening in your field of interest locally and nationally.
• Needs Assessment - Look for an identified need for your arts project in your local area. This information may come from a local funding organisation’s report, the council’s arts & heritage strategy or from looking through ACE papers and research (e.g. the latest Arts Council Plan in the Advice & Guidance section of their website).
• Funding – Build in other sources of funding, such as ticket sales and donations, as an ACE grant alone will not cover all your costs and you’ll be expected to show 10% match funding (which may be ‘in kind’ offers of space for example). Other grant funders may require individual artists to work with an organisation, so look for partners to put in partnership bids.
• Partners – Aim to do work that is mutually beneficial, e.g. running workshops for the host organisation and sharing expertise.
• Timescale – Project managing your time is very important. Allow 3 to 6 months to bring in the funding. Your event timescale should include workshops and other events in your project, such as reporting back to your funder, rather than just the final outcome.
• Artistic Quality – ACE are looking for this quality in your arts projects. ACE need to know a) about relevant artistic work, experience and achievement; b) who’s involved and the quality of mentors and arts supports. Your executive summary should be about 100 words and is best written like the conclusion to an essay.
• Public Engagement – Who will engage with your activity, how will they engage, how will you measure it and who is your target audience? Note that any research and development events you run can provide data for future funded events, so keep records of results throughout.

Footnotes

[1] The Guerrilla Girls – conscience of the art world
http://www.guerrillagirls.com/posters/advantages.shtml
http://www.guerrillagirls.com/info/owa/owa.shtml
[2] Arts Council England – Funding
http://www.artscouncil.org.uk/funding/
http://www.artscouncil.org.uk/advice-and-guidance/browse-advice-and-guidance/great-art-and-culture-everyone
[3] MK Council slides from the Arts and Culture Development Day

What an Emerging Artist Does All Day

Shelfie - for World Books Day, 2015

Now, you may wonder why there's a big gap since my last post and that's because I have recently started to explore the murky work of funding.

As an artist, I have had to get to grips with the thorny issue of having a more defined attitude to selling work, rather than just hoping some exhibition visitor will make enquiries. To this end I have been attending a series of workshops run at the NN Contemporary gallery in Northampton. Over three workshops Tracey Clarke, a business development bod for the Crafts Council and NN, has been gently guiding us through the steps we can take to lead us From Art to Commerce.

With the exception of a couple of professional artists who had lost their direction in their practice, most of the attendees had mainly sold via friends or family. What we lacked was a plan as to how to create sustainable incomes.

There is no quick fix, as we found. As artists we need to research our field and be more business-like as well as have the courage to continue perusing our creative paths. After the February workshop I had several things on my to-do list, one of which was to update my blog, so here we are.

As for my bookshelf, that now contains books on funding and business as well as art, not as a result of the workshop but rather due to a part-time job for a charity, which I started at the end of last year. Although charities seem to be largely interested in grant applications and government-led funding, sometimes you just have to bite the bullet and just ask people directly to help your cause. Active fundraising, research and marketing go hand in hand, as Tracey pointed out to all us emerging artists in the workshop. Dealing with funding issues for a charity has certainly helped me think more carefully about how you ask people for money and I aim to have fine-tuned that skill by the end of this year. 

Let me know what you think about arts funding. Is it getting better where you are?

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