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Published: June 19th 2011
Very slow to get this entered. The internet connection has been so weak at Sanbao that each time I try to enter photos the blog system times it self out and I lose everything. I have been trying for a week. I finally found I can only download four photographs at a time and wait for them to attach. It has been a long and arduous process but I think it is ready. Here it goes!!!!
Sunday, June 5th I hired Qishifu, the local taxi driver, to help me bring my work to the Jingdezhen International Academy of Ceramics gallery. At the end of last summer I brought all my work to be stored in an upstairs room in Qishifu’s home. For a $50 fee he safely kept my work in an unused room on his second floor. Now it is time to move it all to the gallery and select which pieces to set up. I decided to bring everything there and then edit out as needed. The gallery is quite large and I have the option of using as much space as I wish for my show.
Our English-speaking bartender at Sanbao was to help me bring
work to the gallery but had a conflict so arranges for her friend Elaina to help in her place. She meets me at Qishifu’s home and we load his vehicle. Having so many boxes and large pieces the floor quickly fills. Qishifu wants to keep loading and stacking work on top of each other. I quickly say no…no…no! We brought two pieces to Sanbao a couple days ago and I lost one piece when a box fell from his van. The road into town is again awful after the major flooding in Jingdezhen the summer before. The city had just repaved the road and taxi drivers had no issues with taking us out to Sanbao at the beginning of last summer. With three days of flooding the road had been ripped up, bridges out as well as some homes washed away. After a few quick fix there are major potholes, many covered with water from the current rain. I was imagining how many pieces would not survive the four-kilometer ride into town on this road. I convinced Qishifu to make two trips………and go SLOW!
We get to the gallery with the first load and unload the van. Qishifu returns
to his home to get the remaining boxes and pieces while I work with the gallery people, Elaina and my friend Jiang Liqiang to unwrap. When I bubble wrapped and stored work at Qishifu’s home last summer I was in a major time crunch so did not mark the boxes or bubble wrapped pieces with titles or descriptions so I had no idea what was in any box. I knew I had some old pieces from three and four years ago I had kept for reference and quickly weeded these out. I decided the only part of the gallery I wished to use was the front two-thirds because it had the best lighting. By that I mean the back third and another room behind had only spot lighting that made the room feel very dark. I also wanted the presence of the front part of the gallery to draw people in with the work. They had pedestals set up showing other work but were lined up in a very orderly fashion but also an odd mix of sizes and kinds. For the first day I decided to just unwrap and look at the work, place in on existing pedestals, take
a couple photographs and leave as is. Qishifu returned with the second load and again I was so pleased with the productivity of summer 2010 due to Gu Jia’s help in the studio at Sanbao. I had so much work to choose from. I sat down with Yu Guong jun, the gallery director, and Liqiang to discuss some gallery terms. They will produce posters to hang around town advertising the exhibition, contact the press and provide refreshments at the opening. In exchange they take 50% of any sales. If no sales they ask me to give them two pieces of my choice. I am not sure of the standards of Chinese galleries but Liqiang says this is common.
Monday, June 6th I returned the next day with fresh eyes. Yu Guong jun unfortunately does not speak any English so I constantly need to work through an interpreter. I had gone to town that morning with other artists from Sanbao to the glaze shop, back and ate la mein for lunch. I invited everyone to the gallery to give advice. The first thing I needed to change was taking some plants out of the main exhibition area. I love my
work around living plants but after reviewing the photographs I found them to block all sightlines and even hide the work in some instances. I also did not like the glass top pedestal with lighting inside. The stoneware sculpture did not look good on them at all and the porcelain pieces had interesting backlighting but did little for the work. We asked that all those glass top pedestals be removed and white wooden ones be brought in for consistency. The gallery crew found pedestals through out the gallery and brought what I needed. Janet Williams (Charlotte, NC), Joyce Nagata (Philadelphia area) and Echo were of great assistance in helping me make groupings and start placing work together. Echo was my voice to the gallery. She is Chinese and goes to school in Vancouver. I kept trying to ask for help from the gallery people as far as design, direction and opinion with little response. Being a new gallery my opinion now is that they actually do not really know much about displaying a show. Later that night Echo reinforced this by saying they wanted to learn from me. We found pedestals of different heights and made arrangements as best we
could in the space. It would have been preferable to use the full length to let pieces breathe more, but what we came up with for a second day was okay. I told the gallery I would be back again tomorrow or the next day. Since the opening is not until Friday, I have time to change as needed.
Wednesday, June 8th I returned to view the set up again. I had a ceramic table removed from in front of their reception desk to open up a space before my work began. Was trying to discuss prices but did not have any language help this day. I knew my friend Xiaowen was arriving this evening and could help me the next day.
Thursday, June 9th I did return this morning with Xiaowen and asked for her comments. As a designer I felt she would have a good take on the layout and viewing of the work. We began by taking out yet another obstacle, a large wooden table with chair, placed directly inside the front door. If walking by outside this is what you would see as being in the gallery. We wanted there to be a direct
connection between the people passing by and the artwork. This also allowed for all the pedestals and work to be pulled forward allowing more space between groupings. Xiaowen reviewed the galleries translation of my English titles into Chinese while I moved pedestals. It was amazing how this helped perceive the space and my sculpture. We were both quite pleased with the results and gave the okay for the gallery to begin lighting the pieces. We spent another hour or so directing the lighting, attempting to get the work with a balance from all angles. I have not set up such a large exhibition for a few years and forgot how much work it was and how detail oriented you must be to make everything look good. We ended this day and I said I would return the next day to discuss pricing.
Friday, June 10th…..day of the exhibitions opening reception. I went back to the gallery with Xiaowen and Liqiang to discuss pricing with the gallery. This was very difficult for me for China prices for art are not equitable with U.S. pricing. Much higher! I had been receiving a mixed bag of suggestions from my Chinese artist friends.
The first decision is whether I expected to sell anything or not. If not, I could put any high price I wished. I never thought much about selling work through this exhibition. I knew I wanted to present the work to the Jingdezhen audience and as an educator letting the Chinese students experience my work was crucial. I never thought there would be a possibility of selling for the abstract work is difficult for a U.S. audience and even more so here in “traditional Jingdezhen” China. I guessed if anything the funky teapots would appeal to the audience here for they were the only pieces anyone responded to while in the studio at Sanbao. I was hoping for some opinion from the gallery director Yu Guong jun, but again was met with mostly silence as he waited for my prices. One of the things I learned was artists will price two or three of what they feel are their best pieces really, really high to exhibit their intrinsic value to others. It is like the philosophy in Jinan with pretending the stay at the five star hotel to convince others I was important. I was a bit uncomfortable with this
technique but not expecting to sell the stoneware sculpture I went along with Xiaowen and Liqiangs suggestion. We priced a large piece that I like very much at 98,000 yuan ($14,411)….CRAZY HIGH! We then priced “History Lesson” for which is the piece I am most interested in at 89,000 ($13,088) and one other at 79,000 ($11,617). These pieces would be priced at between $2,500 and $3,000 in a U.S. gallery. Mr. Kim, my Korean artist friend, thought I should price one piece at 1,000,000 yuan ($147,058). His pricing opinion was definitely the highest of anyone I spoke with and did not invite him this day for the prices he was suggesting were too wacky! I did find out that for exhibitions there is no price negotiation in the gallery if someone is interested. In their sales shop you can haggle. This was good to know and I can negotiate pricing directly with someone if I choose. We set a range of prices with the coil-made stoneware sculpture the highest and slipcast pieces lower being slightly higher then a U.S. price. The tiles I priced the lowest at 1600 yuan ($235) hoping to sell one in hopes of not having to
give up any other pieces to the gallery. The pricing seems a like playing Monopoly with pretend money. Trying to make conversions between currencies is also difficult. Finally decided to just go with the pricing we set not expecting to sell anything in Jingdezhen.
I ate dinner at Sanbao where Mr. Kim surprised me by driving out for the meal. We loaded up a couple vehicles with the Sanbao crew at 7:00 to drive in for the opening. On the way I told Mr. Kim I wanted to stop for a roll of firecrackers to celebrate the opening. I bought a roll about fifteen inches wide for 50 yuan ($7.35) and he bought two roles. We drove up to the gallery around 7:30 with many people already in the gallery. The passive gallery director kept waiting for me to do something. He was in charge of the opening remarks, which I found out he passed onto a young woman who knew a little English. She asked if we should begin then read a page long text in Chinese. I understood hello, my name and Sanbao. This was never translated into Chinese. I was then given the microphone to make
Gallery representative introducing me
Had no idea what she said but I am sure it was all goodmy remarks. Xiaowen was asked to come up and translate. I kept it short and simple for her to say. I laughed to myself when I thought of remarks I was asked to make at the donation of a sculpture to a cultural house in Santiago de Cuba a few years ago. A woman from Brazil who knew English was asked to translate. I said a couple lines and looked to her to translate. She then proceeded to repeat what I said…in English! Everyone laughed.
As I finished my remarks with please enjoy the exhibition the crowd applauded and someone lit the three strings of firecrackers. Unbelievable reverberation of ear splitting noise throughout the street and gallery. The gallery front was showered with tiny red paper bits. We all went back inside and the gallery served glasses of beer and wine with fruit at their tea bar. I spent the next hour and a half greeting friends and speaking with many students. It all passed rather quickly. I got to see my friend Baixu and the young woman Chenqin from the airline ticket office. I had spent the afternoon going around town handing out postcard invitations to those I
have met over the years. The woman from the brush maker shop attended with her blind daughter, the glaze shop lady and son and others I knew from the Pottery workshop. They also had an opening this night of a young Chinese artist who was given a one-year residency and exhibition. He stopped by at the end of the night to see my show and say hello. I did not have a chance to see his show until the next morning…..high school level, kitschy birds. After six years of going to Jingdezhen I am still waiting to see a young Chinese artist that is making interesting work with an investigation. My gallery told me they would contact the press about my show but did not and I found out his show had the television coverage. Very sad!
I had the most fun talking to the many students attending. The white earthenware tiles I brought from my Minnesota studio were by far the most asked about. I imprint ginkgo leaves, design with the Jingdezhen underglaze decals then glaze with luscious tinted glazes. Not being porcelain allowed me to use glazes they had never seen before. I explained maybe five different
times to different groups of students. Many of the students also used the opportunity to practice their English. Amusingly one student described a particular piece to me as her favorite and wanted to know more about it. I could not understand her description so asked her to show the piece to me. She proceeded to take me to the back of the gallery and a Chinese artists work. I had to kindly explain that this was not my work and I could not tell her anything about it. This happened a second time with a piece in the side gallery.
One student approached me with several questions and had a sense of urgency and almost anger in his voice. He wanted to know “my idea” behind two or three pieces. He then hesitantly said that the pieces had a big problem and were not perfect. Asking him to explain he did not think the Chinese imagery agreed with the forms I had made and what did I think. I told him I respected his opinion and that I am using the imagery after traveling to China for six years and as a cultural marker or record of China. I
do not think he understood my remark but followed with, “Do you not want to make perfect work?” I told him no. My work is about nature and randomness. From a art maker standpoint I shared with him a remark I tell my students that artists live in a strange psychological duality of striving for perfection but not really wanting to achieve it. If we ever created the “perfect” piece we would cease to be an artist for you could never top it. Creating is a journey with the path being more important then the destination. The student looked at me again for a moment then walked away. Stupid foreigner!!!
At 9:00 the gallery had emptied and the rest of the Sanbao crew talked about returning the Sanboa. I said it was too early and I wanted to go out for ice cream to celebrate. They said it was my night so we called Qishifu and he came to pick us up and go to the local coffee shop across the street from the university. He joined us for ice cream and chatting. I had a mango-flavored smoothie, others melon flavored shaved ice or fanciful ice cream scoops served
with spears of fruit and cookies. We had a good time chatting, laughing and taking silly photographs. I told Qishifu I was nervous that he would have sold all my work from his home and I would have nothing to show this summer! Then back to Sanbao where I was pretty worn out from the long day and all the excitement. In all it was a fun day, exciting to open the exhibition. Wendy Li, director of Sanbao, had to go to Beijing for a meeting the day before so could not attend and Jackson Li is traveling in Italy. I did wish I could have shared the event with them. They could have also used their connections to bring more dignitaries and officials to the opening. I found the gallery really did nothing more then put up posters and rely on the Friday night lecture crowd from the Pottery workshop. A reporter from Jingdezhen television I had met at Sanbao last summer came to the opening late. She reintroduced herself and said she did not know I was having an exhibition. I had emailed her a month ago telling her that I was returning and having the show and
again three days ago with an invitation to the opening. She said she received nothing. We exchanged numbers and she said she wanted to interview me and do a piece about the show. I hope this takes place.
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Janeen Whitchurch
non-member comment
Congratulations!!
Gary, Your description of the arduous process of setting up your show makes me tired just reading it!! It looks like a lovely gallery, and perhaps some rich Chinese businessman decides to buy a piece at the super-outrageous-price and you can create art in leisure for the next 5 years!!! Be well, keep creating, and enjoy your new notoriety!!