The Midland Junction Studios

Go and See this Film!

Exit through the gift shop is one of the best films I have seen in a long time. I left the film inspired by the works of Banksy, I was ready to become a street artist. until I read the notices plastered around the Luna Leederville cinema stating that the film does not endorse tagging in Leederville. The film must of made a big impact on a number of viewers, seeing a spike in graffiti in the area or maybe it was a case of sparking some alarm in a conservative local member.

 Anyway just to give you the gist of the story if you haven’t already seen it. Exit through the gift shop tells the story of how an eccentric French shop keeper and amateur film maker spent about 10 years of his life recording street artists undertake there somewhat temporary works. The films served a great purpose in documenting many well renowned street artists works, like Banksy and Shephard Fairey. During the film things take a turn and the relatively uncreative filmer decideds to turn his hand to art. As a result many spectacular outcomes occur and the French film maker becomes famous over night.

 The film leaves an artist like myself questioning how popular endorsement and media attention can lead to artist success. It basically outlines that you don’t necessarily need a lot of artistic creativity and skill to become popular artist. Basically it comes down to who you know and who can endorse your work.

 Anyway, I found the film very thought provoking and would recommend anyone reading this blog to go out and watch the film for yourself.

Back to REMIDA

I went into REMIDA last Thursday and was reminded of what a fantastic place it was. REMIDA is a non-for profit organisation that collects industrial Waste for creative re-use. I stopped going for a little as I had a bad habit of loading up the car with lots of inspiring materials and then when I got back to the studio I had no space to store all of these treasures. The Bath that was used for material storage at the studio was bulging. The temporary loft above the garage was spewing with plastic PET strapping. So it was time to take a break from REMIDA.

 Anyway, I took a trip back to REMIDA, I was on a mission to find about 4 meters of framing to finish off ‘Progression’ a neoprene acoustic paneling piece I have been working on. Anyway, I found a gem piece of picture framing just the right colour, and not too ornate, it will work really well with finish off the piece.

 As well as this I met up with all the enthusiastic staff at REMIDA. They are always interested in the projects their visitors are cooking up and if you get on the right side of Max he will show the sneaky storage space for any large size or excess materials.

Artists Rights

Working in the arts in Western Australia means you are in a pretty tight social group . Sometimes when you get screwed over for your work, with things like delayed payments, lack of payment or stolen ideas. There is an urge to let stuff like this slide to prevent rocking the arts boat. Being such a small scene you fear that you will burn your bridges for future work or will tarnish your reputation. 

However, I would suggest  that any artist who is mistreated in anyway, should attempt to go public in an attempt to protect artists rights. To me this story in the West was a bit risky, but from the article half of the subsidy has been paid out and it has given the public a bit of an inside story on exhibiting in Sculpture by the Sea.