{"id":7622,"date":"2022-06-27T16:28:24","date_gmt":"2022-06-27T06:28:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/yumcreative.yumstudio.com.au\/?p=7622"},"modified":"2022-06-27T16:39:45","modified_gmt":"2022-06-27T06:39:45","slug":"the-artist-needs-a-wife","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/yumcreative.yumstudio.com.au\/the-artist-needs-a-wife\/","title":{"rendered":"The artist needs a wife"},"content":{"rendered":"
PN: Sarcasm ahead.<\/em><\/pre>\n
You know the type. Easy to take for granted. Not often acknowledged. Nor often paid. Does the heavy lifting. Allows the artist to simply do the work. The collective name is ‘wife’, as in wives of artists, also artists’ wife, note the possessive apostrophe.<\/p>\n
What does wife do? They document, record, sort, pile, clean, fold, talk about, agent, share, herald, administrate, hold, provide, pick up, laud, pick up the pieces etc. Ultimately wives believe so much in the artist, the artists’ dreams become the wife’s.<\/p>\n
The real trick it seems is finding one. I know a few, all women, they are wife to artists, all men. But knowing them is not enough to have. Is it any wonder men rule the art world when wives are involved?<\/p>\n
I had a conversation with a well known artist. Let’s call her Betty. For the record, she has no wife.<\/p>\n
Betty and I talked about the lack of space in her studio and what might happen to her works once she died. She said they’d end up down the tip. Unperturbed, she continued “what use are they once I’m gone”. But artist men don’t think like that. They know the world needs their work, their ideas and statements. And the world does. But without the work of artist women and artist feminist and artist queer and artist trans then its a much lesser world.<\/p>\n
If Betty had a wife then she might already have a published monograph, or at least an up to date catalogue. She might have her works in quality storage and galleries might be clambering for her works, because now they know about her. She might have exhibitions, showreels, a website and an extensive documented CV. She may be able to put her hands on a list of her works and their provenance, collections she is in or a data file of literature about her.<\/p>\n
But she doesn’t have a wife. Therefore she has only a few of these things, in different places, in various versions, and an idea that one day she might have the time to get her act together. She might start on dealing with passwords. At her age she’s forgotten more passwords than you’ve had hot toddies*.<\/p>\n
Recently I attended a workshop about the creation of an artist legacy. For when you disappear, as we all will. A lot of the examples given were of artists male. Artists female work deserves preservation. The only problem is we have to do it without wives a lot of us. So here’s what I learnt that might help you. Its brief as people without wives don’t have time to read!<\/p>\n
    \n
  1. Catalogue everything, and include its provenance (where its been, who has owned it etc)<\/li>\n
  2. Create a will! Clearly state where you want your work to go. You can also nominate the tip – surely some of your work belongs here, don’t save everything!\n