Creating Despite Corona: What Does the Artworld Look Like Now?
Graphic by Rosie Shackleton
The Corona Pandemic has made increasing one’s cultural capital very difficult; galleries are off limits, museums too. No longer can we get slightly a-squiff on the free wine at vernissages nor get joyfully sweaty at concerts. The way we view and experience art, in whatever form that may be, has drastically altered. At the very start of the pandemic, I was working for an art collective in Germany and saw first-hand the rush to make exhibitions possible when the opportunities to be in a room with more than five people at a time was dwindling by the day. Since last March, there has been much frustration and worry about how the artworld will survive in a global crisis where to physically experience art is no longer possible.
I asked a series of creatives; from musicians, to sculptors, painters and curators how the pandemic has affected their practice and what this could mean for the future of the arts. Amongst their responses there was an all too familiar feeling of frustration and lack of motivation. But all was not doom and gloom! Everyone I spoke too had, in their own way, adapted to the pandemic circumstances and had somehow managed to keep at it. The purpose of this article is to show creatives doing what they do best: creating! Although disrupting the artworld, Corona has not killed it off. The people and grass-roots initiatives I will talk about in this short article show this. Art is being produced and viewed in new ways. The artworld is still alive and artists are still creating despite Corona.
Who Even Am I by BeeIllustrates
Image Credit @ BeeIllustrates
Negotiating Frustrations
Like many of us, me included, the pandemic has disrupted workflow and motivation, and made leaving our bedrooms a rare occasion. For many artists, the past year has meant cancellations of exhibitions and inability to access vital materials and workspaces. Each artist has also reacted differently. Vroni Holzmann, a German-Scottish artist, photographer and poet responded to my questions with the enigmatic “naja, wir sitzen jetzt halt alle drinnen rum” or “well, we’re all sat around inside” (Aren’t we all!). For Anna-Louise Lambie an artist and arts educator, the start of the pandemic meant “an immediate full stop” for her work. And for Bee Illustrates, an artist and illustrator currently studying at Edinburgh College of Art (ECA) this disruption meant a mixture of “stopping and starting projects a lot, revisiting and reworking old ideas, and being more experimental with composition and colour”. For many art students in particular, the pandemic restrictions have been a double-edged sword. Locked studio spaces, normally provided by the University, mean not only are there restrictions on material and space to create, but this is coupled with the pressure to complete university education based on their artistic output. For the students I talked to from ECA there was a feeling of being let down by the University. Many students are left with bedroom floors, kitchen tables or writing desks as their only workspace; essentially being denied what Imogen Luczyc-Wyhowska, artist and ECA master’s student, described as “the bedrock for many creative people”. For cohorts of students there is a lack of the normal comradery of ‘studio culture’, being unable to see each other’s work first-hand, share ideas and plan in-person exhibitions. Musician Charles Ormrod summed the situation up perfectly in his response: “Artists are all responding to the pandemic quite differently, depending on their optimism, motivation, attitude to risk and (sometimes rather sadly) financial security”. But what does this all mean for the artworld in general? How have artists coped under the current climate? And is there still a future for the arts? My answer: yes!
The Artist Adapts
Despite these varying responses, one thing remained consistent; the ability to adapt. There has been a drastic shift in how art is being performed, curated and created, and artists are rising to the challenge. Charles Ormrod, along with playwright Pieter Egriega, had to drastically alter plans for their collaborative play Mr. Different. As a trip to the theatre is decidedly off-limits Pieter and Charles adapted Mr. Different for online viewing, creating an immersive piece of digital theatre filmed from the audience’s perspective. Sound design is kept “raw”, aiming to keep the authenticity of performing live music for an audience. Charles himself has also adapted his solo work to the current Corona climate. Using a green screen to create a completely black background and highlighting piano keys he aims to create the atmosphere of an authentic gig online, steering away from what he describes as the “set up an iPhone in your living room concerts”. His “studio” as he refers to it, is now made up of only a synthesizer, amp, microphone, sound card, laptop and camera; all lightweight and battery powered meaning, when we’re all allowed out the house again, he can theoretically take his ‘Studio’ anywhere he wishes.
Figure 1 Imogen Luczyc-Wyhowska, Peace Realm, 100-Water, oil,
Image credit @ Imogen Luczyc-Wyhowska
Subject matter has also altered since the start of the pandemic. Dani Rothmann, sculptor and master’s student at ECA, has seen a new focus on house-hold objects; for the exhibition ERROR 404 (see below) Dani made a steel plant potholder lovingly named ‘Angelina’. Her approach and process hasn’t necessarily been altered by lockdown, but it has led to a new focus and new manifestations of her work. The wonders of windows have also been immortalized multiple times since the start of the pandemic, and it’s easy to see why. When we’re not on our government-sanctioned daily walk, windows are normally the only link to outside world. Leipzig-based, American artist and painter, Elizabeth Gerdeman has focused on the motif of windows for years, but the pandemic has reinforced their symbolic quality. The window can now represent our longing to venture out into the world, our anxiety about what may happen if we leave our house, and the exchange between the outside world and the interior environment. Elizabeth understands the window as a perfect way to show how “our relationship to interior and exterior environments has been shaped in ways that we never imagined…”. Elizabeth wants to evoke the yearning we now feel for the outside world through the all-too-familiar motif of the windowpane.
Concept image for Casting Light, Throwing Shade, 2020 by Elizabeth Gerdemann
Image credit @ Elizabeth Gerdeman
Many other artists are exploring new ways to create given the restrictions to studio space and materials. Will Jack, a sculptor and master’s student at ECA, has become more experimental with his drawing, not having access to sculpting materials or studio space. He says that his drawing, stemming from “being desk-bound for nearly a year”, is now something liberating, helping to push his work in new directions. This venture into new materials is seen throughout the responses: Fiona Gray, a fellow ECA master’s student, is foremost a painter but has recently ventured into video and online composition: Hannah Grist, normally a sculptor, is now creating two-dimensional collage: Anna-Lou NAME has even begun creating and communicating her work over YouTube. Unavailability of standard or desired materials or space to create has sent many artists into to completely new directions, changing their artwork. Despite these changes being made under the duress of restrictions, this ubiquitous ability to adapt bodes well for the future of the artworld. Creativity is fluid and the urge to create is defying lockdown restrictions.
A Virtual Vernissage
An extremely common feature of the Corona-artworld has been the switch to digital. The online art space has become what the now out of bounds galleries and museums used to be. Not only have many creatives begun to make digital art, but online exhibitions, Instagram take-overs and virtual rendering have all expanded the scope of the artworld. This digital dominion is also taking varying forms: Vroni Holzmann found the time in lockdown to upload her art online, to improve her website and social media presence which, she says, may have not happened otherwise. BeeIllustrates already had a strong online presence before the pandemic but they have seen a sharp uptake in online engagement with their work since lockdown, especially via Instagram. This increased exposure has not only allowed them to reach a wider audience but to pursue art full time!
The switch to the digital has not just been for the artist. The gallery-goer, concert-frequenter and the museum-mad have also ventured into the online art scene. This February I attended my first ever online exhibition, ERROR 404. The exhibition was organised by MAFA, a group of ECA master’s students whose degree show had been cancelled. The group created, curated and made open to the public a convincing and immersive online gallery experience. As a viewer, you’re invited to make an avatar and enter the exhibition through what they have called the ‘spawning point’. You emerge in a digital room in the centre of a digital exhibition space. You can chat to your fellow gallery viewer which created that background chatter reminiscent of an in-person-exhibition or vernissage. Using the keyboard, you can move your avatar around the space and even zoom into works such as Hannah Grist’s Dystopian Interior Landscapes, which then became a digital space or exhibition room all of their own. The viewer can peruse the gallery space as if in a real-life gallery. The creation and curation of the exhibition set new challenges for all involved. Digital rendering of art normally on paper or in bronze inherently changed the process of creating. Curators of the exhibition, Mia Takemoto and Will Jack were tasked firstly with having to create a digital space using the program ‘Spoke’. This process means the space can be specifically made and moulded to and for the art. The space fits the art, not the other way round.
Bird eye view of the digital exhibition ERROR 404 by MAFA
Image credit @ MAFA Team
The virtual exhibition was not made as a replacement for the in-person show but rather an ersatz-exhibit that allows artists to continue producing and showcasing work to a wide audience. The MAFA team are keen to get back to physical exhibitions as soon as possible. Viewing physical art in a physical space is a very particular experience that can’t be replaced by the online version. Nevertheless, the definition of what an ‘exhibition’ actually is, has changed since the dawn of the digital exhibition. Digital exhibitions can be accessed by a wider range of people all over the world, removing the barrier of in-situ, site-specific or international exhibits for those unable to travel, something especially important under current COVID-restrictions. There is scope, Will Jack says, for digital exhibitions to be ‘fresher’ an be “more personable and interactive than a real-life show”. The online performance space provides the opportunity to be perhaps more inclusive and accessible to the public than traditional exhibitions in established institutions or galleries. If or when things go back to normal, I hope the legacy and possibilities for online showing of art will make an impact on the artworld in general, providing a mixture of physical and digital resources that expand not only the audience’s experience but that of the artist. That being said, there’s a real sense that artist and audience alike, as Izzy Inskip, MAFA member and sculptor says, can’t wait to “make a mess again!”
The Artworld As It Is Now
Will Jack, ‘Untitled’, Polished bronze, 40cm x 25cm x 25cm
Image credit @ Will Jack
Over the past year, all the artists I have spoken to have had to deal with the immense pressure to create despite Corona. The artworld as we knew it has been proved non-COVID-proof and many traditional and well-loved pastimes such as trips to the museum, saving up for concert tickets or returning 5 or 6 times to that art exhibition where you want to see that painting again. In some ways, the artworld ended up catching Corona. But there are signs of a cure in the form of the adaptability of creatives to continue to push through creative (and COVID) barriers and continue to make their art, to display it in COVID-friendly ways and redefine what the artworld can be; it is flexible and will adapt. All the people who responded to my questions have, despite all odds, managed to continue to create, altering their methods, tools and ideas of what art or exhibitions are traditionally seen to be. Although much frustration, there is a real sense that the artworld can and is coming out of the other side of this pandemic. When restrictions ease and galleries, music venues and museums are open again, the possibilities created and explored online and outside of traditional art-spaces will make the artworld more accessible to a wider range of people. The artworld isn’t dying, it is adapting!
Written by Rosie Shackleton
I would like to thank all the creatives that answered my questions about their practice. Below please find a full list of all the people who talked to me, their websites and social media so you can follow, support them!
BeeIllustrates:
Elizabeth Gerdeman:
Vroni Holzmann:
Charles Ormrod:
Website | YouTube | Patreon | For more info on Mr. Different
Pieter Egriega:
Ann-Lou Lambie:
Mel Cooper:
MAFA: Master’s Students at Edinburgh College of Art (ECA)
Exhibition Catalogue for ERROR 404 | Exhibition Video on Youtube
The ERROR 404 Team:
Hannah Grist:
Imogen Luczyc-Wyhowska:
Will Jack:
Mia Takemoto:
Dani Rothmann:
Izzy Inskip:
Fiona Gray:
Ophelie Napoli:
Isabel Duffy:
Emma Lake:
Olivia Jo:
Rhiannon Ferguson:
Frances Driscoll:
Amelia Morgan:
Mizra Kara: