During the week that the mini exhibition was up I had a crit session, in which I received feedback from both a tutor and my peers surrounding the presentation of my exhibition piece. I found this session incredibly valuable, not just with relevance to my own work but also to my peers work, as there were a number of issues which arose through the critiquing of the mini exhibitions. The issues brought up were key to note, especially for the curation of the degree show.
Issues relevant to everyone were trivial but important things like everyone having the same font, sizes etc on the information cards next to the work. Also the way in which foam board was used was an issue. After critiquing the use of foam board we found that if the board is cut correctly then it can look professional, however, if cut incorrectly then the viewers attention is taken away from the work and to the imperfections in the presentation of the work.
The mini exhibition was a chance for myself to critically reflect upon the way in which I present my own work, a chance to analyse and improve upon my presentation skills ready for the degree show. What I found valuable from the crit session following the setting up of the exhibition was not only tutor feedback, but peer feedback. The different viewpoints have enabled me to view my practice from different perspectives. The feedback I was given in terms of presentation was generally quite good, however the fact that I had used a plinth did raise some issues. It was suggested to me that a plinth is quite a masculine object and the way I had placed my work vertically upon the plinth suggested masculinity and represented the male genitals. I found this viewpoint quite interesting, however most of my peers argued that just because the work was placed on a plinth it wasn't suggestive of male genitals.
After debate surrounding this issue, it arose that the issue occurred in my statement rather than the presentation of the work itself. The context I had written about in the statement referred to a gender divide and feminist issues, therefore the connotations surrounding gender were automatically assigned to the work. Therefore what I found important here was to either keep the statement away from the work, and let the viewer proceed to view the work prior to reading the statement, or to manipulate the statement I have at present. I have realised that the statement and also information labels can impact greatly upon the reception of the work, therefore this is something I will be conscious about for my degree show.
In terms of my work, the reception of it was one of shock, not in a bad way, but in the sense that my peers had not seen work like it before. When they realised that the structure/painting/craft was knitted out of paint their reactions were all I needed to realise that my practice is innovative and blurring the boundaries of what can be classified as high art or craft.
