Jazz Green : Artist Journal

Posts tagged ‘postcards’

rca secret exhibition 2011

November 16th, 2011

a short while back i spent an afternoon making some new postcard artworks for the rca secret exhibition 2011. i cannot, of course, show you any pictures of these new postcards because it is a secret art sale, but here are my secret art postcards from rca secret 2010.

rca secret art postcards - royal college of art

[rca secret postcards 2010, signed & dated on the back]

see more of my secret rca art postcards 2010, rca secret postcards from 2009 or some previous years’ rca secret postcards are here.

there will be around 3000 secret postcards in the rca secret exhibition at the royal college of art in london, which is open to the public from 18 november to 25 november 2011. the postcards will also be viewable on the rca secret website from 18 november, all in the run up to the big sale day on saturday 26 november 2011 (queues likely).

remember, to purchase any of the rca postcards (maximum four per person) you will first have to register as a buyer. monies raised from the rca secret sale benefit the royal college of art’s fine art student fund. lastly, some mention must be made of the excellent organisation & voluntary work that goes on behind the scenes to make this event so successful, many of whom are current fine are art students.

the rca secret exhibition has become a very popular annual art event in london, with thousands of people queuing to be in with a chance of obtaining an original artwork for just £45. some of this year’s big name contributors include: tracey emin, grayson perry, gerhard richter, anish kapoor and yoko ono.

i always find it troubling to discover some buyers go on to immediately sell their rca postcards on ebay for much more money – especially when the artists donate artworks for free to support an art college in the education of future artists.

i am waiting with much anticipation to view all the rca secret postcards online and try to guess who has made what. it has become something of a sport, and perhaps there is a skill in knowing what to look out for, armed with the knowledge of an artist’s likely subject or style of work. there are always some surprises, though. i would dearly love to visit the exhibition, but i think work commitments will preclude me from doing so this year.

for breaking news (top tips, faqs, artist interviews, media coverage, etc) on rca secret 2011 i highly recommend a visit to the unofficial rca secret blog…

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some secrets revealed

November 28th, 2010

these are the four small postcard paintings that i submitted to the recent rca secret exhibition at the royal college of art…

they were not signed on the front, nor do they have any titles…

other than the ubiquitous roman numerals…

untitled i, ii, iii and iv, 2010

if any environmental influence were needed for these four abstracts then maybe these four photographs might suffice to illustrate (i am now recycling some of my blog images since a quick delve into the image folder revealed over 1500 used on this blog so far!)


lake, early morning


winter field in fog


a long view of the fens


stubble field with frost

i received an email this week from someone who had bought one of my secret postcards at the aforementioned rca exhibition, which was nice – but i wonder who might have bought the others..? since the exhibition was a ’secret’ the works were displayed in a random order, so my postcards would not have been displayed together. you can view all 2800 postcards on the rca secret website, with the artists’ names now revealed. i’ve been having another browse through the secret archive…

who’d have guessed this was a genuine Grayson Perry?

[grayson perry, rca secret postcard, 2010]

i wonder which artist grayson perry could possibly be referring to, with the big, vaguely spiritual shiny sculpture..? hmm, could it be..? the room filled with people reading text panels made me chuckle, a rather laborious task which seems to be a prerequisite at any curated exhibition, because we must first know and then we can fully appreciate the art in context… and what of the never-heard-of artist in the isolated project space..? those sparsely occupied white cubicles where the art is often presented in the minimalist manner of a forensic investigation – collections of things in cabinets, suspended in space or more fugitive offerings on the floor, or perhaps a projected video playing on a loop – but it’ll be too dark to read the text panel… we have all been there…

perhaps this all hints at perry’s cynicism towards much contemporary art – that of spectacle and performance. grayson perry is a british artist whose work reveals (firstly in ceramics but more recently in textiles and printmaking) with a wry hogarthian eye, the cultural & social issues of our times. his work also graciously acknowledges many historical, narrative influences – one can see elements of european folk art, medieval paintings, classical greek, egyptian, chinese or japanese art. with a dash of dark comedy thrown into the creative pot he provides us with a thought-provoking visual commentary on contemporary life, from war to shopping.

i first saw his ceramic vases at the 2003 turner prize exhibition at tate britain and instantly knew he would win – and he did! he successfully married beautiful craftsmanship with thought-provoking and often shocking social narratives. i like that his ‘pots’ (as he still humbly calls them) bear the hallmarks of being handcrafted, ever so slightly irregular in the tradition of coiled pots – it seems unthinkable that he would use studio assistants, unlike the other brit artists of his generation. he still manages to assume the role of a roguish outsider and yet he is fast becoming something of national celebrity, in the mould of stephen fry or michael palin – entertaining and enlightening us in equal measure, but many are not happy that such ‘celebrities’ travel the world at our expense – but aren’t they missing the point? i think that perry is one of the most engaging & intelligent artists working in the uk.

[tracey emin, rca secret postcard, 2010]

tracey emin’s postcards were, in contrast and rather predictably so, showing emin’s scratchy poetic words and spontaneous doodlings, so much so that i thought they must be fakes, another artist or a student having a joke, in light of the recent news report of emin fakes for sale on ebay… emin thought the fakes were very poor quality and too ’sentimental’ to be ‘true’ emin’s – i guess she’s the best judge, but ’sentiment’ seems to be innate her style, the work often looking quite weak out of context…

emin is quite a contradiction in that she needs to ‘confess’ her feelings and yet derides the public response that it causes – does she want our pity, our love or just our respect? she comes across being very in control of her emotions and what they project (some might even say manipulative), but exhibiting just enough angst or vulnerability to be mildly intriguing. her best work is undoubtedly the appliquéd textile pieces, perhaps because they appear less sentimental, but with the so-called ‘drawings’ or monoprints i am left wondering just what the big secret is…

it is interesting to compare perry with emin – it’s no secret that both had troubled childhoods which has undoubtedly been a factor in their art, but it seems some artists create a ‘confessional’ type art as a method of personal psychoanalysis much better than others…

thinking about perry & emin also reminds me that it’s drawing close to the time when the current year’s turner prize winner will be revealed to the nation. the turner prize, if anyone needs reminding, is an annual art prize which is awarded to ‘a British artist under fifty for an outstanding exhibition or other presentation of their work in the twelve months preceding‘. in 1999 the shortlist included tracey emin, the exhibition featuring emin’s ‘my bed’ – a true mess of an installation which still ignites controversy in art circles. emin herself has since said she (or the work) was probably nominated to add a flurry of media interest. the remade ‘unmade bed’ definitely drew some attention, most spectacularly from a pair of chinese performance artists. emin didn’t win the prize that year, but the exhibition did inspire the alternative and rather ridiculous turnip prize (mentioned previously here), where any artwork can be entered so long as it’s rubbish… you can view some of the current turnip prize entries on their facebook page…

sometimes rubbish can be art, but that’s another story…

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on art and photography, regained

October 10th, 2010

photographic images rescued from a camera; hidden layers of digital data, memory extracted and reclaimed – digitally collaged fragments of erased photographs that were previously recorded (or found) then deleted (lost), now recovered again…

i obviously did not plan to create these actual compositions but i am their originator…

in this first digital composition there are three photographic images, of some naturally occurring lichens and two works in progress…

this composition also combines the surface elements of one of my paintings with yet another found abstract or painting, some rusty traces on a metal tank…

have you read about the minor discovery of the ivy drawings? nature’s means of making a mark on a surface – here montaged with a small glimpse of electricity lines (more drawing, or lines in space) and a snippet of surface rust – the black void of a small rectangle aptly completes the composition…

i am not sure why some of the rescued images were divided vertically, some lichens on stonework and more ivy found drawings…

the middle section is a close up of some paintings, the lower section is as before and the thin upper section is a detail of some wood texture…

these images are exactly as found or retrieved, i had no direct input (other than expressed above) – the compositions seem arbitrary according to the original data and the colours are at times quite skewed. now, there’s an idea; i can’t wait to see what will happen next… (please do not copy, reproduce, modify, distribute or otherwise use or reuse without the owner’s permission)…

these are images not just retrieved from layers of digital memory but are also intriguing montages of my observations, or reflections on the process of painting, my own visual experiences and memories collated & recollected in a new composite format if you will…

to quote proust: ‘ in fashioning a work of art we are by no means free, [...] we do not choose how we shall make it, it pre-exists us and therefore we are obliged, since it is both necessary and hidden, to do what we [must] do as if it were a law of nature, that is to say, to discover it.’

if art, or the work of being an artist, has no other defined purpose then it is first and foremost to bring into being a new discovery. these digital images, discovered by chance and yet actioned, reminded me that what makes the art is what makes us. these remind me that art, life & its experiences are ever-evolving, accumulating in many layers over time, and that art is still very much an essential, sensory need, even in a virtually giving world.

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this week i spent part of an afternoon creating some new postcard-sized artworks especially for the future rca secret 2010 exhibition. the rca secret is an annual exhibition of original art on postcards donated by the great and the good, invited international artists, current students, graduates & alumni of the royal college of art.

of course, i cannot show you any photographs of the postcards i have made as the artworks’ creators must remain a secret during the exhibition and the artist’s name is only revealed after purchase. however, i can show you some of my previous contributions to this annual event.


[rca secret 2004, mixed media collage on postcards]


[rca secret 2005, wax encaustic on postcards]


[rca secret 2006, acrylic & ink on postcards]

you can see last year’s rca secret postcards here, completed during a period of cloud watching and drawing, hence no abstraction…

all of the postcards in the 2010 rca secret exhibition will also be viewable online in the run up to the grand sale day in mid november although you will have to register to buy. the rca secret exhibition is attended by thousands of people hoping to obtain an original work of art for less than £50 with queues going around the block on the final sale day. monies raised go towards the royal college of art’s fine art fund…

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i will have a couple of small works in the cromer & sheringham arts festival (a good excuse to revisit the wonderful north norfolk coastline). the arts festival takes place between 23rd and 31st october 2010 at various art venues and will include music, theatre, dance, poetry, performance & the visual arts – i will plug this event again nearer the time.

i have been asked to put in some small works into a local exhibition, which will very much be filled to the rafters with contemporary art & craft, royal academy style, a month long view & buy event with extra work kept in backstock. also, i received in the mail an invite from a gallery that i have worked with in the past to submit work for an anniversary show in 2011.

i have also been working on an exhibition proposal, or rather the ideas for some new work for it; we’ll see, nothing ventured, nothing gained… other ideas are slowly percolating as usual, but i have become mindful of late that this blog is very much a reflective journal and not just a show & tell. sometimes i know i have said too much and perhaps should keep some of my thinking to myself. other times i see it as one side of a conversation; the artist talking. what do you think? are you appreciative of the insight into my own creative process or are you just looking for some inspiring how-to’s?

in a previous post i mentioned that my creative blocks, or rather the obstacles i create for myself, are the extra finances required to push forward new ideas – perhaps these limitations will be good but i fancifully thought that a little foray into ceramics or glass would be a natural development of my interest in surfaces & materials.

it seems that all of these little happenings will keep art matters ticking along for the foreseeable future, in the present circumstances…

[one thousand and ten words exactly; in honour of today's date...]

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