I must admit, that it feels nice to wake up on a Monday morning and see that your work are featured amongst other great artist in a respectable magazine in South Africa!
Thank you House and Leisure….
http://www.houseandleisure.co.za/decor/textile-artists-in-sa/
Wishing you all a leisurely week ahead!
hannalie taute 
I’d like to ask a question regarding copyright. A magazine like House and Garden would want one to ask permission to use any of its material published in whatever way, right? Shouldn’t it be the same with using an artist’s work in their publications? The train of thought more or less runs along the lines of your work is prized, well known and using it aids in selling the magazine. And shouldn’t you as the artist get paid some kind of royalty for having your work published? I seem to remember seeing something like that on the Dalro website, the people that assists artists and writers and so on with copyright of their work. http://www.dalro.co.za
I’d be interested to know what you think.
I read the article in the House and Leisure and see they provided a link back to your site. It seems they interviewed you first as well. So … But still the issue of being paid some kind of royalty for using your work, and of course the other artists featured as well, should be an issue. The idea of providing exposure to the artist is no longer good enough. Heaven knows artists have little enough control over their work once it leaves the studio, having been bought. Unlike musicians or writers, if an artwork gets resold at three times the price it was bought for, time and again, the artist doesn’t see a penny of that money.
Hi Petru, thank you for your questions and concern. House and Leisure did indeed interview me and ask permission to publish images of my work. I was surprised this morning when a friend emailed me the link, because I wasn’t sure if/when the article will be published.
As for the payment, well I don’t have all the answers, but I suppose that if I wrote and article for them or if they asked me to draw or make an artwork specifically for an article, or if those images can be re-printed to be sold as ‘artworks’ then I think that payment should be in order, but in this case…
I’d like to quote the artist Grayson Perry from his book: “Playing to the gallery” : “I do think that you’ve got to take every opportunity as a young artist or a designer. If somebody offers you some little exhibition or a small part in a group show or any tiny opportunity, you take it. You take it because you never know. Every artist you know who’s successful will probably trace their career back to some small event that was fairly insignificant, but that event led them to meet someone, and so on and so on…”
If that’s they way you feel about it, then it is, of course, okay. All they ‘tiny’ bits of exposure in the quote by Perry is what should rankle though. An artist with your profile should no longer be ‘grateful’ of ‘tiny’ opportunities but of a publication spanning the entire oevre of your work so far.
Thanks for the compliment Petru! Maybe it all boils down to validation…?
Here I would like to quote Perry again, because his words is still fresh in my mind:
“Validation is the key point to understanding how some art is regarded as better than other art – at least within a large part of the art world, including most museums and galleries and roundabouts. The key to validation is to understand who is doing the validating, who is bestowing their good opinion, their money, their attention and time, who is giving value to certain artists and works of art. The cast of characters in this drama is large: artists, collectors, teachers, dealers, critics, curators, the media, oh, and even maybe the public.”
I appreciate it to be mentioned in an article that features artists that have been invited to Biennales etc. I don’t know if the galleries that represent them answers on their behalf or get monetary rewards from an article like this?
So yes, ultimately I must start validating myself: it would be really nice to have a whole publication dedicated to my art…
thanks for your validation! xxx
It was a good article and, indeed, the other artists mentioned are well-known too. Love Nicholas Nhlobo’s work too, always have. It’s just that this whole principle artists live by, of hope, for more exposure, seem a bit old fashioned. I’ll read Perry. Go from strength to strength. (tussen hakies, op jou blog gelees van die stink Afrikanertjie was psigiese drome kan oproep as mens dit onder mens se kussing sit. Dit gedoen en gedroom en dit het regtig waar geword!) 🙂
I hope you enjoy Grayson Perry’s book too. I like it because it is written from another artists perspective. It is based on his Reith lectures which I found on Youtube. I liked it so much that ordered the book :-p
Wow! Ek kry sommer hoendervleis toe ek lees van jou Stink Afrikaner ervaring! Dit wil voorkom of dit darem n goeie droom was. ❤
Darem. My dinges gered.:-)
You asked a while ago about whether you should have a website – I see Majak Bredell is on art.co.za. Else WordPress does a dot com thing for a bit of money. Not sure if art.co.za is free or not.
Thanks for the feedback! Het nogals vandag terwyl ek op WordPress werk daarna gekyk…sal ook bietjie loer na die ander opsie wat jy noem.
Die ‘website’ gedeelte van my ‘studio-practise’ kort defnitief aandag. Sal een of ander tyd, tyd moet afknyp daarvoor. x