The days before hanging the exhibition were extremely stressful as even though I measured and sketched and conducted tests ahead of time, I felt unprepared because of all the other things I am working on simultaneously: the blog, the studio practice and the study statement. I knew my husband and I would not have anyone there to help us so the weight of hanging everything correctly and on time would be solely on us. We had our inlaws who came to help and that was really wonderful but we still ended up hanging everything from noon until 6pm and the final spotlights were being installed by my hjusband from a 5m ladder while the first guests who arrived early were walking around looking at the art. My husband wanted to give up with the spotlights but I persisted as I knew that was the most important thing: the church was supposed to be dark and the only illuminated pieces were supposed to be the fridge door collages and the paper lamps in the middle. The effect was actually quite stunning and the amount of people, who came up telling me how emotional it made them feel to look at the pieces and to listen to the music was astonishing. A lot of people commented on the level of professionalism when it came to the installation so it was amazing to realise that all that extremely hard work actually paid off. I was especially happy with the 6 fridge doors with black sketches of dancers, my piece from the May collaboration with mothers-dancers. I realised that the frames were the one aspect that truly turned them into “works of art”. I managed to sell one of them which is always a happy moment for me.
LESSON LEARNED: I want to keep developing these types of projects but in the future I feel I will need a team of people dedicated to installing the work as doing it by myself or with very little help from elderly parents is not going to work in the long term.
This morning I received an email:
Dear Olga, Jan and Colleagues,
We are huge Radiohead fans and saw your beautiful flyer for the show last night and managed to find ourselves a babysitter and were excited to attend.
We wanted to share what a wonderful evening you created. The artwork was moving and beautiful and the music blew us away. We have been listening to the danish sting quartet all morning!
It is lovely to be reminded of what beautiful things human can create when they work together.
We hope you do another event in Aldersbrook again!
Thank you so much.
Warm wishes,
Susie
