President's Message July 2009

The fire at Manningham Gallery has been a disaster for those participating in the Annual Exhibition, after many hours of hard work by Marija, Bronwyn, and Gillian in planning and setting it up, and a great start. The exhibition had opened in a party atmosphere; the exhibits looked to be good standard, well laid out, beautifully lit, and with a great sound from the band, thanks to Rod. The hall was full of people as an opening night should be – really buzzing. Now the closure of the council complex has sadly limited sales to John Bishop (2) and Meredith Plain. Well done by those two in surmounting trials by fire and financial recession. The council is now arranging cleaning of exhibition sculptures by professional art specialists. Patrick Culshaw on behalf of the Exhibition Sub-Committee is liaising with the council curator, and exhibitors, and any enquiries should be sent to him.

I heard Edward Albee, playwright (“Who’s afraid of Virginia Wolf”) and three times Pulitzer prize winner, recently discuss his 30+ works and approach to art (Radio National Artworks 12 July 2009). It seemed to me that some of the pearls cast over the air waves had a wider impact, and are maybe relevant to the art of sculpture:
• Has it been done well, and was it worth doing?
• Reading really bad plays is enormously encouraging.
• I (Albee) write plays to make people different. All art to be any good must be useful. It is not enough to be decorative. Art must be useful. It must change our perceptions. That is the function of art.

I wonder how many of us would agree. It might be interesting to have a discussion on what each of us aims to do in our sculpture.

The AGM looks to be full of boring business stuff so we are going to try to have a social for those brave enough to attend. Do come and let your hair down in frank discussion, including where we are going, and where we are not going. Please note the date is Wednesday August 12 at 7.30 pm. We missed an error on the Agenda showing a date of August 18: that is incorrect. Our apologies for that.

Geoff Williams